- 穿越珊瑚海 (Across The Coral Sea)
- 越长大越孤单 (More Grown Up, More Lonely)
- 如果明天 (If Tomorrow)
- 我不是Rock N’Roll (I’m Not Rock N’Roll)
- 咖喱咖啡 (Curry Coffee)
- 蝶恋花 (Die Lian Hua)
- 爱的旋律 (Love Melody)
- 小丑 (Clown)
- 完美生活 (Perfect Life)
- 夜 (Night)
- 快乐星猫 (Happy Star Cat) [Bonus Track]
Firstly, let me say that after listening to almost exclusively Japanese, and occasionally Korean, music for the past year, it’s somewhat unnerving to suddenly hear Chinese music — that is, music which I actually understand. On one hand, it’s somewhat refreshing; on the other, I feel myself straining to listen to every word, to decipher what the artist is saying. Mandarin mixed duo milk@coffee makes this urge both rewarding and amusing, which brings me to my second point: this is no ordinary group.
Transitioning from rock ‘n roll to slow ballads to cutesy pop seamlessly, milk@coffee carries themselves with both a carefree playfulness and a dedication to good music. Referring back to what I said earlier, their songs/lyrics are a toss-up between the sheer nonsense (although all in good fun) of tracks such as “I’m Not Rock N’ Rock”, “Curry Coffee”, and “Happy Star Cat” and the melodic, somber pieces of “Across the Coral Sea” and “Night”. Naturally, the former bunch features mind-blowing lyrics such as “My temper is like curry.” What does that even mean? Your temper is spicy? Tasty? Hard to get off once you’ve spilled it on your favourite shirt?
Although the album is pretty great overall, I have to admit that I skipped a few tracks. Namely, the ballads simply because they were too slow for my attention deficit self. But the one that I absolutely would not touch is “Clown”. Maybe it’s because I’m still recovering from Strange Circus, but that carnival music just freaks me out. I advise you do the same unless you want clowns coming after you in your sleep.
But I digress. I initially eased off the Mando-pop because I was finding it too generic, too full of the cotton candy, rainbows, and prancing unicorns that seemed to dominate the music scene. However, if there are artists out there like milk@coffee, who are attempting to go against the grain and break from the tried-and-tired concepts, then I’ll gladly return.
I mentioned more tracks than usual, but here are the absolute favs: “Across the Coral Sea”, “I’m Not Rock N’ Roll”, and “Night”. YouTube goodness, as usual, is just after the jump. I would have found more info on the duo, but the last time I tried searching for stuff on Yahoo! China, my computer was blitzed by viruses. RIP.
