My Tam – Tro Lai

After three consecutive flops, My Tam is finally making a solid comeback with Tro Lai. Maintaining her pop and r&b flavors, her new album is a consistent set—track for track—in both vocal performance and beat production. Her song choices are wise and her writing skill has revealed incredible improvement.

The advantage of singing her own songs is that she knows exactly how they should be delivered. “Nhu Em Doi Anh” is a slow, pop-rock ballad in which she carried the tone and emotion just like the way she has intended: sweet and mellow. “Khi Tinh Yeu Tro Lai,” also written by her, is an instant hit as well. She takes her time pouring her heart out on the simple, electric guitar that accompanied by a thumping r&b beat.

Although she does her own songs good, she does other songs even better. In Quoc Bao’s “Va Em Co Anh,” she proves to have enough juice to take on a gospel-tinged cut. The way she vocalizing and phrasing reminded me of r&b singer like Alicia Keys and Mariah Carey. Unfortunately when she tries to be like them on “Hurt So Much,” the spell breaks. Even with such a marvelous voice couldn’t save her English accents.

Music wise, the Korean producers have done a much better job on here than her previous Vut Bay. They must have recognized that they can’t turn a “toc nau moi tram” into a blonde Korean doll. The slow productions blended in with her voice smoother. Tro Lai indeed is an important return for My Tam and she has reclaimed her title as the princess of Vietnamese pop.