Elva Hsiao / 我愛我

One of the hottest new releases of late last year / early this year that’s absolutely addicting - C-Pop star Elva Hsiao’s ”Wo Ai Wo” (“I Love Me”). Another case of “if it were in English everyone would love it”. In fact it doesn’t sound very far off from where the American charts are heading at the moment. Super dancey and ultra-lightweight, this flies by in a breeze. All the vocal distortions in the chorus are right on trend, if not slightly ahead of it. Watch for that to get big when Rihanna finally unleashes “Where Have You Been” this summer (hopefully). That one sounds like the vocals have been put through a shredder. 

I really like that effect though. When you hear the chorus you’ll know what I’m talking about. It makes the vocals a part of the production - “I know you want me-e-e-e-e-e-e”. Of course this is nothing new, but like everything it’s come back around again now.

Unrelated but related - one of my musical / blogging goals this 2012 is to keep a better track on C-Pop / Mandopop. There’s so much good music in China these days it’s ridiculous. Possibly even more than Korea or Japan right now, it’s just a lot harder to keep up with. I can’t seem to find many places that cover Chinese music to the extent I really want. Any suggestions would be welcome!