In the past few years, Phuong Thanh tries to mellow out, but nothing seemed to work. She sounded worn out and lazy. On her new release, The Best of Tinh 2010, she returns to her signature style: soaring from the pussy. Revisiting her breakthrough hits like “Trong Vang,” “Tinh Co” “Lo Lam” and “Hay Ve Voi Em,” she roars like a lion in a long and painful labor. At times, her vocal cords seem to burst from screaming too hard. In these new recordings, the producer had wisely kept the accompaniments simple—mostly with an acoustic guitar—to show off the Phuong Thanh effects: rough and raw on the surface, yet sweet and soulful underneath. This collection reminds us of how she had dominated the Vietnamese pop scene a decade ago.

When I first started my blog, I wanted to improve my writing, but I didn’t know what to write. I decided on reviewing music because I constantly listen to music. When I work, when I drive, when I eat and even when I go to sleep, music was always around me. Music always put me into a mood. I get emotional, excited or even sleepy and I wanted to just write down how I feel when I listen to a song or an entire album.

I struggled tremendously trying to find the right words to describe my thoughts on something I have heard. I began to read any music reviews I could get my hands on and wrote down passages that sounded good to me or something I would have said on my own. I have filled two notebooks of little sentences and paragraphs (mostly from jazz writing) I have collected.

So when I began to review an album, I would listen to it the first time straight through. Then I would listen again track by track and take notes. I then go back into my notebooks and search for the sentences that best described what I wanted to say. When I put my piece together, I revised the sentences and made it all my own.

Once I got the first sentence down, the rest came easy. That first sentence is always important to me because it has to be catchy. Sometimes just the first sentence alone would take me half an hour to write and I can’t write the whole piece until I get that first sentence. The entire process could take me up to two hours to write one album.

I slowly began to move away from the notebooks and just began to write on my own. I still read reviews and write down things that I liked, but I hardly refer back to them when I write. Nowadays, a review could be written in one commuting trip, which is around half an hour. I can’t live without my MP3 player.

In the past five years, I have penned 597 music reviews ranging from Vietnamese to jazz to hip-hop to live concerts. These pieces come highly from my personal opinion. I am not a music critic and I am not trying to be one. I just want to write down how I feel and sometimes they are highly favorable and many times very offensive.

I don’t have any music training background other than a jazz history course I audited at Vassar College. That class was an ear-opening and made me appreciate the art of jazz and improvisation even more. I also enrolled in Music 101, but quickly dropped after two weeks of class. The course attempted to teach students to hear, write and read notes. I started to picked up technical terms, which was good. But then I tended to focus on the technical aspects and lost the emotional connection and my personal approach when listening to a piece of music. I started to pick out B-flat major and G minor instead of focusing on the sounds of music.

I don’t want to write like a musician. I just want to write the way I hear music. When listening to jazz, John Coltrane and Miles Davis for example, I am not interested in how they had done it, but the end result of how well they executed. I am more interested in the feelings Coltrane brought rather than how high he could blow. I am more interested in the tones and the moods Miles played rather than the notes.

For singers, I am interested in the way they convey the lyrics than the way they scream at the top of their lung. Billie Holiday for example, I don’t care how she played with the timing, but I do care the way expressed the lyrics and the placement of words without losing the tempo. (Listen to her phrasing in “All the Way.”)

In retrospection, I had fun writing about music and get to share my thoughts with my readers. Although it has taken quite a chunk of my free time, the investment was worthwhile in improving my English. It takes more discipline than simply writing a journal.

Asia latest release was politic free? That was so unreal, but when the production left out two propaganda papas (Nam Loc and Viet Dzung), it did happen. With just two sexy (and pretty silly half of the time) MCs, Thuy Duong and Bao Chau, holding down the floor, Ngay Tan Hon (The Wedding Day) was entertaining.

It was about time Asia came up with a creative concept by combing wedding fashion with music, but let’s hope that we won’t see too many sequels like Mua He Ruc Ro, Da Vu Quoc Te and Bon Mua. One wedding show was enough already. And unlike most of Asia previous releases, Asia 63 was filmed in a studio and not a concert hall.

One of the standout video was Nguyen Khang’s jazzy version of Pham Dinh Chuong’s “Mong Duoi Hoa.” The black and white film gave the performance a classic vibe and Nguyen Khang carried the tune with calmness and confidence. Ho Hoang Yen delivered a sexy rendition of Hoang Nguyen’s “Bai Tango Rieng Cho Em.” She didn’t need to reveal all that cleavage, but it didn’t hurt. Y Phuong did a fine job of covering Hoang Thi Tho’s “Ta Tinh” with her soaring alto.

On the flip side, the duet between Philip Huy and Thuy Huong was kind of yucky, as if a father and a daughter telling each “love me with all of your heart.” Another horrendous pair was Trish and Mai Thanh Son. Their vocals were just awful. Doanh Doanh was doing her Chinese tune as usual and Doan Phi was dancing like he had a bee in his pants. The rest of the show were passable, but the fashion design would prevent viewers from pressing the fast-forward button.

Let’s get two things straight. Quynh Hoa has a young face, but an old, grainy voice, as if her vocal cords were sent through a dryer machine with a handful of small rocks. Although her forth release titled Tango 09, the album only featured three tango-style ballads.

All three tango tracks (Doan Chuan & Tu Linh’s “Tinh Nghe Si,” Pham Dinh Chuong’s “Xom Dem” and Duong Thieu Tuoc’s “Bong Chieu Xua”) are excellent because of her raspy vocals and effortless flow around the ballroom arrangements. Her jazzy rendition of Hoang Giac “Bong Chieu Qua” is exceptional and the intimacy of Nguyen Anh 9’s “Buon Oi! Chao Mi” (accompanied mostly by solo piano) is a reminiscent of the early Le Thu (before her ranges and tones are gone).

Tango also featured four special guests: Le Anh Dung, Duc Long, Quang Hao and Tuyet Tuyet. The weakest is the duet with Quang Hao on Hoang Giac’s “Mo Hoa.” The chachacha arrangement is robotic and Quang Hao’s voice is attractive but lacks the individuality. Overall, Tango is a solid ballroom dancing album.

Song Giang has a sexy, slightly smoky voice, but her song selection on her forth release, Uoc Mo Co Nhau, makes her sound rather sleepy. The leadoff title track is simply snoring and she has done her best but still couldn’t make Bao Chan’s overrated “Bien Em La Bien Rong” anymore exciting. Two tracks that truly showcase her talents are Duong Thu’s “Bai Hat Ru Cho Anh” and Nguyen Ngoc Thien’s “Tinh Suong Khoi.” On the first one she soars like a songbird with a wounded wing over the sensual Latin groove and the jazzy arrangement on the second fits well with her raucous timbre.

If Bang Kieu is your bitch, Phan Dinh Tung is mine. His latest album, Hat Nhan, is campy as shit and I am totally gay for it. Beside the lame-ass birthday track (“Khuc Hat Mung Sinh Nhat”), a heartfelt dedication to mom (“Nho On Me”) and a tribute to dad (“Loi Day Cua Cha”), the rest are sweet-n-sour ballads that are delicious enough to get you craved for at least three returns before getting sick of them.

On Your Songs, Harry Connick, Jr. uses the Frank Sinatra swag to reinvigorate classic popular tunes by the likes of Billy Joe, Elton John and Nat King Cole. The results are mixed. His version of Elvis Presley’s “Can’t Help Falling In Love With You” is straightforward yet enticing thanks to the help of Wynton Marsalis’s gorgeous solo. On “And I Love Her,” Connick gives the Beatle’s classic song a sensational cover by wrapping his luscious, nasal voice around the lush bossa nova arrangement. On the other hand, tracks like Sinatra’s “All the Way,” Leroy Jones’s “(They Long to Be) Close to You” and Rodgers and Hammerstein’s “Some Enchanted Evening” sound like Christmas shopping mall music.

Thai Bao has apparently been around for a while, yet this is the first time I’ve heard of her and it didn’t take long for me to be hooked on her raspy, intimate voice and effortless yet emotional delivery. Her fifth volume, Nghe Giot Nang Phai, is a tight set that could be enjoyed straight through with many savory repeats.

The leadoff track, “Khat Vong Tinh Yeu,” doesn’t impress me at all. The way she stretches the words and her stilted phrasing come off awkward. The silky-smooth sax doesn’t help either. The second track, Diep Minh Tuyen’s “Canh Hoa Luu Ly,” however, is a complete turnaround. She took my breath away with her soul-stirring rendition of the war-sentiment ballad. Accompanied by acoustic picking guitar, she soars like a lonesome bird with despondency and solitude on Thanh Tung’s “Mot Minh.” On Pham Minh Tuan’s “Thanh Pho Tinh Yeu Va Noi Nho,” she pours her heart out on one of the most moving red-music tunes from Viet Nam. (They didn’t grant her the NSUT title for nothing.)

Her version of Ngo Thuy Mien’s “Rieng Mot Goc Troi” comes closest to Tuan Ngoc’s if not as good. Although she couldn’t grab the high notes like him, she could reach the low notes deeper than him. You can feel the complete isolation when she phrases “Toi da choi voi / Rieng mot goc troi.” On Trinh Cong Son’s “Lang Le Noi Nay,” you can hear that she has lived the lyrics and tasted the bittersweet tang of love: “Tinh yeu mat ngot mat ngot tren moi / Tinh yeu mat dang mat dang trong doi.” On Thuan Yen’s “Chia Tay Hoang Hon,” the inexplicable bleakness of her voice makes you want to slit your finger and write “Please don’t go” on a mirror with blood.

Duc Huy’s “Va Con Tim Da Vui Tro Lai” is a perfect album closer. Her voice lights up the dark corners and brings hope to love and forgiveness to life. What makes the album so addictive is that most of the arrangements are kept to the minimal to allow her vocals to do the seductions. The end result is just pure magic. The title of the album is taken from a line from “Rieng Mot Goc Troi” to suggest her voice as “a drop of fading sunshine” but far from waning. To me, her voice is like fine wine that gets better and spicier with age.

Let’s make it official: No rapper could balance pussy and poetry as skillful as Ghostface Killah. Ghostdini, his new release, is the proof. On “Stapleton Sex,” Ghostface takes hardcore pornographic rhymes to a new ground. He spits like a horny bastard on doses of viagra: “Yo my, face is wet, got hair on my tongue / Cause I’m a greedy nigga, absorb pussy juice like a sponge / Feel the pretty warm dick, rub it on your clit / Oh, right before I bust, I spray it on your tits.” Elsewhere, “Do Over” and “Baby” with Raheem DeVaughn on the hooks, Ghostface comes off raw yet strangely charming. Ghostdini is choked full of R&B guest spots, but they don’t get in his way.

In a recent interview, Pham Anh Khoa claims that Lam Sao Noi Het is his best album ever. Giving that he only released two CDs, what he really mean is that he can’t make any record louder and more obnoxious than this. On the title track, he can’t seem to say everything so he wails over the noisy rock guitar riffs. “Throw Away” would be a more suitable title for this album. Yes, please throw this shit away.