Wake Up You Guys

(So say Suntribe in this year's official Estonian Entry "Let's Get Loud")

• Natalya Podolskaya has launched her new website (wherein she spells her name as Natalia instead of Natalya, but for reasons listed below, I'm spelling it that way I want to). It's a very standard affair, but it merits a mention in this entry because on the site is La Podolskaya's new video clip for "Nobody Hurt(s) No One" is a true tragedy and illustrates the major disconnect between the lyrics and the performers. It's a song about school shootings and what do we see? Natalya and generic East Village rocker types (I don't care if one of them is from Rasmus, they still look like bland rocker boys/models) performing and pouting but NOT A SINGLE image of the terror and aftereffects of school shootings. This is a message song people! To not show what you are singing about (and I am giving her the benefit of the doubt that she does) and instead focus on portraying "rock cred" is really selfish and beyond the pale.
• So I'm watching "Revolution" (on AZN, formerly the International Channel) and they play a video for this Japanese singer Rie Fu. While I'm certain Ms. Fu is nice woman, she is irritating to listen to. I've already come across once before, as she is currently singing the new ending theme song for Gundam SEED Destiny. I didn't like it, but I gave her the benefit of the doubt. No more. What gets my goat about her is that she has an extremely flat singing voice. Lady, if life is indeed a boat, I suggest you get on yours and sail away from the music business.
• As evidenced above, my major criticism of Japanese pop music has always been its focus on style over substance. Rie Fu may have a flat singing voice that gnaws at the nerves, but YUI & YUKI are even worse. YUI and the management team behind her seems to think that by playing a guitar and wailing "Feel My Soul" off-key makes her seem credible. Far from it. She looks and sounds like a teenage girl playing grown-up. (Nami Tamaki does the same thing, except Nami actually has the voice to back it up.) YUKI & her crew don't even pretend that she can sing and that's just plain cruel. Listen to her song Joy. It sounds like it's going to be a nice little pleasant synth-pop song then YUKI starts "singing." Oh lord, it is painful. The woman is nasal beyond belief and she strangles words within an inch of their life. Never before have I heard "desu" come out as "DE~A~YA~S."
• ORANGE RANGE has a pretty good song out called "Asterisk." My only problem with it, is that I can't pick up any sort of connection between the lyrics and asterisks. Were they just looking in a dictionary picked a random word as the title? I mean the group's name is ORANGE RANGE, so clearly logical names and ideas are not important to them.
• Gawker has interesting coverage of the launch party for Air Tahiti Nui's new nonstop flight between New York and Papeete. That's right, New York to Tahiti nonstop. To give some context to this, you must know that Air Tahiti Nui (an airline I have never flown, but the buzz seems like it's quite a good one) has plastered the sides of buses and phone booths with ads reading"www.nyctotahitinonstop.com" for months now. I admit that as a playwright, I am disconnected from the business world, but I have trouble believing that there are enough New Yorkers clamouring for nonstop service to Tahiti even on a weekly basis. At least not enough to fill up an A340. When I last checked, a fair amount of Air Tahiti Nui's Papeete-Los Angeles flights continued onto Paris. So unless they are flying Paris-New York-Papeete, then this is one stupid business move in my opinion.