BoA’s Single, “Eat You Up”, Heats Up in the U.S.
October 26, 2008 by Dennis Amith · Leave a Comment
BoA’s new single, “Eat You Up”, has earned an immediate positive response from U.S. listeners.
The song was introduced on music sites MyTunes, Amazon, AOL, eMusic and MySpace at 3:00 am on the 22nd (Korean Standard Time) and reached 3rd on iTunes in the Dance category and 10th on Amazon’s list of Hot New Releases in MP3 Downloads and 21st among Today’s Top MP3 Songs.
America…Are you ready for BoA? BoA…Is America ready for you?
October 17, 2008 by Dennis Amith · Leave a Comment
With BoA’s US debut CD single coming out, an editorial about her press conference and also my previous experience with the labels when it came to promoting the Asian pop artists in the US and would be curious to hear about your thoughts about BoA’s US debut.
You can download the article here.
BoA – Vivid – Kissing you, Sparkling, Joyful Smile- (a J!-ENT World Groove CD Single Review)
September 7, 2008 by Dennis Amith · Leave a Comment
“BoA returns with a triple A-sided CD single (her 26th) that features three various songs that remains consistent in terms of her musical style within the past few years. Overall, a good single.”
ARTIST: BoA
CD SINGLE: Vivid – Kissing you, Sparkling, Joyful Smile-
LABEL: avex trax
CATALOG #: AVCD-31447/B
DURATION: 23:39
RELEASE DATE: June 4, 2008
- Kissing you
- Sparkling
- Joyful Smile
- Kissing you (Instrumental)
- Sparkling (Instrumental)
- Joyful Smile (Instrumental)
DVD: Region 2, 4:3, Duration: 7 minutes
- Kissing you
- Sparkling
BoA has been making the headlines lately with the announcement by her Korean label SM Entertainment that she will be making her US debut.
This is what fans have been wanting for years especially when she first performed in New York for the New York-Tokyo Music Festival over five years ago.
But in Japan, she continues to make the charts but her music of late has been hit or miss for me. When she first debuted, I really enjoyed the energy exhibited from her older music in Korea and also in Japan but within the past two years, I found myself gravitating towards the ballads but her upbeat songs, not as much.
Not to say that the songs are bad because they are catchy and good, it’s just I’m expecting more of her dance, energetic style that you hear sometimes on her albums but it seems here J-Pop CD singles have been more conservative than anything.
Even with her fellow SM Entertainment comrades on avex (ala Rhythm Zone), Tohoshinki (Dong Bang Shin Ki) and Tenjochiki (The Grace), manage to give you various music and change things up and still remain energetic. We’ve seen BoA do it many times before and as much as I wanted to enjoy this CD single, to tell you the truth, it was not in my CD rotation that long.
With her 26th triple-A CD single “Vivid”, the first track “Kissing You” features an upbeat, happy track with Fujibayashi Shoko on lyrics, music by ArmySlick and arrangement by NAOKI-T. Again, this is another song that is more happy, conservative and consistent with her recent releases.
The next track “Sparkling” features a pop song that is upbeat and catchy. And actually my favorite song on the CD single. The music is by Hara Kazuhiro and arrangement by h-wonder. Lyrics by MIZUE.
The third track “Joyful Smile” is another upbeat track and when I heard sounds similar to Tohoshinki’s “Doushite Kimi wo Suki ni Natte Shimattandarou?” with that little acoustic guitar like sound, but overall a good beat but again, a song that was ok. Lyrics were by Satomi, music and arrangement by Asada Masaaki.
The final three tracks are the instrumentals of the first three tracks.
As for the DVD, the DVD features two music videos.
“Kissing You” features a colorful stage setup with BoA living in this small home and wearing this colorful outfit and helps a crying child with his balloon stuck up on her tree and protecting a birds nest with her umbrella and her writing a letter and receiving a letter from her love. A cute, color music video.
“Sparkling” features BoA singing with a CG background and various CG icons around her. When she clicks one one and drags it to her microphone, the instruments and dancers appear.
The insert booklet is a bifold with the lyrics and production credits.
I know that it seems that I’m a bit hard on my reviews for BoA. I know that a lot of the fans love her music and love the music no matter if it’s an upbeat, hard hitting dance club style or if it’s a sugary sweet pop song.
I really enjoy her music but I think I found myself gravitating to her older style when you would see her just as energetic, dancing with her background dancers or belting out an awesome ballad but this one not one of those CD singles.
I feel that with her CD singles within the past two years, it’s typically hit or miss for me. “Vivid” features three songs which are good but of the triple A songs on this CD single, “Sparkling” was pretty much the track I found myself listening to the most and the others, not as much. It’s not necessarily a “miss” but it wasn’t necessarily a “hit” for me either.
All in all, I found “Vivid” to be an average CD single release from BoA.
Check out more of our reviews at J!-ENT’s World Groove
Buy this CD Single:
BoA – THE FACE (a J!-ENT World Groove album review)
June 25, 2008 by Dennis Amith · Leave a Comment
“Featuring her CD single releases from 2007 and 2008, ‘THE FACE’ is an album that features a good balance of pop songs and beautiful ballads”
ARTIST: BoA
ALBUM: THE FACE
LABEL: avex trax
CATALOG #: AVCD-23498/B
DURATION: 1:02:20
RELEASE DATE: February 27, 2008
- AGGRESSIVE
- Sweet Impact
- My Way, Your Way
- be with you.
- LOSE YOUR MIND
- Girl In the Mirror
- Happy Birthday
- Diamond Heart
- LOVE LETTER
- BRAVE
- ギャップにやられた!
- Style
- Smile again
- Beautiful Flowers
- Best Friend
DVD: Region 2, 4:3, 19 minutes
- Sweet Impact
- LOVE LETTER
- LOSE YOUR MIND feat. Yutaka Furukawa from DOPING PANDA
- be with you. (Original Verison)
BoA’s fifth album “THE FACE” features another cool R&B/pop album by the Korean/J-Pop artist.
I really find it amazing how focused BoA has been towards her career especially how she’s maintaining her music career in two countries for so long and she shows no sign of slowing down as the past two years, following her as a young teen to now an adult, I’m always discovering something new.
Similar to her SMTown label friends Tohoshinki, “The Face” has three different versions available to the public. The normal version, a second version with a single DVD (which I’m reviewing) and a third album version which comes with a second DVD that includes several live performances.
The album features her 22nd through 25th CD singles: “Sweet Impact”, “Love Letter” and “Lose Your Mind” which were her CD singles released in 2007 and “be with you.” released in Feb. 2008.
I was actually surprised to find out that she only had three CD singles released in 2007 but with her also pursuing more and more Korean activities, it’s not like she has an empty plate. She’s a definitely busy music artist.
The first track “AGGRESSIVE” features a more upbeat, club style of track. More synth-based with music by Daniel Pandher and Tommy La Verdi who have created a good number of music tracks for SM artists.
The second track “Sweet Impact” is BoA’s 22nd CD single and a track that is more reminiscent to her past releases. So, for those who enjoy the happy, pop style of BoA’s music, there are several tracks such as “Happy Birthday”, “Diamond Heart”, “Gap ni Yarareta” (a track written by BoA) and “Beautiful Flowers”.
The third track “My Way, Your Way” features a collaboration with J-hip-hop artist WISE. I actually enjoyed this track. Similar to when BoA collaborates with m-flo, similar style. Very smooth, free flowing and the addition to WISE rapping on the track definitely made it more lively.
The fourth track “be with you.” is the 25th CD single and BoA’s first CD single of 2008 which is a beautiful Spring ballad and for those who enjoy BoA’s Christmas/Winter songs, will definitely enjoy this track. The other beautiful ballad on this track is the piano-influenced track “Smile again”.
The fifth track and BoA’s 24th CD single “LOSE YOUR MIND” feat. Furukawa Yutaka from DOPING PANDA. For this track, Furukawa plays guitar in this track.
The ninth track “LOVE LETTER” is BoA’s 23rd CD single which is a ballad but more upbeat compared to her other ballads.
As for coupling songs from her CD singles that are featured on this album are “Beautiful Flowers”, which is from her “Love Letter” CD single (was also used a theme for the baseball team Yokohama BayStars for 2007) and the ballad “Smile again” was from her “Lose Your Mind” CD single and a track written by Boa.
As for the DVD, featured are the music videos for the four CD singles.
“SWEET IMPACT” features BoA dancing with her background dancers combined with CGI scenes of BoA riding in a futuristic cycle and going to a holodeck-style of room and featuring her in a suit and and hat that kind of reminds me of Michael Jackson’s “Smooth Criminal”.
“LOVE LETTER” features BoA sitting in a restaurant setting and holding her cell phone and walking around Tokyo reading a letter.
“LOSE YOUR MIND” is definitely a sexy video featuring BoA walking on a runway (wearing several outfits) and dancing with her dancers. This video is vintage BoA which features cool dancing and actually a very enjoyable video.
Where the last three videos were directed by Hamashima Yu, for “be with you. (original version)”, this video is directed by Inoue Tetsuo (who directed her awesome slow jam “Merikuri”). I think that Inoue has always been a director that has worked well with BoA and the same goes for this music video. A Spring video with BoA riding in a boat through a river and playing with her dog in a park. Very Spring-like and I wish more videos featured BoA outdoors. A very cool music video!
The CD insert booklet features the lyrics and production credits and also several photos of BoA. Also, a promotional mini-flyer for BoA’s Spring Ballad CD single “be with you.”.
All in all, “THE FACE” is a good album and does feature a good balance of pop songs and two cool ballads but since her album “Outgrow” (her 2006 album which I really enjoyed), this album was pretty cool but not great.
It seems that with this album and even the last (Made in Twenty), I feel like I gravitate mostly towards the singles released and her ballads on “FACE” (I typically tend to not focus so much on CD single tracks so much on an album when reviewing) and possibly a few upbeat songs such as “AGGRESSIVE” and “My Way, Your Way” but the other non-single tracks were good, just not great.
But all in all, a cool but average album from BoA.
BUY THIS ALBUM:
