Mingus’ orchestration on this six-piece suite is psychologically amazing. Through his rich textures, vibrant tonal colors and expressive rhythms, one could feel the suffering, struggling and mourning in his conceptual compositions. “Group Dancers” is my personal favorite. I can’t get the exquisite eastern melody, the breathtaking flamenco guitar and the dizzying horn lines out of my head.

Tu Quyen is a pop singer who doesn’t follow the latest trend. She is just way behind the trend. Her newest album, Em Van Yeu, sounds as if it has been shelved a decade or so ago and only get released recently by Thuy Nga production. Seriously, when was the last time you heard the Chinese tune with the chorus that goes something like, “Wo ai ni, I love you / Wo ai ni, I need you?” How does she do it? How the hell is she not sick of singing the song when I am already sick of listening to it?

Listening to Em Van Yeu gives me a second thought about Nhu Loan’s Trai Tim Da Duoc Yeu. Between the two albums, I am not sure who is the worse. Vocal wise, Tu Quyen is no better Nhu Loan. Her voice is weak and she has no range either. She sings the title track as if she is merely reading through the lyrics with no emotional expression and no attempt to get beyond her comfort zone.

Musically, Tu Quyen demonstrates no originality. She not only covers old tunes, but she does so with no creative or inventive effort. The arrangements are typical of Thuy Nga’s quality: cheap and manufactured. Em Van Yeu was put together just for the sake of making an album and an opportunity to sell the album booklet. Maybe the album’s glamorous photo shot is worth more than the album itself.

Holy shit, Vanilla Ice is Back and he covers hip-hop classics. Though I am not ashamed to admit that “Ice Ice Baby” grooved me and I could still recite some of the tune’s rhymes. So when come across a “comeback” album for the Iceman, I couldn’t resist. I have to give the fake-ass wigger a spin.

“Ice Ice Baby” kicks off the album and the memories are all back. The catchy riff sampled from Queen’s “Under Pressure” is still contagious as hell. Although he has remixed that joint to death, the original version is still the illest. No one can take that shit from the Iceman. As soon as Public Enemy’s “Fight the Power” comes on, I just can’t imagine what Chuck D would do when he listens to the record. The real jokes, however, are both the rock cover of House of Pain’s “Jump Around” and the jungle-fever rendition of Sir-Mix-a-Lot’s “Baby Got Back.”

Although the Ice age has melted a long long time ago, Rob Van Winkle has yet to leave rap alone. And he knows damn well that the game doesn’t need him.

Christmas had passed by, but I still have not passed up Bela Fleck & the Flecktones’ Jingle All the Way. Like the title suggested, Bela and his trio take Christmas songs and jingle them all the way.

I played the album for the first time at my in-law’s Christmas party and folks looked at me like I have a strange taste of music. The opening track alone is one of the most unique versions of “Jingle Bells” we have ever heard. They couldn’t understand what language the male’s vocalist was singing. I don’t either, but it doesn’t matter. It just sounds so freaking cool. Of course, Bela on the banjo is simply breathtaking.

Because Bela and the Flecktones had chosen such well-known Christmas tunes, they have the creative freedom to go all out. The result is that the group has created fresh new sounds to familiarized songs. Some of my personal favorites are “Silent Night,” “Sleigh Ride,” “Twelve Days of Christmas” and “Linus and Lucy.”

Don’t take my words for it. Find out for yourself by checking out “Bela Fleck Gives Christmas A Flecktone Fervor” on NPR.

As Thuy Nga dedicates its 94th show reflecting on Paris By Night’s 25 years of existence as a populist art form, some of us have been so crude to question, what the heck are we celebrating exactly? After damn near 100 endless repetitions of musical episodes, nothing more than the young shows more skins and the old shows more wrinkles.

Love it or hate it, PBN has become part of Vietnamese pop culture and it is now inseparable from our mainstream entertainment. Looking back, PBN has grown into a big enterprise. With all the razzle-dazzle staging and lighting, the show costs millions to produce. Its music repertoires, however, remain extremely limited. The most critical dismissal of PBN and its competitors (Asia and Van Son) is the recycling of songs, but none of these productions give a shit. As long as there is a market out there, they will continue to rape the culture. Even with the piracy, PBN will be around for at least 25 more years, so stop bitching already.

If we wake up tomorrow and there will be no PBN, we would find out what kind of value it holds. The moment PBN would vanish from the marketplace, the moment we would find out if PBN were truly a cultural force or a manufacturing product. But I won’t be holding my breath waiting to see.

Early this year Phan Dinh Tinh announced that he would release twelve albums in 2008. Needless to say, he was trying to do the impossible although he dropped three albums—Tung Teen, Tung Trinh (Trinh Cong Son) and Tung Ballad—in the first few months. Tung Ballad fits his style best. With several young songwriters, he released four more—Tung Chung (Nguyen Van Trung), Tung Thuan (Nguyen Hong Thuan), Tung Phong (Nguyen Hai Phong) and Tung Teens 2—at the end of the year.

Time has run out on him and he could only cut seven out of twelve like he had publicly claimed. Seven albums in one year is still quite an accomplishment, but why in such a rush? He’s still young and has plenty of time on his hand. He should have taken his time to do it right. Crafting an album takes careful attention and skillful listening to choose the right tracks and throw out the fillers. Instead he just release four very generic albums. You can put all four on random and still can’t tell them apart except for the kiddy tunes like “Cop Con,” “Hat Bui Le Loi” and “Chu Cuoi Xi Tin.”

Tung has a distinctive tenor of a voice, but has only one style of delivery. All of his songs ended up sounding quite monotonous and the manufactured productions don’t help much either. After going through four albums on my road trip from Virginia to New Jersey, the only track stood out was “Troc,” a song about his baldness written by Nguyen Hai Phong. The rests are consistently formularized.

In my initial review of Kanye West’s 808’s and Heartbreak, I was too quickly turned off by Auto-Tune that I didn’t give the album an opportunity to grow on me. After many revisits, I am starting to convince that Kanye has made a good use out of the tool. He can’t sing, yet he didn’t use Auto-Tune to enhance his vocals. His pitch and breath issues could be heard all over the tracks; however, he used the program to create a unique voice.

On the contagious “Love Lockdown,” Kanye starts off singing over the thumping bass. The best use of Auto-Tune is on the high register where he distorts his voice into a screeching alien. Of course the catchy chorus is highlight of the track. The drum loop is just irresistible. “Coldest Winter” is another highly addictive track with the banging beat. Lyrically, Kanye still has his witty moment. On “Welcome to Heartbreak” he rhymes, “My friend showed me pictures of his kids / All I could show was pictures of my cribs / He said that his daughter got a brand new report card / All I go was a brand new sports car.”

The album has quite a share of its dull tracks, but there are a still a number of outstanding ones including “Say You Will,” “Heartless” and “Amazing” featuring Young Jeezy. The most accomplishment of 808’s and Heartbreak is that Kanye has proved his originality, talent and fearlessness in taking his music to a higher level.

Ngo Thanh Van has stepped up her game. Her newest release, Nuoc Mat Thien Than, proves that her music has been upgraded from really bad to not so bad. She knows that her fragile voice alone can’t carry the album; therefore, she relies on the beats and the rapping to make up for her singing.

With infectious, club-driven beats and tolerable raps, NTV cuts the most listenable record so far in her singing career. From the rock-hip hop “Di Tim Binh Yen” to the highly catchy “Mai Mat Nhau” to the booty-shaking “Tinh Yeu Nhac Nhoa,” Nuoc Mat Thien Thien comes on like an all-night-out party taking the girls out of school and into the dark, wild club. Put this record on high volume and you’ll guarantee to be sweat.

Of course the album isn’t perfect and NTV has her limitations. Her weak voice is not ready (or may never been ready) to take on slow-pop songs like “Khi Tinh Yeu Den,” “Tham Mong” and “Giot Nuoc Mat Mau Den.” Nevertheless, I wouldn’t have imagined that she could make some improvements. The album hits the mark for clubbing functionality.

This is a very different record of Trong Tan. For one, he doesn’t pound the songs with his sledgehammer-like voice. For two, he tries to sing northern folk music that requires tremendous versatility. Unfortunately, he doesn’t have the chops to maneuver his way around the nuances of Quan Ho. Sort of like banh beo without fish sauce; his flow misses the key ingredient to deliver the folk tunes. Standout is the title track thanks to the jazz tinge and Thanh Thanh Hien whose vocals give colors to song.

With seventeen tracks clocking in around an hour and twenty minutes, Ho Ngoc Ha’s latest release, Noi Em Gap Anh, is unnecessary long. The record goes into one ear and out the other. Except for her timbre, which has become raspier, nothing is worth noting. While her sentimental vocals on Trinh Cong Son’s “Bien Nho” try to capture your heart, the glossy, poppy production tries to capture your feet. Not sure if you should break down and cry or break down and dance. Still, nothing beats her duet with Duc Tri on “Van Biet The.” Like the title suggested, he already knew he can’t, but he still sings. Do us all a favor by staying behind the board and away from the booth, dude.