Even with his beautiful baritone and delightful diction, Đình Bảo continues to disappoint by staying in his comfort zone. His new release, Cuộc Tình Đã Mất, has some enjoyable tracks such as the bluesy rendition of “Sa Mạc Tình Yêu,” the Latin-inflected “Chia Tay Tình Đầu” (Nguyễn Ngọc Thiện), and the charming cover of “Nổi Đau Muộn Màng” (Ngô Thụy Miên). Unfortunately, there are some bad choices, particularly the cheesy “Tuyết Rơi Mùa Hè” (Trần Lê Quỳnh) and the odd phrasing on “Tiếng Mưa Đếm” (Đức Huy). Then again, this is the best you could get out of a typical Thúy Nga product. He needs to break out on his own to move beyond what the big production can offer. While the music as usual, Thúy Nga has steps up its cover design for this album. The front cover has a simple design with decent typography and the back has a nice white space for the song tracks.

Earl Sweatshirt tweeted about his new album: “WHEN YOU GET DONE LISTENING TO IT, LISTEN TO IT AGAIN, THATS WHY ITS 30 MINUTES NUMBNUTS.” It’s true. The album is surprisingly short. His rhymes are dark; his beats, self-produced, are unpolished; yet his stories are compelling. “Faucet” is an impressive track that has the early Wu Tang vibe to it. His opening bars sound so much like Method Man, but with a chilling menace. His tone is serious when he rhymes, “Fuck out my face while I’m thinking.” “DNA” is another gloomy track. His verse is superb. His flow is fluid and his message is clear: “Tell momma get a gun if I get too popular / I’m just being honest with it.” In the guest spot, his brother Na’kel contributed an emotional story of his friend who passed away. Earl is right in his tweet. This is an album to be experienced again and again to appreciate the grim storytellings and hypnotic beats.

Bích Vân’s debut, Kiếp Nào Có Yêu Nhau, demonstrates the benefits of being an independent singer. She has complete control of her creative output. She chose the right songs for her voice and hired the appropriate musicians to produce them. The result is a superb album that could be experience in its entirety.

Even though nine out of the ten songs on the album are well-known standards, she has managed to inject her own feelings and soaring soprano into them with the help of elegant, exceptional arrangements. On “Nữa Hồn Thương Đau,” Hoài Phương reworks a Phạm Đình Chương ballad into a blues form and Zoltan Vegvari enhances the song with his mesmerizing piano solo and accompaniment. Hoài Phương also turns “Tuổi 13,” a Ngô Thụy Miên’s ballad, into a bossa nova flavor and adds his own sax supplement into the record.

Elsewhere, Hoàng Công Luận, one of the Vietnamese best classical-inflected arrangers and pianists, contributes three excellent tracks. His skillful string orchestration is showcased in the title track, “Kiếp Nào Có Yêu Nhau” (Phạm Duy), and his sensational jazz touch is displayed in “Hoài Cảm” (Cung Tiến).

Another standout arranger is Phan Khắc Tuấn who invigorates “Xin Còn Gọi Tên Nhau,” a Trường Sa standard, using the blues. Brian Mantz enriches the late-night vibe with his hypnotic muted trumpet sounds. With Ngô Hoàng’s sensational orchestration, Bích Vân was abled to slip in her own tune “Một Mảnh Tình Thơ” without sounding out of place among the old standards.

Although the album features a wide range of songs and arrangers, it still sounds cohesive throughout because of Bích Vân’s indelible delivery and art direction. Kiếp Nào Có Yêu Nhau is a strong debut. Can’t wait to hear where she will be heading next.

Giang Trang is apparently a devotee of Trịnh Công Sơn’s music. In her debut, Lênh Đênh Nhớ Phố, she brought some fresh air into his songs with her earthy interpretation backed by pared-down accompaniment of violinist Anh Tú and guitarist Anh Hoàng. In her sophomore release, Hạ Huyền, she continued to record Trịnh’s music, but experimented with richer sounds from guitarist Nguyễn Văn Tuấn, flutist Sương Mai, cellist Lê Thanh Long and percussionist Trần Xuân Hòa. The result was not pleasing. The exotic arrangements drowned out her singing. In her third recording, Hạ Huyền 2, she and her arranger Thanh Phương wisely return to the minimalist setting.

Recognizing that Giang Trang has an effortless style of singing that is best placed in an intimate atmosphere, Thanh Phương backs her voice with his own acoustic guitar. Although his accompaniment alone can create a musical dialog between the vocalist and the guitarist, he incorporates a few voices into the conversation. With Vân Mai on the Vietnamese 16-string zither, Lê Thư Hương on the flute and Trọng Kiều on the piano, their playing enhances rather than distracts the whole experience.

To hear how these instruments come together, listen to “Nhìn Những Mùa Thu Đi.” The zither starts off with a beautiful folk tradition. The guitar picks up the vibe and the flute joins in to create a zen setting. All the instruments drop out to focus on Giang Trang’s singing. The guitar alone returns to back the vocals. When Giang Trang gets through the song the first time, the guitar takes over the solo with the keyboard comes in. The keyboard stays on and the guitar plays an ostinato pattern as the vocal returns. After the vocal naked vocal faded out at the end, all the instruments join force to take the tune out.

The entire album is orchestrated in similar fashion; therefore, the experience is coherent, but never boring. What makes the arrangements so intriguing is that they never reveal the original melody because they don’t have to. The ballads are already too familiar and Giang Trang sings them straight on. As I am listening to record, I can’t help but wonder what if she takes Billie Holiday’s approach and deviates away from Trinh’s melody completely? That would be the art of reinterpretation.

Thanh Hà’s Đến Bên Anh is neither groundbreaking nor cohesive. Her delivery is straightforward and her song choice is all over the map. What makes the album enjoyable, however, is the productions.

Most of the arrangements come from Roland Casiquin Jr., her lover. Unlike Thúy Nga’s typical producers, Casiquin brings some fresh vibes to the table. The title track, for example, is groovy as hell with uptempo rhythm made up of energetic percussions, sweet keyboard comps, and slick guitar riffs. With “Anh Muốn Em Sống Sao” (Chi Dân), he wisely turns up the base drum to drown out Chi Dân’s cheeseball lyrics. Thanh Hà is also smart enough to make it less campy than drama queen Minh Tuyết.

Casiquin’s guitar chops and dance production skill are displayed on “Huyền Thoại Người Con Gái” (Lê Hựu Hà), but the best track on the album goes to Minh Hoàng. His string arrangement and bossa nova flavor make “Xóm Đêm” (Phạm Đình Chương) so damn hypnotizing. Thanh Hà’s alto is also so fine and sexy floating along the swaying rhythm. Although I don’t mind her youthful pop covers, I would rather hear her taking on the more mature level.

I damn near overlooked Quốc Thiên’s Tình Khúc Một Thời when the album first hit streaming web sites late last year. Quốc Thiên is a new face with a warm baritone and sincere delivery. For his debut, he chooses a rather safe approach: covering standards. The album kicks off with a gentle, Latin-inflected version of “Nếu Xa Nhau,” a Đức Huy’s ballad. The second track, “Chiếc Lá Mùa Đông,” a duet with Uyên Linh, is disappointing. While their vocal chemistry blended well, their Chinese-translated song choice, is such a letdown. I didn’t make it past the third track, “Tình Như Lá Bay Xa,” which is another Chinese ballad.

A few days ago I copped the entire high-quality album and decided to give it another try. Without the Internet streaming interruption, the album comes to life. Standout is the bluesy rendition of Quốc Dũng’s “Em Đã Thấy Mùa Xuân Chưa.” The blues-turn-valse arrangement is hypnotizing. The strip-down version of “Tiếng Mưa Đêm” (Đức Huy) is refreshing. The strumming guitar, the brushing percussion, the thumping bass, and the accenting piano work their magic to accompany the vocals. In addition, Trịnh Nam Sơn’s “Quên Đi Tình Yêu Cũ” gets an elegant bossa nova makeover.

If Quốc Thiên were to focus Tình Khúc Một Thời on the jazz side, he could have created a sensational experience. Too bad the album is wasted with sugary, Chinese-translated ballads. He definitely has potentials. He just needed an executive producer to guide him to the right direction.

Both Molly Johnson and Rebecca Ferguson know too damn well that no one can phrase like Billie Holiday and no one can touch the dark corner like Lady Day; therefore, they reinterpret Billie’s repertoire with their own approach: lighter and less serious.

Whereas Johnson still shows some traces of Holiday’s timbre and texture in Because of Billie, Ferguson draws no resemblance in Lady Sings the Blues. “Fine And Mellow” for instance, Johnson’s version is swinging a bit faster than Billie’s, but Furguson takes it to the retro soul. Both versions lost the emphatic of “Love is just like the faucet / It turns off and on,” in which defined Billie’s signature style. In contrast, Ferguson’s rendition of “Lady Sings the Blues” is closer to Billie’s than Johnson’s, which is a faster blues-swing cover.

Because of Johnson’s and Furguson’s vocals and choices of arrangement, they have created different vibes of Billie’s classic materials. For a wine-and-dine time with friends and family, Furguson’s album is ideal. For a more intimate time with a lover, Johnson’s album is the perfect mood. For an up close and personal experience, Billie’s albums remain unmatchable.

Under the mentorship of Đàm Vĩnh Hưng, Trọng Khương released his debut, Mộng Bình Thường, covering standards. From the bluesy opening on “Gởi Gió Cho Mây Ngàn Bay” (Đoàn Chuẩn and Từ Linh) to the closing duet with Mr. Đàm on “Chiều Nay Không Có Em” (Ngô Thụy Miên), Trọng Khương doesn’t have much freshness to offer, specially in this overcrowded market of recording old ballads. The exceptions are the bright swinging “Cô Bắc Kỳ Nho Nhỏ” (Phạm Duy) and the Latin-inflected “Chỉ Có Em” (Lam Phương). Both tunes have the light, joyful vibe that suggests the simple dream he alludes to in the title. The album would have worked better if he opted for more strip-down productions.

On the surface, Kendrick Lamar is a swift, gifted rapper. In “For Free?,” the second track off his newest release, To Pimp a Butterfly, he rhymes like Ella Fitzgerald scatting over the hard-swing jazz arrangement. At the core, he is a sharp, skilled lyricist. Using the pimping metaphor, Lamar turns his dick on America: “You’re bad bitch / I picked cotton that made you rich / Now my dick ain’t free.” From the funkified groove (“Wesley’s Theory”) to the Compton’s big bass (“Hood Politics”) to the Latin-inspired rhythm (“I”), Lamar has crafted an outstanding album rich in sonics and affluent in lyrics. Lamar should get the creds he deserved for this joint.

Ngọc Anh’s newest release is a predictable, yawn-worthy cover of Lam Phương’s ballads. Like Lệ Quyên, Ngọc Anh brings nothing fresh to the old standards. Even the music productions are dull and lifeless. Listening to Cám Ơn Người Tình makes you want to return to Bạch Yến’s superb interpretation of Lam Phương’s music.