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.
50 Cent has been meaning to release his Before I Self Destruct album for close to a year now. There may be a lot of reason for the delay, but for an artist that has always sold more than 500,000 copies during the first week of sale, this fourth album is a disappointment, selling less than 160,000 copies. 50 calmly explained that it’s because his album leaked online weeks before the official release. That may have dented some number, but considering that he hasn’t had a top 10 single in several years, 50 Cent may not be as hot as he thinks he is anymore. Recently he began picking on Jay-Z to give himself more attention, but so far Jay-Z hasn’t fired back.
Local rock radio station was having a discussion about who was the biggest American rock band. Rolling Stones are British, U2 are Irish and Bruce Springsteen is more commonly known as a solo artist (even though he travels as a band). So that leaves Bon Jovi and Aerosmith. This discussion can get to the heated level, but give Bon Jovi where the credit is due. The Circle is their eleventh album, and they have been around for 25 years now. The lead off single, “We Weren’t Born to Follow” is nothing unique as it sounds like most of their other songs, but it is definitely Bon Jovi.
Florence + The Machine is lead by singer, Florence Welch. This British indie band released their debut album, Lungs, in summer of 2009 and peaked at #2. She reminds me quite a bit of Sandi Thom (whatever happened to her?) and a bit of PJ Harvey and Jenny Lewis mixed together. A lot of her songs has harp instrument in it, which gives her music interesting sound.
Indian British R&B singer, Jay Sean had a big hit a couple of month ago with “
Down” featuring Lil Wayne. With his US debut album being released, he is dropping his second single, “Do You Remember” featuring Sean Paul & Lil Jon. It has Lil Jon’s signature shouting, and Sean Paul’s incomprehensible verses. How could you not like this song?
Lady GaGa seems to be everywhere nowadays. And I seem to be selecting every single one of her singles so far. It’s not that I’m a huge fan, but when all of her songs are becoming global phenomenon, I feel like I need to pay some attention to her songs. With a huge success of her debut album, she is re-releasing it by adding 8 new songs. One of them, “Bad Romance” is already climbing up the chart.
British pop star, Leona Lewis recently released her second album titled Echo. The lead off single, “Happy” is doing ok on the chart, but both the single and the album isn’t doing as well as her debut album, Spirit. “Happy” has been featured on the movie trailer of Precious, quite effectively, even though the track isn’t on the official soundtrack. “Happy” was produced by OneRepublic’s Ryan Tedder (who also participated on her big hit, “Bleeding Love”).
Despite the heavy promotion Rihanna had been doing for her fourth studio album, Rated R, by talking about her incident with Chris Brown from almost a year ago, the first week sale was not that impressive. Her first single, “
Russian Roulette” did well upon its debut, but it is steadily climbing down on the chart. For the second single, Rihanna is releasing more hip-hop song, featuring Young Jeezy. It’s a pretty good track, produced by the team that brought us the monster hit, “
Umbrella” but this one lacks the catchiness.
Shakira’s latest single, “Give It Up To Me” was produced by Timbaland, and initially it was to go on Timbaland’s album, but instead went to Shakira’s third English album. The music definitely has Timbaland signature on it. The track also features Lil Wayne.
A lot of the hardcore Weezer fans are upset with their new album, Raditude, complaining that they are not as clever anymore. I personally think they are as clever and fun as ever. For the seventh album, Rivers Cuomo collaborated with many artists, including hip-hop producer, Jermaine Dupri. Dupri admitted that he had been a Weezer fan ever since, “Buddy Holly” and after he had written this song called, “Can’t Stop Partying” he thought it would be perfect for Weezer. And the demo tape got passed around and landed on the latest Weezer album. To make it even more interesting, busy rapper, Lil Wayne is featured on the track.
Other than being featured on Shakira’s “Hips Don’t Lie”, we haven’t heard much from Wyclef Jean recently. He has released a couple of solo projects here and there this past decade, but nothing has rivaled the success of his former group, The Fugees. His latest release comes in form of a mix-tape, and it is actually quite good. On the track, “Warrior’s Anthem”, Wyclef explains to his new younger audience who he is, and makes a point of clarifying that he is not will.i.am from the Black Eyed Peas. This track, featuring Cyndi Lauper is one of the slower tracks from the album, but Wyclef still shows that he is a good rapper.
Sixth season American Idol runner up, Blake Lewis was dropped from his label after a rather disappointing numbers the debut album, “ADD” has put out. After switching his label, Seattle native, Lewis switched music genre as well, and released his sophomore album, Heartbreak On Vinyl. The new album features more dance oriented songs. The first week sale was very disappointing (only selling 4000 on first week), but the lead off single, “Sad Song” is slowly catching on the Dance Chart.
Britney is releasing another Greatest Hits album. In 2004, she released Greatest Hits: My Prerogative, and five years and two albums later, she supposedly has more hits for another collection. This time, there is only one new song added, and that is “3” which instantly became a #1 hit upon its single release. It’s a typical Britney catchy dance pop number.
Embodying the rags-to-riches rap dream, Jay-Z pulled himself up by his bootstraps as a... 