Namie Amuro – “WHAT A FEELING” PV

Yeah, I know I’m ruining my CD, but I just can’t help it. Today I spent an unhealthy amount of time whoring out the “WHAT A FEELING” PV. Say what you want, but it’s a damn good waste of time if you ask me. This song is sheer ecstasy. I don’t care what kinda stuff kids are on these days — this is what they should be on.

Admittedly, the PV isn’t as fantastic as the previous two (I’ll leave it up to you to YouTube them yourself) — in fact, it looks almost low-budget in comparison (perhaps they spent it on all the robots?) — but the song just about makes up for it. I say “just about” only because well, the first two PVs were like Hollywood blockbusters in their own right while this one mostly makes me glad I was only around for 1 year of the ’80s.

tsubaki – 覚醒ワールド 3/5

1. 覚めた生活
2. 悲しみの中からはじめよう
3. 亡霊ダンス
4. 青い月
5. さよなら、嘘つきな二人
6. ボーダレス
7. money&honey
8. coffee
9. タブレット
10. 羽の在処

Thinking back on my post yesterday regarding “best of” albums, I realized that I had forgotten a very important one which helped introduce me to one of my absolute favourite bands, tsubaki (つばき), not to be confused with the solo female artist. Their compilation Best Early Collection 2002-2004 made me a fan for good and I consistently return to the album when I’m in a good mood, a bad mood, or just a mood for good music. So it was out of sheer fan duty that I checked on their official website today and lo and behold: a new album! Titled 覚醒ワールド, roughly “World Awakening” according to Google, the album features what I believe are completely new songs since no singles have been released since the band’s last original album in May ‘07.

March 5th marks the release. In the meantime, check out some PVs from the group after the jump.

Namie Amuro – “WHAT A FEELING” Remix

1. NEW LOOK
2. ROCK STEADY
3. WHAT A FEELING
4. NEW LOOK (INSTRUMENTAL)
5. ROCK STEADY (INSTRUMENTAL)
6. WHAT A FEELING (INSTRUMENTAL)

I normally pride myself on being into things that no one knows/cares about, but one of my guilty mainstream pleasures is the self-proclaimed “queen of hip-pop,” Namie Amuro. Her latest single, 60s70s80s, a promotional tie-in with Vidal Sassoon, is a revision of classics from the 3 mentioned decades. The ’60s features a sampling of The Supremes‘ “Baby Love”; the ’70s Aretha Franklin’s “Rock Steady”; and the ’80s Irene Cara’s “What a Feeling”.

Now, the single’s not set to drop until March 12th, but today the 3rd track, “WHAT A FEELING”, premiered on Japanese airwaves and a remix version has been discovered on composer/producer Shinichi Osawa’s myspace (thanks to NATE @ JPM). The remix, though almost completely different from the original, is off the hook and I’ve been looping it for the past hour. (I would post up the radio rip for comparison purposes, but the quality is so bad it’ll make your ears bleed.) The song’s got me into a sort of trance, and I almost made an impulse purchase of both the CD+DVD version of the single and the PLAY tour — that is, before I ran into problems with PayPal. It seems like PayPal and CD Japan aren’t cooperating at the moment. I don’t know whether to be disappointed or relieved.