(All pictures are taken from 8TV's Gallery)
(RT= Rough Translation)
Yes. It's that annual event I have been reviewing about the last year.
This year 8TV's Summer Live Concert or 夏日8度演唱会 had a line up of new singers and old...literally, old.
The Concert was held in Padang Besar, Ipoh which is an equivalent of Dataran Merdeka back here in KL.
So let me launch into reporting and reviewing the whole event. I watched the whole event broadcasted live on 8TV yesterday starting from 8.30 p.m.
This is only a fraction of 10,000 people
SLC had more than 10,000 participants and the theme this year was dancing, so the whole show was packed with dancing (modern dance), other than singing. Though you can say that all concerts are always packed with dancing, no?
Since the tickets are free, it's not difficult to see why is there so many people. Heck, if they have to pay they would still be there.
I'll skip the hosts' (Gary Yap, Dylan Liong and Cheryl Lee) and go straight to the performance.
I can say that this year's lineup is still quite starlicious. And the music arrangement is more balanced than last year.
The opening
First up was a combined performance by the 2007 绝对Superstar winners: Henley and Orange and 2006 winner Johnson Wee, Danny One, Kelly Song and Daniel Lee. It was just a starting bang to start the party spirit in all the concert goers. Yeah, there's dancing.
George Lam singing his rendition of songs...
Second up is Hong Kong veteran George Lam (林子祥) who started all the hype the fans were yelling about. He delivered three powerful songs where one is the famous Wong Fei-Hung song. His vocals are still solid though he did screamed a little too much when he can't reach the notes.
Then it was Taiwanese twin brother group 2moro which I haven't really had time to go and read up about them. I just know that they look good. Hahaha...that was so typical girl talk. Either they aren't popular enough or starlicious enough, they only sang two songs, which are 朋友出去走走 (RT: Friend, Let's Go And Walk) and 被骗了 (RT: Cheated). The younger one (in red) was charming the audience with his harmonica skills, they were charming the same with their guitar playing skills for the first song. At least they can sing as well as they play.
C'mon. They are good looking. No? The younger one is in red, elder one is in white. Next to them is Dylan, one of the three hosts.
Genie Zhuo
Third artist to appear is Genie Zhuo (卓文萱). She is also a Taiwanese actress, acting in shows like Love Queen (恋爱女王) and singing the theme songs. She sang one of her Love Queen theme song that is Super No. 1 which was a light-hearted, pop kinda stuff. Then she slowed down for 爱我好吗 (RT: Love Me) which ended with the beginning of another commercial break. This is what happens if you are not in the live setting. The commercial ended with a duet with Gary Cao Ge (曹格) with their famous lovey-dovey duet, Liang Shan Bo And Juliet (梁山伯与茱丽叶). Both of the artists held hand throughout the whole song. It is a love song after all.
Did you see the look on her face? So cute lah.
Gary's turn to sing now.
Since Gary is already on stage, obviously it would be his turn next. Gary's the Malaysian who writes songs for S.H.E, Aaron Kwok and even Piggy Show Luo (小猪/罗志祥）. He was also labeled as the artist, like David Tao and Jay Chou who are REAL artists. So Gary has his own charm on stage as a versatile singer. After the duet, he sang further 3 songs from his new album Superman: 背叛 (RT: Betrayal), 3-7-20-1 and title song Superman. I actually thought he went slightly out of tune as this is quite normal for live performances sometimes.
Gary's Taiwan-based, making him more popular than those who are 'stuck' here in Malaysia. Next in line was Malaysian Idol Season 2 WinnerDaniel Lee (李吉汉) who surprisingly, only delivered one song, 万年烽火 (RT: Devastation). Honestly, no offense to either Daniel or his fans, I find it a little limp. I mean, yes. Daniel has his gusto and all, but this song's a little heavy for his high voice. They even put him on an elevated platform (which was the lamest prop of the whole stage. It's like some square table that rises only about 5 feet ++. :S) which makes his small frame looks smaller. As I've said, no offense. :) But Daniel can somewhat act. Really.
The Malaysian Idol Season 2 Winner today. Can't find the picture with the elevated platform. Maybe he's standing on it in this pic.
After just delivering one song, 2006's 绝对Superstar winner Johnson Wee (黄俊源) delivered also another one song which was his famous I'll Be Good. Funny Des was not there this time round. No elevated platforms.
John throwing "love letters" to his fans.
After all that Malaysian one-song conundrum, it's back to the big stars. Another Hong Kong small-eyed veteran artist Sandy Lam （林忆莲) got the crowd singing with their favorites. As I've said, she is a veteran after all, so her songs have been sung by many in their favorite karaoke hangout. No joke. She delivered a remix version of 爱上一个不回家的人 (RT: Fell In Love With A Person Who Never Comes Home) which is like more suitable for dancing but she didn't dance to this song. Then it was another favorite, 至少还有你 (RT: I've Still Got You) which was a super hit ballad in the late 90s. Then she danced to her last song of the night which she sang in Cantonese. 灰色 (RT: grey) is the name of the song and this got people on their dancing shoes cause after her came a lone B-boy dancing...
She has the nicest set of small eyes cause it accentuate her features just nicely.
...and out pops another Malaysian one-song conundrum artist who will be advancing his career in Hong Kong soon. He is none other than Danny 温力铭. Following the dancing, he presented a song Wanna Dance With You which had the dancing team dousing themselves with water and splashing water at the audiences. Yup, it had become a wet party...reminds me of some beach party 8TV just had recently.
Danny One and his entourage of dancers.
No stripping. Just dousing oneself with water. It is very hot after all.
Henley from this year's 绝对Superstar was next. He actually delivered two songs. The first was Perfect Love which showed why he won the competition just ended a few months back. Though I won't say his singing is superb or anything new, he has the certain look that would win votes. It is after all, a voting show.
They didn't held hands until later. Ironic.
However, it's the second song he sang with Orange, the other winner that got me raising my eyebrows. Henley's voice is high, whereas Orange's voice is low. The song 我们勾勾手 (RT: Let Us Hold Hands) though have nice tune and all, was somehow a little offbeat. I'm not talking about the tune. I'm talking bout the delivery. It was like as if Orange is the guy and Henley's the girl when in fact, it is the other way round. Orange has a very deep voice, and somehow she cannot sing high due to the fact that Henley can't sing any higher when harmonising or sing too low. So my opinion of this song is rather biased cause I have always listened to guy low girl high voice.
Oh well.
What happens when you don't speak English well, but yet you sing English songs? It's interesting. It's like when Jang Nara and Nicky Lee (李玖哲) sings in Mandarin instead of Korean. (Though Nicky's long term involvement with Machi and Taiwan helps improve his Chinese, so he can speak Chinese fairly well.) Introducing The Cross, a Korean rock group who are the only Koreans performing that night. They are really a rock group, though only one played the electric guitar and the other belted out fast-paced songs. The first however was a medium-beat song called Don't Cry, here you can hear the rock scream from the singer. Both have blond hairs. The rest of the songs sung were in English...like the all-timer We Will Rock You, I Love Rock & Roll and even a remixed version of Britney Spears' Baby One More Time. Surprisingly, with all their screaming and their English, they had more reception than Jang Nara when she came last year. Hmm.
The blond Koreans.
Then came the lamest dance of the whole night. A few guys were dancing to the song "Don't Cha" by Pussycat Dolls. And one guy was on the square elevated platform doing I don't know what. I was like..."Are they dancing for the sake of dancing now?"
Next comes another Hong Kong singer, Vincy 泳儿 who interestingly, only sang two songs. But yeah, she can sing indeed. Even Dylan the host was starry-eyed all over her. Her two songs sang are 倾斜乐园 (RT: Upside Down Park) and 感应 (RT: Reflex).
I've not heard of her songs until that night. Yes. Sad.
Of course now left two more artists. And they are both my favorite. The first one is JJ Lin (林俊杰)! I've been anticipating his arrival. Funny they placed him the second last, similar to last year. JJ sang a light-hearted song from his old album No.89757 entitled 简简单单 (RT: So Simple) and a popular song (which I haven't heard) from his even older album Second Heaven entitled 江南 (RT: South of the River). I'm impressed that he tried to impress Ipoh fans (who speak Cantonese more than Mandarin) by singing the chorus in Cantonese. Knowing Singaporeans don't speak Cantonese, it's an effort.
The most irritating irritating irritating part was perhaps watching it on telly cuts off his performance after his second song. Apparently, he did a B-boy routine and then sang another song which I didn't get the title because the host (Cheryl) was busy talking bout F.I.R. That was a total turnoff. And the second most irritating thing is that he didn't at least sing a new song from his new album. Probably he wants a proper promotion of his new album. Sigh. Managers.
Of course, all that disappointment was quickly dismissed by the appearance of F.I.R which I think probably is the most popular group/artists among all...recently that is. This is where the arrangement goes unbalanced. F.I.R actually delivered 7 songs in a row, beating all the rest and especially the aforementioned one-song conundrums. The songs they delivered were: 飞行部落 (RT: Flight Tribe), 我要飞 (RT: I Wanna Fly), 光芒 (RT: Flame), 你的微笑 (RT: Your Smile), Flyaway, 天天夜夜 (RT: Day And Night) (Faye sang with Real for this song) and Get High. It was madness, it was like a medleys of all the best songs. Faye and Real kept looking at each other though, poor Ian is always like out of the limelight cause even though he look so cool with his keytar, he can't really walk around like Real with his electric guitar. And yes, Faye actually stood on the miserable elevated platform. It was still lame.
Real and Faye singing 天天夜夜. A very beautiful song that had LeAnn Rimes recording the first part as well.
On TV, the show ends there. But in reality, they were having a all-star dancing and singing at the end of the show, dancing to "Macarena" till sleep beckons them.
Overall, I think the concert was a typical kind of concert. Once in a while, songs will make all these fans hype up, but then I think somehow this year's lineup of artists seemed to be lacking some kind of lustre. Last year's concert to me, though unbalanced, was more enjoyable. It's not the crowd. I can't put my finger on it, but it does somehow lack some shine in it. Maybe the singers weren't really dancing themselves. Or maybe because they cut JJ off. Or maybe I was in a dancing mood and this concert won't encourage me to dance even if I'm there. Besides, they are overemphasizing the Taiwan-based and Hong Kong-based singers, neglecting the Malaysian-based. It's normal, cause it's hard to get the overseas people to just come and sing a few songs. Normally, they would want the whole concert to themselves. (Look at Lee Hom, David Tao and Jay Chou. You see them in a lineup?) It is however, more balanced than last year's since even when they give priority to the overseas singers, they could only sing 3 songs, except for F.I.R of course. But I would still prefer last year's concert. More happening.
By happening, I don't mean anybody kisses anybody like how JJ did to A Du (阿杜) in his concert last year. That was just so wrong.
:P
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