The problem of Vietnamese music is obvious. New singers pop up every day while songwriters fades away. Dieu Huong who made a few hits, including the notorious “Vi Do La Em,” is a talented lyricist, but a limited composer. Her new album, Hu Ao, sounds dull partly because of the cheap arrangements, but mostly because of her restricted range.

Musically, “Cho Mot Lan Quen” has a melody that is a reminiscent of a dozen of songs Quang Dung had covered. “Coi Doi Vui” is one of those cheersy (cheerfully cheesy) tunes that always assigned to the forever-young Don Ho. “Cho Em Hoi” is a slow ballad that progresses steady all the way until the end where Diem Lien gives a hair-raising belt out. The lazy-rumba “Tinh Mai Theo Ta” allows Y Lan yet another opportunity to do her namby-pamby delivery.

Trong Bac who is unknown to me handled the title track. He has a charming voice, but similar to Anh Tuan with lesser power. Although Nguyen Khang gives a great performance of “Mot Nua Tam Hon,” it sounds like some of her more popular tunes, especially the chorus. Not sure why Dieu Huong covers “Vi Do La Em” herself since the song is better presented in a male viewpoint.

One of the major weaknesses of Hu Ao is the crowded vocalists. The result is more like a piecemeal slapped together than a coherent production. Maybe her intention was to have a mix of voices to mask the similitude between the tracks, but still didn’t work.

Though each record of Diana Krall is remarkable in its own way, a collection of her Very Best is a retrospective to her long-lasting career. From the seducing-bossa nova “‘S Wonderful” to the swinging-in-concert “Fly Me to the Moon,” these so called “very best” tracks are debatable. What stood out to me is her previously unreleased rendition of Tom Waits’ “The Heart of Saturday Night.” She does what she does best: covering a ballad with her own touch.

Tung Duong does not give a fuck what you think. You can call him gay, feminine, freaky or whatever, but you have to respect his musical sensibility. While most of the young singers can’t break away from the pop bubbles, he takes his music to another planet. Working with Do Bao, an imaginative producer, Tung Duong reinvents himself once again on Nhung O Mau Khoi Lap Phuong.

Since his jazz-breakthrough Chay Tron debuted three years ago, Tung Duong has established himself as one of the idiosyncratic performers in the Vietnamese music scene. He has no fear for turning himself into the characters in his song through visual appearance and vocal manipulation. He not just sings about a particular character; he is the character. In the bizarre “Noi Khat,” he transforms into a kid voice to express Huyen Ngoc’s weird lyrics about a woman thirsting for a child. The arrangement gets creepy; his voice gets creepier. Listening to the title track, which written and produced by Do Bao, is like taking a trip to a kaleidoscopic ecstasy where Tung Duong drowns his soul into a pool of bleak, serene chaos. Tran Tien’s “Nhuc Nhoi” paints an odd image of a lonely soldier returning from the war and a woman lusting to be touched. The upbeat production and his painful moan “oi a” served as drug music.

NOMKLP is obviously not cut out for everyone. Different folks like different strokes. Some like Pepsi, some like Coke. Comparing to Chay Tron, this album is much harder to chew on. Tung Duong is way out there and Do Bao’s productions are much more intricate (with the mixture of new age, chill-out, rock, electronic) than his infamous work on Nhat Thuc.

Nguyen Khang’s new album, Ta Muon Cung Em Say, is a cop-out: He stays in his comfort zone; he covers candy tunes; and he abandons artistic daring for formulaic boring. With such a unique of a voice, he could push his craft into a higher level, but instead he chooses to play safe, which is a damn shame.

TMCES begins with the dated “Café Mot Minh.” Why bother rerecorded a song that not only every Vietnamese singer had sung, but also in the same acoustic guitar sound and the exact written melody every Vietnamese singer had done? The basic rule of cover is to make an old, popular tune sounds new. He redelivered Dieu Huong’s “Vi Do La Em” with an equivalent blandness and monotone he did the first round. On “Diem Xua,” his flow is slicker on the refreshing arrangement, yet lacking the rawness of emotion he brought to Trinh Cong Son’s lyricism before. “Tro Ve Mai Nha Xua” would have benefited from a string ensemble rather than a club remixed, but he desires to enter the popularity contest more than he would like to raise the musical bar. Fame is blinding him.

On the album cover, he sports a black tuxedo looking like a pimp surrounded by his hotties. His long-time collaborator Diem Lien returns with Quoc Hung’s “Vi Sao Em Oi.” Their duet is once again an opposite attraction where good girl goes for bad boy, and Nguyen Khang beefs up vocals to sound like a badass. Ngo Thuy Mien’s “Niem Khuc Cuoi” turns out to be not so great, even though Ngoc Ha and Nguyen Khang are two of the best vocalists among their peers. What didn’t work is that they don’t seem like a believable couple. The only thing they might have in common is their height. Surprisingly, Nguyen Hong Nhung, his partner in crime, steals all the duets. Truc Ho’s “Gio Da Khong Con Nua” is a lustful pleasant from a sensualist-meets-bohemian romance.

TMCES is actually not a bad album, but rather a disappointing one. He chooses to commercialize more than to challenge himself.

My latest hip-hop’s gratification is the southern soul from the Underground Kingz. With heavy, hypnotic productions, meticulous flows, lustful lyricism, and a handful of guest list including OutKast, Too $hort and Talib Kweli, the dynamic duo from Port Arthur, Bun B and Pimp C, delivered a double joint that filled with guilty pleasures. From the catchy keyboard tinkling on “Tell Me How Ya Feel” to the luscious guitar sampling on “Trill Niggas Don’t Die” bring back the authentic vibe of the underground south. Still, twenty-nine tracks straight is simply too much. The album would have been tighter if the dull fillers had left off.

Eardrum once again secures Talib Kweli as a virtuoso of lyricism. His rapping, however, is still restricted to just a monoflow. Doesn’t matter if the beat is fast or slow, he rides in a steady pace. His swift, rapid-fire delivery works well on the up-tempo such as “Hostile Gospel” and “Say Something,” but not on the mellow vibe like “In the Mood” (Kanye West rhymes more on-beat than Kweli). Still, his sixth studio solo is more consistent than his previous releases, and “Soon The New Day” is a beautiful hip-hop-meets-jazz collaboration with Norah Jones.

Besides paying respect to those who died in the strategic events, September 11 will be a showdown between two multi-platinum-selling rappers, Kanye West and 50 Cent, go pound for pound on their third solos. Fiddy who has a gigantic ego is putting his career on the line for this competition. He told SOHH.com: “If Kanye West sells more records than 50 Cent on September 11, I’ll no longer write music. I’ll write music and work with my other artists, but I won’t put out anymore solo albums.” Will Mr. West put Mr. Curtis out of job?

Unlike his previous albums, West’s Graduation is wisely slimmed down to thirteen tracks. I wonder if his brother Jay has anything to do with it. The jump-off “Good Morning” sounds promising as he makes some cracks about education: “Scared to face the world, complacent career student / some people graduate, but still look stupid.” Unfortunately, his head is so big now and he is so impressed with himself that he could not move beyond his own fortune and fame. In his ode to Jay-Z, he rhymes: “But he got me out of my mama’s crib / Then he helped me get my mama a crib.” He seems to be following his “Big Brother” footsteps. The different is that Jay got swag and West got beat. Jay could count his money and still make his flow fascinating whereas West’s beats are banging, but his lyrics aren’t.

In contrast to West, Curtis is not stuck inside his own celebrity’s status. On “Fully Loaded Clip,” he claims: “I ain’t fresh out the hood / I am still in the hood.” To him, more money more paranoia; therefore, in the first three consecutive tracks (“My Gun,” “Man Down” and “I’ll Still Kill”) he spits rhymes filled with graphical violence. He’s more at ease when boasting about how he sold bottle of water for two bucks and Coca-Cola bought it for billions, or when throwing his fans a bone: “Without them, there’s no me so I love them / Man, they’re the reason I exist, the reason I insist.” He also lyricized himself as hustler: “While Jay and Beyonce was mwah-mwah kissin’ / I was cookin’ one thousand grams in my kitchen.” He is, no doubt, an egomaniac, but he sure lives up to his arrogance.

The buzz has been that West’s Graduation will outsell Fiddy’s Curtis, and as much as we all want to see Fiddy flops on his face, it isn’t going to happen. Fiddy already told Rolling Stone about his victory over West: “I’m King Kong. Kanye is human. Humans run when they see King Kong, because they’re scared.” Imagine what he’ll look like with the cockiness in his face telling the world: “I told you so.”

M.I.A. is back in full effects: Big beats and bold rhymes with shots of bullets and politics. Underneath the international flavors, including Bollywood discotheque (“Jimmy”) and Jamacian dancehall (“Paper Planes”), Kala reveals some of M.I.A.’s dark lyricisms: “People judge me so hard / Cause I don’t floss my titty set / I was born out of dirt like I am porn in a skirt.” From war zones to street corners, no matter where she takes us to, she makes sure we can dance along not only to the music but also to the sound of gun pops.

With the rate Thuy Nga’s releasing, Paris By Night videos aren’t going away anytime soon despite how repetitive they get. So writing detailed review of each show is pointless. What I’ll do is I’ll treat each release like an upgrade of a software by highlighting what featured had been added or deprecated.

So what’s new in Paris By Night 89? It was filmed in Korea. Y Lan turned Pham Dinh Chuong’s “Nua Hon Thuong Dau” to “Mot Nua Hon Thuong Dau.” From her over-sentimental delivery to her over-dramatic presentation, she had tripled the tune’s spirit. Listening to Tran Thu Ha sings “Ao Anh” while watching the models walk the floor is brilliant. Whoever came up with that concept, I owe you a beer.

What should be deprecated? Ky Duyen’s same old jokes poking at Nguyen Ngoc Ngan has to go. After more than ten years of mocking his height, age and appearance, I think we got it: he’s short, old and ugly. Come up with some new shtick, will you?

After all the glamors on stage, we’re presented with the cruel reality: the suffering of our brothers and sisters in Korea via Van Son-style documentary. Witnessing workers with fingers chopped off and wives with battered bruises is heartrending. Like machines, Korean men must have no feelings.

Love could make you happy or busy depending on the stage you’re in. Because Quang Dung and Hong Nhung are falling in love (not with each other), they sing to celebrate their happiness. Because Duc Tri fell out of love, he makes music to keep himself busy.

Ho Ngoc Ha had done us a huge favor. After she dropped his ass as well as his label, Duc Tri had produced some of the finest albums this year including Duc Tuan’s Tinh Ca Pham Duy and Pham Anh Khoa’s debut. He had mastered semi-classic, flirted with rock, and now he returns to romantic ballads with Vi Ta Can Nhau for the newly-wedded duet.

They are compatible should not be a surprise. In the world of pop, Quang Dung is the prince; Hong Nhung is the diva. The surprise is how laid back they are in their collaboration. The special bond has to be there in order for them to cut nine duet tracks with such consistency. From the opening “Giac Mo Xa Voi” (Duc Tri) to the closing “Nhu Mot Loi Chia Tay” (Trinh Cong Son), they share the joy, the passion and the mutual respect for the man whose music had given them their stardom.

As a result, Vi Ta Can Nhau is not memorable for how great they sound together, but for how great their musical friendship is. And they had made their point not loud but clear.