About This Site
Each month I select 20 songs (10 songs twice a month) that I am either hooked on or am curious about. Most of the music I select are rock, hip-hop, R&B and pop songs.
My song selection comes from 20-30 CDs I get from various sources each month, as well as recommendations from iTunes and Amazon. I also check out the charts in US, UK and Japan.
Akon’s second album, Konvicted, has already generated several top 10 hits, including “Smack That” featuring Eminem and “I Wanna Love You” featuring Snoop Dogg. For the third single, he chooses a much slower paced song that could become a good summer chill out song.
Avril Lavigne decided to sing her latest single in multiple languages. The verses are still in English, but she does her best to sing the chorus in different languages. And each of these songs were released separately. I don’t know if there was anyone that was suckered into buying all the different versions, but I was too curious to hear her sing in Japanese, so I ended up getting this version. She also sings in French, German, Italian, Mandarin, Portuguese and Spanish. When asked in an interview if she had a difficult time recording in Japanese, she noted that Japanese was easy, but Chinese was the most difficult. But on this Japanese version, I can only understand every other sentence (and there are only 8 lines).
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I am completely hooked on this band, The Fratellis, from Glasgow, Scottland. This song is probably well known to others for appearing on the latest iPod commercial. It’s a kind of song where you want to be in a pub (not a bar, but a pub) and have a big pint of beer in one hand and have your other arm on your mate’s (not a friend, but a mate) shoulder, and sing, “pah la pah pah la la la, pah la pah pah la la la”.
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This is the first single from The Fratellis. It was released in the UK, June of last year. UK’s popular music magazine, NME labeled them as “the best new band in Britian.” Their band name supposedly comes from the movie, The Goonies. The band guys in the film were named Fratellis. Each members take that last name for stage names as, Jon Fratelli (vocals/guitar), Mince Fratelli (drums), and Barry Fratelli (bass)
I liked Good Charlotte’s second album, “The Young And the Hopeless” which had big hits like “Lifestyles of the Rich & Famous” and “The Anthem” both of them got a lot plays on the radio and at clubs. This first single off of their fourth album, Good Morning Revival, features Avenged Sevenfold’s lead singer, M. Shadows and the guitarist. But the Madden brothers sound whiney on this song. Hopefully their other singles would be better.
“Dig” is Incubus’ second single from their sixth album, Light Grenades. The album was released in late November of 2006. Incubus decided to hold a contest to see if their fans could come up with a cool music video for the song. One fan created a video using animation, and won the voting by other fans for the official video.
Even though this is Joss Stone’s third album, it is titled as she is debuting (titled, Introducing Joss Stone). Now that she is 20 years old, she wants the world to know who she is via these songs (she claimed that her first two albums were made for the record label). I’ve always been a big fan of her more-mature-and-soulful-than-her-age voice, and on this song she mixes classic soul sound with modern beat.
This is Justin’s third single from his hit album, FutureSex/LoveSounds, and third consecutive #1 single on Billboard chart. This song reminds me of “Cry Me A River” from his previous album. Justin Timberlake performed this song live at the Grammy’s last month.
UK rock band, Kaiser Chiefs may not be that popular in the US just yet, but hopefully this single would spread a little more airwave love. “Ruby” is the first single from their second album, Yours Truly, Angry Mob. This song is already a huge hit in the UK (#1 single) but I haven’t heard it yet in the US. It is a bit slower than their big hit, “I Predict A Riot” but still very enjoyable.
The vocalist of The Killers, Brandon Flowers has said that this is the best song he’s ever written. I think it’s a decent song, but personally it lacks the impact “Somebody Told Me” had. Their second album, Sam’s Town doesn’t seem to be as big of a hit as their debut album, Hot Fuss, so far. This maybe their sophomore slump album.
“This is why, this is why, this is why I’m hot.” These words are addictive and stays in your head. Mims delivery as a rapper isn’t that great, but I like how he sampled Kanye West’s “Jesus Walks” and Dr. Dre’s “Nuthin’ But A G Thang” in the song. Surprisingly this became a #1 song on Billboard chart this month.
Trent Reznor, aka Nine Inch Nails’ sixth studio album, Year Zero, will be coming out next month, but until then we get to enjoy the lead off single, Survivalism. I am actually not a Nine Inch Nails fan as I don’t particularly enjoy this “industrial” sounding songs, but somehow I catch myself humming their songs after hearing it on the radio. Maybe my dark-side enjoys this kind of music.
Papa Roach’s fourth album, The Paramour Sessions, was recorded at the Paramour Mansion while they also lived there for half a year. “Forever” is the second single from this album, and it is slower paced rock song similar to “Scars” from their previous album.
If you are a hip-hop fan, you may know Redman’s association with Method Man. If you are a pop fan, you may know him as the rapper on Christina Aguilera’s hit single, “Dirrty.” For his 6th album, Redman gets help from ace producers such as Scott Storch, Pete Rock and Timbaland, who produced this track.
Rich Boy is a former engineering student that dropped out of school to concentrate on rapping. “Throw Some D’s” turned out to be a big hit for the young rapper, and bunch of high profile rappers joined in for the remix. By the way, “D” on this song refers to “Dubs” which is a certain kind of rims for the car. It’s been a while since I heard anything from Murphy Lee, I wonder what he’s up to nowadays.
After producing mega-hot albums for Nelly Furtado (Loose) and Justin Timberlake (Futuresex/Lovesounds), Timbaland asks them to return a favor by singing on this track for his solo album. Contrary to the hits he produced for those two artists, this track sounds a little too complicated. There is too much going on (more than usual Timbaland), and verses by Furtado and Timberlake aren’t catchy enough. Hopefully other tracks on the album will be more catchy and club friendly.
I picked up their CD earlier this year, and really liked the song, “In the Clouds.” I was going through some of the free singles I downloaded from iTunes and came across this song. This song has a bit of BeeGee’s 70s disco feel with the high falsetto singing and the violin.
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Yoshida Brothers are real life brothers that play awesome shamisen. Shamisen is a traditional Japanese guitar (some even say “Japanese banjo”). Traditionally shamisen is used to play more slow mellow songs, but Yoshida Brothers have taken old and boring sound to new heights. Just catch them on YouTube. You will be amazed.
G-Unit member, Young Buck is back with a new album. His second album, Buck the World is produced by famous producers such as Lil Jon, Jazze Pah, Eminem and Dr. Dre. He even has some surprise featured guests on the album, including Chester Bennington of Linkin Park. This track, “Get Buck” was produced by Polow da Don.
Atlanta rapper, Young Jeezy released his second album, The Inspiration a few months ago. The lead off single, “I Luv It” was a tight track that found some charting success. The second single, “Go Getta” features R. Kelly and was produced by The Runners (most famous for producing Rick Ross’ “Hustlin’”)
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