seriously EXCESSIVE amounts of flail...
1. Happy birthday, dividingday! Hope you have a marvellous day. :D
2. Dude, LJ, why are you so fucked up? What is with the seriously fugly and stripped-down posting/commenting options these days?
3. Omigod SO ILL. It's one of those maddeningly slow illnesses - the annoying creeper version rather than the kind that just explode all over you - so I woke up on Saturday (at 5pm, go me!) with a slightly worse cold and cough, my voice a little bit gone. Thankfully I didn't sniffle at all throughout the show (so my audio should be clean). And I get up this afternoon (surprisingly, at 1.30pm!) and I'm done: the snot is green, I'm sneezing, and ARGH.
4. I'm supposed to be meeting a friend of mine from uni (who's now based in Taiwan and brought his wife over here for her birthday weekend), but I'm soooo lazy about it. I can't even pretend to be ill as my plan for today is to go out and catch up on movies since I can't do anything much else.
5. Though, then again, my back aches from the being ill. Yuck. I guess that doesn't matter though, as long as I don't fall asleep during the shows?
6. I got a full tank of petrol for under $70 yesterday. WTF. That's, like, almost a 20% drop in what I USED to pay. \o/
7. I was SO remiss yesterday in posting about the concert I went for. I was catching up on some internet flailing (mainly of the Mamma Mia variety), and then I fell dead asleep. Anyways: I haven't seen Emil Chau live since I started this LJ, so you guys have NO IDEA how scary my flail over him can get. Ahem. In other words, consider this fair warning that what follows is INCREDIBLY self-indulgent and flaily, and so is best kept under a cut:
SO. I found out about this concert quite a few months back, and immediately leapt on tickets because OMG IT'S EMIL LIVE. I haven't seen him live since 2006! (And if you want to see how scary I could get back then, I ported in an LJ entry from my old journal about this mini-concert I went for in June 2006. Terrifying, yes?) Anyways. Emil wasn't the headliner - but he was one of six incredibly talented acts, two others of whom I have also flailed over in the past (namely, Tanya Chua, the MOST talented singer-songwriter Singapore has ever produced, and MAYDAY!), so I figured I'd have an awesome time even if Emil sang, like, two songs.
AND I DID. Dude. I had NO IDEA what the concert was about, I thought Jonathan Lee (henceforth JL) - one of the BEST songwriters in the Chinese pop industry, BAR NONE and FOREVER - was just getting a bunch of his old mates together and having a raucous concert. Ha ha, no. Well, not exactly. It was actually a lot more incredible: apparently he's started (literally) making his own guitars, and so this was a HUGE event celebrating that. So all of the performers turned up, their personal handmade guitars in tow, to sing LIVE and to celebrate JL's awesome. CAN YOU BELIEVE THAT. A largely acoustic concert, given by ridiculously ridiculously TALENTED people who can all sing and write their own songs and EEK, that was OVER THREE HOURS LONG. Fuck. It fucking made my LIFE, is what it did.
EMIL. EMIIIIIIIIL. He came on first of all the acts that were not JL, and he was TOTES on fire. He sang his old chestnuts, mainly i.e., I'm Going To Marry You Tomorrow and Flower Heart - but eek. I DIDN'T CARE. I've missed seeing him live SO much, and his voice. God. Firing on every cylinder and then some, with his high notes and the minor riffs and and!! *sobs* He also did a duet with JL on You All during his set... What made my night though was that he sang Love Rose, which is one of the most gorgeous, angsty ballads he has EVER sung, and it was on his most recent album which means I haven't seen him perform it live all THAT much. So yeah, I kind of wanted to DIE from the awesome.
So all that PLUS his trademark incredibly LOL-arious banter - telling a story about Andrew (his son) having girl troubles and gloating about how he made Andrew cry by singing him Love Rose, when really no one listens to him when he plays the guitar at home anymore.
And then! Because Zhang Zhen Yue had just recovered from the flu - this explains why he sang only two and a bit songs compared to everyone else's four - Emil and JL came on and covered for him and sang a couple MORE songs from their duet concert setlist. YES PLZ. YOU KNOW HOW MY BRAIN DIES WHEN PEOPLE SING INCREDIBLE HARMONIES? Even though I can't actually DO that myself? Emil sang this ridiculously high, gorgeous harmony for JL on one song (the name of which I still do not know, fail), and EEK. FLAIL FLAIL. Emil also told this incredible story about HIS JL guitar, and how he wanted a black one - that JL proceeded to make for him by grinding the coal in his backyard into powder and then spreading it by HAND on a normal wood guitar. FECK. *weeps*
Then, for the closing number of the concert, all the stars came out to sing This Old Guitar, and it was SO evident that nobody on that stage knew the song or the lyrics - since it was in English! - other than Emil and Tanya Chua (coincidentally, the only people who can speak good English, probably: Emil's wife is American and Tanya's Singaporean). SO WE GOT WHAT WAS, ESSENTIALLY, A DUET BETWEEN EMIL AND TANYA. Can we say: more win than ever in the ENTIRE UNIVERSE. *weeps*
Oh, the rest of the show was good too! Seriously - Zhang Zhen Yue is a rocker (who wears his sunnies indoors, what a poser), and he managed to knock his numbers out of the park even though he was probably still ill. Cheer Chen (yes, that's her name) has the prettiest ballads ever, but she SOUNDS like a teenybopper when she sings so I didn't appreciate her set quite as much as the rest. Still, she told an adorable story about how she was temping in McDonald's way back when, and then JL turned up (he's been famous since the 80s) and she made him a hamburger! And now she's singing a song on a guitar made by him! Awesometimes. :D
TANYA. OMG TANYA. Okay, I don't flail about her half as much as I should, but she's SO talented, and SO much better live - it was just her, her guitar, and this incredible ability to soar over these ridiculously difficult notes in front of an entire stadium. She sang songs whose names I have to look up as I am a bit far removed from C-popdom at the moment, but True Love and Darwin were highlights. I love how Singaporean she is too - I mean, her accent and ability to speak Mandarin are MUCH improved now, since she spends most of her life in Taiwan these days. But you can tell how it doesn't come naturally, ha ha. Her story about getting her JL guitar was SO sweet too: how she just picked up one of the prototype guitars at a backstage event in Shanghai and started playing to herself - and wound up doing it for 20 minutes! And then at a subsequent concert, JL played his number and then announced to the crowd that he was giving that guitar to Tanya. SO sweet. ♥
MAYDAY. Also ROCKED THE HOUSE. It was clear MOST of the audience was there for them, because people leapt to their feet and it turned into a rock concert for about four songs. They burst out with Mad World and JUMP, which is the most energetic rock song in the history of EVER, and also ballads like Gentle. *cries*
SERIOUSLY. BEST CONCERT I'VE BEEN TO IN EVER.
Only a couple of nitpicks - as my friend pointed out, this was a show that would've worked SO much better in the more intimate setting of a pub. This was, basically, guitar-strumming and story-telling to an audience of 8,000 people... most of whom probably didn't appreciate just how MUCH amazing they were witnessing. So many people were there for Mayday, and others just left at random times once the people they were there to see had finished performing! Can we say fucking RUDE?
Also RUDE was - OMG. There was this UTTER FUCKWIT of a family next to me who were EATING POTATO CHIPS AT THE SHOW. They were passing a packet around and just... eating. And rustling. And even if I WASN'T audio-ing, I was just appalled at how ridiculously rude that was. I have NEVER seen people behave quite so atrociously at a concert, I must say. So much random talking throughout the audio too. CAN WE SAY I HATE PEOPLE?!
ANYWAY. So I'm going to be on an Emil/c-pop kick for a while now. For a LONG while. I cannot WAIT for it to be February when he's finally staging a solo show again. EEK. I know there's a whole lot of January awesome in between, but ARGH. Time needs to jump forward NOW. NOW. I love that his concert is slated to start at 7.30. HA HA. He's the only pop star who's tried that - making the audience come half an hour earlier than the traditional start time of 8pm (because concerts always start at least half an hour late in Singapore, wtf) so that the show starts ON TIME. Which means 3.5 hours of Emil again! SCORE! \o/
So I've been catching up on my youtubing and googling for Emil, since I have been SO remiss in that. And I'm going to be doing that for a looong time to come. Especially since I discovered a NEW SINGLE. Which I am insanely in love with. Like, SO in love with it that I keep playing it on iTunes (except now, when I have my audio playing) to the point that I... errr, skip back to it even though the next song on my playlist is Julia's Gravity. *weeps* YES. I AM THAT FLAILY RIGHT NOW. And I have to share, even if no one cares. BUT HE WROTE IT. THE LYRICS AND THE SONG AND EVERYTHING. *bounces*
圓一個夢 Yuan Yi Ge Meng <-- DOWNLOAD
曲：周華健 詞：周華健
黑暗中 畫一道虹
裝扮著 蒼茫夜空
偶爾我會有傷痛
也可以笑得從容
因為我 還有感動
給我愛 給我笑容
我要的 只有你懂
你懂得我的惶恐
你要我仰望星空
就算是 暴雨狂風
而夢 就陪我圓一個夢
陪著我 一起淚眼迷濛
而夢 就讓我圓一個夢
在夢裡 萬紫千紅
只有春風 沒有 寒冬
過去的 心事重重
都已經 昨日種種
你給我深情萬種
讓我還可以悸動
還可以 怦然心動
而夢 就陪我圓一個夢
陪著我 一起淚眼迷濛
而夢 就讓我圓一個夢
在夢裡 萬紫千紅
只有春風 沒有
而夢 就陪我圓一個夢
陪著我 一起淚眼迷濛
而夢 就讓我圓一個夢
在夢裡 萬紫千紅
只有春風 沒有 寒冬
WHAT EVEN IS THAT AMAZING.
Also, thanks, guys. :P
lanafromoz: where did Shawne go? :P
irnbruise: she shuns both us and holiday cards
me: Sorry, Shawne is flailing very hard
irnbruise: lol
me: I'm writing a post, almost done
irnbruise: what happened?
whenever you say things like that i want to tell you not to sustain injuires
lanafromoz: ahaha
llyfrgell: it does sound like you're going to smack into something
lanafromoz: or pull a muscle
llyfrgell: I visualize hands flapping and then THWAP, desk
irnbruise: yeah
or her pulling a muscle in the neck
me: LOL
llyfrgell: oh, necks are involved in flail? I hadn't realized
me: there is very little capslock
irnbruise: and then having to read the computer with the head to an angle
i don't know
me: mainly because I cannot deal with THAT much capslock ;)
irnbruise: i guess the flapping is probably more realistic
lanafromoz: omg the flail is so huge it's come all the way back around to lowercase? xD
irnbruise: LOL
llyfrgell: ahahaha
irnbruise: that sounds like me
i'm so hardcore i flail like this.
ee cummings style
llyfrgell: you are SO hardcore :-P
8. Anyways, audio will be tracked. Once I get around to tracking Act II of Wicked and STOP listening to this one song over and over again, argh.
9. And then I caught up on everything I've not been reading over at Simply Streep, and AIEEE. Meryl is on the cover of Entertainment Weekly! I HOPE that they're selling both covers and she isn't just on the subscriber's copy or something, because I do NOT want cover with Twilight boy. DO NOT WANT. Must haunt bookstores over the next week. Also, these pretty much made my life: Meryl on Obama and on religion. Can I be this smart and together when I grow up, plz?
10. Man. That took me almost 1.5 hours. O_O I'm going to stop now. :P
2. Dude, LJ, why are you so fucked up? What is with the seriously fugly and stripped-down posting/commenting options these days?
3. Omigod SO ILL. It's one of those maddeningly slow illnesses - the annoying creeper version rather than the kind that just explode all over you - so I woke up on Saturday (at 5pm, go me!) with a slightly worse cold and cough, my voice a little bit gone. Thankfully I didn't sniffle at all throughout the show (so my audio should be clean). And I get up this afternoon (surprisingly, at 1.30pm!) and I'm done: the snot is green, I'm sneezing, and ARGH.
4. I'm supposed to be meeting a friend of mine from uni (who's now based in Taiwan and brought his wife over here for her birthday weekend), but I'm soooo lazy about it. I can't even pretend to be ill as my plan for today is to go out and catch up on movies since I can't do anything much else.
5. Though, then again, my back aches from the being ill. Yuck. I guess that doesn't matter though, as long as I don't fall asleep during the shows?
6. I got a full tank of petrol for under $70 yesterday. WTF. That's, like, almost a 20% drop in what I USED to pay. \o/
7. I was SO remiss yesterday in posting about the concert I went for. I was catching up on some internet flailing (mainly of the Mamma Mia variety), and then I fell dead asleep. Anyways: I haven't seen Emil Chau live since I started this LJ, so you guys have NO IDEA how scary my flail over him can get. Ahem. In other words, consider this fair warning that what follows is INCREDIBLY self-indulgent and flaily, and so is best kept under a cut:
SO. I found out about this concert quite a few months back, and immediately leapt on tickets because OMG IT'S EMIL LIVE. I haven't seen him live since 2006! (And if you want to see how scary I could get back then, I ported in an LJ entry from my old journal about this mini-concert I went for in June 2006. Terrifying, yes?) Anyways. Emil wasn't the headliner - but he was one of six incredibly talented acts, two others of whom I have also flailed over in the past (namely, Tanya Chua, the MOST talented singer-songwriter Singapore has ever produced, and MAYDAY!), so I figured I'd have an awesome time even if Emil sang, like, two songs.
AND I DID. Dude. I had NO IDEA what the concert was about, I thought Jonathan Lee (henceforth JL) - one of the BEST songwriters in the Chinese pop industry, BAR NONE and FOREVER - was just getting a bunch of his old mates together and having a raucous concert. Ha ha, no. Well, not exactly. It was actually a lot more incredible: apparently he's started (literally) making his own guitars, and so this was a HUGE event celebrating that. So all of the performers turned up, their personal handmade guitars in tow, to sing LIVE and to celebrate JL's awesome. CAN YOU BELIEVE THAT. A largely acoustic concert, given by ridiculously ridiculously TALENTED people who can all sing and write their own songs and EEK, that was OVER THREE HOURS LONG. Fuck. It fucking made my LIFE, is what it did.
EMIL. EMIIIIIIIIL. He came on first of all the acts that were not JL, and he was TOTES on fire. He sang his old chestnuts, mainly i.e., I'm Going To Marry You Tomorrow and Flower Heart - but eek. I DIDN'T CARE. I've missed seeing him live SO much, and his voice. God. Firing on every cylinder and then some, with his high notes and the minor riffs and and!! *sobs* He also did a duet with JL on You All during his set... What made my night though was that he sang Love Rose, which is one of the most gorgeous, angsty ballads he has EVER sung, and it was on his most recent album which means I haven't seen him perform it live all THAT much. So yeah, I kind of wanted to DIE from the awesome.
So all that PLUS his trademark incredibly LOL-arious banter - telling a story about Andrew (his son) having girl troubles and gloating about how he made Andrew cry by singing him Love Rose, when really no one listens to him when he plays the guitar at home anymore.
And then! Because Zhang Zhen Yue had just recovered from the flu - this explains why he sang only two and a bit songs compared to everyone else's four - Emil and JL came on and covered for him and sang a couple MORE songs from their duet concert setlist. YES PLZ. YOU KNOW HOW MY BRAIN DIES WHEN PEOPLE SING INCREDIBLE HARMONIES? Even though I can't actually DO that myself? Emil sang this ridiculously high, gorgeous harmony for JL on one song (the name of which I still do not know, fail), and EEK. FLAIL FLAIL. Emil also told this incredible story about HIS JL guitar, and how he wanted a black one - that JL proceeded to make for him by grinding the coal in his backyard into powder and then spreading it by HAND on a normal wood guitar. FECK. *weeps*
Then, for the closing number of the concert, all the stars came out to sing This Old Guitar, and it was SO evident that nobody on that stage knew the song or the lyrics - since it was in English! - other than Emil and Tanya Chua (coincidentally, the only people who can speak good English, probably: Emil's wife is American and Tanya's Singaporean). SO WE GOT WHAT WAS, ESSENTIALLY, A DUET BETWEEN EMIL AND TANYA. Can we say: more win than ever in the ENTIRE UNIVERSE. *weeps*
Oh, the rest of the show was good too! Seriously - Zhang Zhen Yue is a rocker (who wears his sunnies indoors, what a poser), and he managed to knock his numbers out of the park even though he was probably still ill. Cheer Chen (yes, that's her name) has the prettiest ballads ever, but she SOUNDS like a teenybopper when she sings so I didn't appreciate her set quite as much as the rest. Still, she told an adorable story about how she was temping in McDonald's way back when, and then JL turned up (he's been famous since the 80s) and she made him a hamburger! And now she's singing a song on a guitar made by him! Awesometimes. :D
TANYA. OMG TANYA. Okay, I don't flail about her half as much as I should, but she's SO talented, and SO much better live - it was just her, her guitar, and this incredible ability to soar over these ridiculously difficult notes in front of an entire stadium. She sang songs whose names I have to look up as I am a bit far removed from C-popdom at the moment, but True Love and Darwin were highlights. I love how Singaporean she is too - I mean, her accent and ability to speak Mandarin are MUCH improved now, since she spends most of her life in Taiwan these days. But you can tell how it doesn't come naturally, ha ha. Her story about getting her JL guitar was SO sweet too: how she just picked up one of the prototype guitars at a backstage event in Shanghai and started playing to herself - and wound up doing it for 20 minutes! And then at a subsequent concert, JL played his number and then announced to the crowd that he was giving that guitar to Tanya. SO sweet. ♥
MAYDAY. Also ROCKED THE HOUSE. It was clear MOST of the audience was there for them, because people leapt to their feet and it turned into a rock concert for about four songs. They burst out with Mad World and JUMP, which is the most energetic rock song in the history of EVER, and also ballads like Gentle. *cries*
SERIOUSLY. BEST CONCERT I'VE BEEN TO IN EVER.
Only a couple of nitpicks - as my friend pointed out, this was a show that would've worked SO much better in the more intimate setting of a pub. This was, basically, guitar-strumming and story-telling to an audience of 8,000 people... most of whom probably didn't appreciate just how MUCH amazing they were witnessing. So many people were there for Mayday, and others just left at random times once the people they were there to see had finished performing! Can we say fucking RUDE?
Also RUDE was - OMG. There was this UTTER FUCKWIT of a family next to me who were EATING POTATO CHIPS AT THE SHOW. They were passing a packet around and just... eating. And rustling. And even if I WASN'T audio-ing, I was just appalled at how ridiculously rude that was. I have NEVER seen people behave quite so atrociously at a concert, I must say. So much random talking throughout the audio too. CAN WE SAY I HATE PEOPLE?!
ANYWAY. So I'm going to be on an Emil/c-pop kick for a while now. For a LONG while. I cannot WAIT for it to be February when he's finally staging a solo show again. EEK. I know there's a whole lot of January awesome in between, but ARGH. Time needs to jump forward NOW. NOW. I love that his concert is slated to start at 7.30. HA HA. He's the only pop star who's tried that - making the audience come half an hour earlier than the traditional start time of 8pm (because concerts always start at least half an hour late in Singapore, wtf) so that the show starts ON TIME. Which means 3.5 hours of Emil again! SCORE! \o/
So I've been catching up on my youtubing and googling for Emil, since I have been SO remiss in that. And I'm going to be doing that for a looong time to come. Especially since I discovered a NEW SINGLE. Which I am insanely in love with. Like, SO in love with it that I keep playing it on iTunes (except now, when I have my audio playing) to the point that I... errr, skip back to it even though the next song on my playlist is Julia's Gravity. *weeps* YES. I AM THAT FLAILY RIGHT NOW. And I have to share, even if no one cares. BUT HE WROTE IT. THE LYRICS AND THE SONG AND EVERYTHING. *bounces*
圓一個夢 Yuan Yi Ge Meng <-- DOWNLOAD
曲：周華健 詞：周華健
黑暗中 畫一道虹
裝扮著 蒼茫夜空
偶爾我會有傷痛
也可以笑得從容
因為我 還有感動
給我愛 給我笑容
我要的 只有你懂
你懂得我的惶恐
你要我仰望星空
就算是 暴雨狂風
而夢 就陪我圓一個夢
陪著我 一起淚眼迷濛
而夢 就讓我圓一個夢
在夢裡 萬紫千紅
只有春風 沒有 寒冬
過去的 心事重重
都已經 昨日種種
你給我深情萬種
讓我還可以悸動
還可以 怦然心動
而夢 就陪我圓一個夢
陪著我 一起淚眼迷濛
而夢 就讓我圓一個夢
在夢裡 萬紫千紅
只有春風 沒有
而夢 就陪我圓一個夢
陪著我 一起淚眼迷濛
而夢 就讓我圓一個夢
在夢裡 萬紫千紅
只有春風 沒有 寒冬
WHAT EVEN IS THAT AMAZING.
Also, thanks, guys. :P
lanafromoz: where did Shawne go? :P
irnbruise: she shuns both us and holiday cards
me: Sorry, Shawne is flailing very hard
irnbruise: lol
me: I'm writing a post, almost done
irnbruise: what happened?
whenever you say things like that i want to tell you not to sustain injuires
lanafromoz: ahaha
llyfrgell: it does sound like you're going to smack into something
lanafromoz: or pull a muscle
llyfrgell: I visualize hands flapping and then THWAP, desk
irnbruise: yeah
or her pulling a muscle in the neck
me: LOL
llyfrgell: oh, necks are involved in flail? I hadn't realized
me: there is very little capslock
irnbruise: and then having to read the computer with the head to an angle
i don't know
me: mainly because I cannot deal with THAT much capslock ;)
irnbruise: i guess the flapping is probably more realistic
lanafromoz: omg the flail is so huge it's come all the way back around to lowercase? xD
irnbruise: LOL
llyfrgell: ahahaha
irnbruise: that sounds like me
i'm so hardcore i flail like this.
ee cummings style
llyfrgell: you are SO hardcore :-P
8. Anyways, audio will be tracked. Once I get around to tracking Act II of Wicked and STOP listening to this one song over and over again, argh.
9. And then I caught up on everything I've not been reading over at Simply Streep, and AIEEE. Meryl is on the cover of Entertainment Weekly! I HOPE that they're selling both covers and she isn't just on the subscriber's copy or something, because I do NOT want cover with Twilight boy. DO NOT WANT. Must haunt bookstores over the next week. Also, these pretty much made my life: Meryl on Obama and on religion. Can I be this smart and together when I grow up, plz?
10. Man. That took me almost 1.5 hours. O_O I'm going to stop now. :P