The 16-year-old proves that she did not come from a cookie-cutter mould with her first release that draws musical influences from soul, jazz and R&B
LEE HI / FIRST LOVE
Born in 1996, Lee Hi got her start in the music business only last year when she auditioned for South Korea's popular reality show Survival K-Pop Star, and came second after Park Ji-min (who, alongside Baek Yerin, make up girl duo called 15&). The then 15-year-old pop star in the making got signed by YG Entertainment, one of the most influential K-Pop labels whose roster includes international phenomena like Big Bang, 2NE1, and, most recently, PSY of Gangnam Style fame.
During the course of the show, Lee Hi stood out from the pack with her impressive renditions of Roberta Flack's Killing Me Softly and Adele's Rolling in the Deep, subsequently earning her the title of "Korea's Adele". Not too long after the show and a brief collaboration with girl group Epik High, Lee Hi debuted her own material on a single called 1,2,3,4 followed by Scarecrow, It's Over and Rose _ all of which did exceptionally well on the domestic charts.
Her music has recently reached a wider audience and generated a lot of buzz, thanks to label mate PSY, who invited her as a guest performer to his "Happening" concert which was livestreamed on YouTube a few weeks back during the Songkran holidays. Good timing, considering that the young artist had just released her first full-length studio album, First Love, a month prior.
The album capitalises on Lee Hi's uniquely soulful vocals, and, in a lot of ways, shares the same retro soul, jazz-laced R&B sound as British songstresses as Adele and Pixie Lott. The sassy lead single, 1, 2, 3, 4, reminds us of some the best of Duffy and Kate Nash. There's enough of a Motown vibe here to get our feet tapping.
Rose and It's Over see Lee Hi returning to the modern era, flirting with a poppier and jazzier approach which should appeal more to the masses.
And, of course, it's not quite a pop album without a few power ballads thrown in. One Sided Love and the piano-driven Dream allow us to catch a glimpse of the 16-year-old's softer side. Given her well-established vocal capacity, she succeeds in delivering them with class and maturity well beyond her years.
The rest of First Love continues to explore the R&B-pop-jazz route, though not yielding quite the same result.
We could have done without the album's bland fillers such as Special and Turn It Up.
Despite this slight miss and the fact that she's backed by one of South Korea's largest record labels, Lee Hi's debut album proves that K-Pop is not entirely overrun by cookie-cutter boy and girl groups.
We appreciate the unique direction she's taken, and believe that with more time and experience she'll mature into a fully developed artist who's able to provide the K-Pop scene with a fresh perspective as well as an exciting voice.
THE PLAY LIST
Mahasaja Thammada/ Win Yan
If the band's name (it literally translates as "extraordinary ordinary") is not enough to grab your attention, their debut single, Win Yan (Spirit), definitely is. Having made a name for themselves in Bangkok's underground music scene, the band has been steadily picking up fans over the year, thanks to their appearances at local festivals and indie nights. The track stays true to the band's Beatles-inspired, '60s aesthetic, fusing elements of rock 'n' roll with a dose of charming country twang. "You bade goodbye and fled to the kingdom of faraway heaven," sings the frontman, drawing an interesting analogy between the girl who left him and a ghostly apparition.
Daft Punk (featuring Pharrell Williams)/ Get Lucky
When the French electronic dance duo announced their follow up to their 2005 album Human After All a few weeks back, the internet almost exploded. And naturally, the album's first single, Get Lucky, is surrounded with so much hype that it could possibly only be rivalled by the hype for The Great Gatsby's soundtrack. Featuring funky riffs by legendary American guitarist Nile Rodgers and vocals by Pharrell Williams, the song itself benefits from distinct disco influences lifted right off from the dancefloor in the '70s and feel-good lyrics ("We've come too far to give up who we are/So let's raise the bar and our cups to the stars.") Well-worth the near decade-long wait to say the least.
Empire of the Sun/ Alive
Speaking of comebacks, eclectic Australian duo Empire of the Sun finally follow up their 2008 debut album, Walking on a Dream, with the abstractly titled second album, Ice on the Dune. Alive sees Nick Littlemore and Luke Steele still clutching to the sound of scintillating synth pop that they have so perfectly mastered. While the chanting reminds us of their earlier project PNAU, the lush vocal harmonies and sun-kissed synth melodies are unmistakably Empire of the Sun. Give it a listen and you'll have trouble shaking the hook, "Loving every minute 'cause you make me feel so alive," out of your head for some time.
Vampire Weekend/ Ya Hey
Pop-punk outfit Vampire Weekend continue to tease us with another new tune from their upcoming third album, Modern Vampires of the City. Ya Hey is a mid-tempo song that pairs a heavy subject matter with the band's signature quirky wit. "Oh sweet thing, Zion don't love you/The Babylon don't love you, but you love everything," vocalist Ezra Koenig intones during the intro. "Oh, you saint, America don't love you/So I could never love you, in spite of everything." The track then gets seriously catchy once it's broken into the piano loop-driven chorus followed by a series of unintelligible hums only Vampire Weekend could pull off so successfully.
Mika (featuring Ariana Grande)/ Popular Song
British pop maestro Mika joins forces with rising pop songstress Ariana Grande on the former's latest single from his third studio album, The Origin of Love. Based on the song of the same name from the musical Wicked, Popular Song follows in the same footsteps as his earlier hits, such as Grace Kelly and We Are Golden, with exuberant energy and style. Here, Mika and Ariana step in to vouch for misfits everywhere, singing "I never was a scholar, you were always popular/You were singing all the songs I don't know, now you're in the front row 'cause my song is popular."
