well, to many of us chinese over here, i guess most of us are familiar with the famous song 月光 (literally translated into 'moonlight') by 王心凌 (cyndi wang), which was released in 2004 under the album 'cyndi loves you'. a gentle song with a smooth flowing melody which many of us like. in fact i used to like it a lot, and still quite like it now.

whether you have listened to it before or not, take a few minutes to go through this youtube video of the song.

then some of the people will go... NOOOOO THAT IS NOT THE ORIGINAL VERSION! SHE RIPPED OFF paid homage to 島谷ひとみ (shimatani hitomi)!! then you probably go... yeah she ripped off referenced quite a few other songs too like from M2M's 'the day you went away' and SweetS '虹色の永遠' (nijiiro no eien / rainbow-colored eternity). ok anyway that's not the main point, and i don't believe it is her fault. her job is to sing, not to decide what to sing, i think. those of us who noticed that she ripped off borrowed from shimatani hitomi will most likely also know that the original title is 亜麻色の髪の乙女 (amairo no kami no otome / the girl with the flaxen hair), released under the single 亜麻色の髪の乙女, in the year 2002.

so again, whether you have listened to it before or not, spend another few minutes to just go through the video below to see the difference. the tempo of the music as well as the melody had some obvious changes.

and then, only the true pros would notice yet another thing! that shimatani hitomi is not the original singer of this song! and yes praise me more now you readers! this very song 亜麻色の髪の乙女 was sung by the boyband group ヴィレッジ・シンガーズ (village singers) in.... THE YEAR 1968!!

of course, for many of us chinese, few of us would have known that the song was taken from hitomi, except for those of us who are familiar with the japanese music circle. and even among us, even fewer would know that this was also actually taken from a song which was already floating around wayyyy back before we were born.

anyway, probably by now, if you have read until here, you would be very interested and probably shouting STOP THE NONSENSE AND TELL ME THE LINK TO THE LAST AND THE MOST ORIGINAL OF THE SONG! so, here we go. the user who uploaded the video on youtube disabled embedding of that particular video. so all you have to do is to click on the link below to bring you to youtube. enjoy, this particular song, which everyone thought was a song meant for female singers, yet actually sung by a group of males.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=YAvFoixk240

sometimes, when i listen to a particular song, a certain feeling or memory would come back to me. just like how i used to listen to mizuki nana's heaven knows and crystal letter when i was playing the game perfect world. at that time, i only had that few nana-chan's songs, and that's why the music kept looping. the 2 songs were at the top of my playlist, among other japanese songs.

anyway, my point is, sometimes when we do the things we used to do in the past, it brings back memories.

my friends would probably know, i usually only listen to japanese songs. i don't listen to english or chinese. i used to, though, but nowadays the music evolved to a state that i no longer like it.

i scrolled back my ipod to the playlist where i have my westlife, backstreet boys songs. yar, you guessed it, they are old. it brought back memories to when i was a teenager. up until the early 2000s, perhaps 2002 or 2003, the boybands were quite famous. but it was around 2004 onwards that their decline was obvious and fast, and before long bands like greenday and busted, and some individuals like akon came out. at that point in time, the songs had already evolved to a new kind of music. i still listened to it though, but after a while, i switched to japanese, and listened up till today.

i remembered the first boyband i liked was westlife. in fact i still kind of like them now. the first song that attracted me to them was 'coast to coast', and 'if i let you go' became my favorite at that time. 'larger than life' made me realized the existence of backstreet boys, and among their songs i like 'shape of my heart' the most. m2m was also one of my favorite bands, above backstreet boys and below westlife. 'pretty boy' got me hooked for a long long time. michael learns to rock, blue, n'sync, plus one, a1 and bands/singers of that 'era', well i suppossed you know them, they were really quite famous. i loved their songs. not all, but they always had that trademark songs which defined their success. sleeping child, 25 minutes, it's gonna be me, best in me, last flight out, learn to fly, caught in the middle.... etc. i am sure, you know them too.

as i listened to each of these songs, it brought back memories to which i had usually forgotten unless something happened which reminded me of them. the time when i fell in love for the first time, the time when everybody in school were using those cool songs for our drama production, when we sang along and memorized the lyrics, when i would envy my friend because he got a poster signed by westlife. actually i still envy him now.

the songs, at that time, were awfully like chinese songs, which talked mostly about failed relationships, one-sided love, and everything except a happy romantic relationship. although it was more to the sad side, i still kind of like it. it was just too bad that the the boybands had to disband, m2m had to split up...etc. the current cool songs now, be it chinese or english, did not really attract me. i seriously do not like them that much.

it is the same for chinese songs. i would rather listen to songs in the 1990s and the early 2000s than songs now. songs of current era, give me the japanese. haax.

for now, i would probably start compiling a list of the old songs i used to have but for some reason lost it, be it chinese or english. and probably for a while, i will stop listening to japanese. i wonder, how the future will change the way music is produced, and what i will listen to in a few year's time.

listen to one old chinese song. it used to be my favorite when i was in primary school. the first song i really really got addicted to. i was 10 at that time. although the lyrics did not apply to me then. hahahaha.

少女病 (Shoujo Byou), or literally translated as girl disease, is a doujin group producing music and songs, as well as sing them. well i think they are a doujin group. as to how they look like, seriously i have no idea. google doesn't offer me any pictures, the famous chinese search engine baidu too.

anyway, it doesn't really matter. since there are singers who don't exactly look pretty but still sing very nice songs.

so i just managed to got a big part of their discography in my computer and was listening to them. although as with all singers, not all their songs are nice, but there are certainly a few that are worth listening to and putting on your playlist.

hmm among the list of their songs, the famous 砂漠の雪 by mell was also included. well some say the original by mell sounds better, but for me i think 少女病 sounds better. well, personal preference. hmm hmm how to say.. i like the music in 少女病 but i prefer mell's voice. serious. for mell's version the music is a bit too noisy to my liking. aww. if only they could combine, it would be perfect. i like mell's voice. but regardless, both of them sing it very well.

少女病's songs usually have this smooth, gentle voice, that makes it nice to listen, especially if you are not that into hardpop, hardrock, or metal.. you get the idea.

well so if you have the time, take time to listen. i kind of like their songs.

anyway if you want to know, their website is at http://www.girldisease.com/index.html

currently listening to: color of happiness (少女病).

yeapx, this video is 6 months old, around there. but i just saw this from another website recently, and thought it is kinda cool. well i have like miku-chan all along. in fact she is so famous (well i guess she is not over here in singapore) that they based black rock shooter on her. she sang the song, and the character design looks awfully like her. hahax. anyway enjoy this video.

so, i finally opened the parcel. and there i see a wonderful and totally pretty face of mizuki nana. there are 3 pictures of her, one at the cover, one at the back, and one on the inside. the packaging this time is a bit different from the others, in that it does not have a full cd bracket. well it would be nice to change the style of packaging once in a while. but so far i prefer the type of packaging used as that of the single starcamp ep.

anyway, i still havent gotten to listen to the songs. because i just compiled back my instrumental music playlist, 3 months after my computer crashed. what an efficient person i am. and now i am addicted to these instrumental music i missed so much. oh, i have not add in the bgm of planetarian and narcissu, well a few specific tracks, and not the whole set of bgm. code geass and 07-ghost tracks are not added in too. and here and there.. but cannot remember as of now.

of course, before the end of tomorrow i will definitely listen to phantom minds. hopefully, i can add one or two more tracks into my ipod or playlist. i wonder how many listens do i have to take this time to get hooked to it. i don't know if it is that nana songs take many listens to like it, or that because i always play it and do my own stuffs and lost concentration on the music, that i have to listen many times.

anyway, among the instrumental music i have on my playlist, there is one special track that is actually a song, though i also have the instrumental version. for some reason, i really like the music, and find the lyrics interesting. so here i will post the lyrics. can anyone guess what is the title and where it comes from? this is quite an old song. hint: it comes from an anime, and the song fits the theme, very very much.

although, there will be no prize for correct answers. so here we go:

Who are those little girls in pain just trapped in castle of dark side of moon
Twelve of them shining bright in vain like flowers that blossom just once in years
They're dancing in the shadow like whispers of love just dreaming of a place where they're free as dove
They've never been allowed to love in this cursed cage
It's only the fairy tale they believe

They're dancing in the shadow like whispers of love just dreaming of a place where they're free as dove
They've never been allowed to love in this cursed cage
It's only the fairy tale they believe