Quang Dung – Va
Let’s face it. Marriage kills your sentimental mood. It’s good for a guy like me, but not so for a guy like Quang Dung. I don’t make a living baring my soul; he does. In his new album, Va, he covers mostly heart-rending ballads, but he sounds more pathetic than persuasive.
Right off the opening track, Lam Phuong’s “Mot Minh,” you can tell that he’s not feeling it. When a man, who is married to a beautiful wife and welcomed a cute son into his life, sings about loneliness, do you really believe him? He doesn’t convince me at all. How pitiful is that for a man to cry on a woman’s shoulder: “Anh khoc tren vai em / Anh khoc tren vai em / Mot lan cuoi, mot lan cuoi cung?” He must be her bitch. Some songs you just can’t switch the role and assume that it will sound right.
Musically speaking, Va is just an average work. Le Quang’s productions are generic and sedative. Can’t blame the producer for not feeling inspired when Quang Dung hardly pushes his vocals. Even on a mid-tempo “Tieng Dan Toi” (by Pham Duy), he doesn’t even switch up his flow to ride with the beat. He plays safe throughout the album by delivering only in his comfy range and refusing to take chances. Evaluate between his and Tuan Ngoc’s version of Tu Cong Phung’s “Tren Thang Ngay Da Qua,” and you’ll see clearly why Tuan Ngoc is still irreplaceable.
I totally agree with Donny!
Quang Dung’s new album Va is the most boring work of Quang Dung so far. From technical vocal level to the musical arragement is a bad choice to produce.
Quang Dung could not at all deliver the soul of the songs, he just did the same monotone & boring crooning through the rest of the entire album.
In his rendition of Tu Giong Hat Em, Quang Dung really tried to show off his vocal skill but unfortunately he accidentally killed the song without knowing it. The musical arrangent is an off beat style which also reduces the beauty of a original moderately slow tempo. Quang Dung had tried a bit hard to catch up with the beat as well as the high note which left him out of the feeling mood. General speaking, Khanh Ha is the only one who can deliver it perfectly with her heart & soul as well as technical aspect.
His voice got a bit shaky in some songs even though he tried to cover it up by sustaining his vocal, but unforunately, the more he did the more he revealed his weakness.
The musical arragement is just a repetition tune from the beginning of Mot Minh until the last song Da Khuc Cho Tinh Nhan. Nothing special but a boring mood which puts you into sleep without knowing it.
In short, this album lacks of the investment in time to absorb the old sentimental songs which are sung by a few successful former singers already. That’s my 2 cents!
toyota, your two cents was hard to accept, very bad grammar
Khanh, your grammar is not much better than mine! :)
two cents are not worth as much as they used to these days
Toyota’s view is great. Very articulate, and not just a line or two like “Quang Dung sucks.” He didn’t repeat what I said either. Thanks for sharing.
toyota, i doubt my one line is enough for you to judge my grammar
Khanh, you need to look at the picture with a whole POV not just trying to dig in a small tiny part to find dirt in it.
Ok, my typo “arrangent” as it should be “arrangement” & “…the beauty of a original moderately” as it should be “…the beauty of an original moderately”.
If you find my post hard to accept just because of my grammar, then please raise your view point!
Thanks Donny for your positive feedback! You rock as always!!!
My two cent is that khanh need to get a life :) At least Toyota can write a paragraph. khanh can barely put together a sentence… hmmm
QD sucks từ cái lúc hát Ru Tình, phát âm không chuẩn 1 vài chữ là coi như xong! Sao VN thì chẳng cần đòi hỏi gì cả, nhìn kìa: DVH, Phương Thanh, Đan Trường, Ưng Hoàng Phúc…
toyota and hoang,
with all do respect, i find it hilarious that people get offended when i give my honest opinion
it’s not so much the spelling because i do applaud your views
i believe you have quite a creative mind, but find it quite difficult to digest what you are trying to get across – it is ashame because i know you are quite passionate about your POV
it’s like eating your favourite dish but having to winse in the process – not a good experience, if you know what i mean
just an opinion
Khanh, your sentences should start with capital letters,and end with periods. Also, it’s “I” not “i”:)
Sorry, I can’t help it :)
Oh hell, someone called the grammar police before me.
fight baby fight :)
This is so funny! It’s not an essay we’re writing…
And if it is, no mark for writing off topic …he he
Again, QD has chosen to cover old songs by famous songwriters/ and successful singers. It is in a way a short cut, as the songs have been successful and had withstand the test of time. However, to sing them at different tempo, or to to have the music arrangement in a different genre/ beats can be difficult for the die hard fans of these old songs, in particular songs that were sung by Khanh Ha/ Tuan Ngoc.
However, QD may catch attention of some new audiences, esp younger audiences who have no idea of the songs, or even who KH/TN are. I’ve known some pple who likes QD’s covers of Dan Chim Viet/ Hoai Cam/ Mat Le cho Nguoi/ Ngam Ngui/ Tuong Niem…which i found he sang pretty ordinary.
I myself has dropped QD out of my fav list since his cd Nguyet, as i found the songs were better covered by Quang Linh/ Tran Thu Ha.. Since then his songs choices were pretty ordinary and boring. A few exceptions here and there of course. He’s still a good singer.
About Pham Thien Nhien comment about pronunciation. It is difficult for some singers to have to sing purely in Northern accent. I think as long as the singers pronunciation is nice it should be OK/ acceptable. A singer with unique pronunciation can have a big fan group, and Thanh Thuy is a big example. Has she sung with perfect pronunciation, i don’t think it would be as phenomenal. We don’t really want to have lots of Thanh Lam/ Hong Nhung / Bang Kieu/ Khanh Ly…etc…I think also depend on what songs the singers sing…You can not expect “nhac tre bay gio” sang in ” phong cach classic “.. One Vietnamese judge in Australia Viet Talent Quest surprise me by saying the vietnamese contestants always mis- pronounced, whereas all the Westerners sing correct english…God, I do believe his english is good enough to judge the westerner contestants…
In summary, i am not interested in QD covers of old songs, They are not bad, but boring and not convincing enough but he’ll have his audiences.
Never mind the grammar, this is a good discussion. Well said, Lam Dien, but I beg to differ your point:
“to sing them at different tempo, or to to have the music arrangement in a different genre/ beats can be difficult for the die hard fans of these old songs, in particular songs that were sung by Khanh Ha/ Tuan Ngoc.”
This is where Quang Dung fails miserably by singing exactly like what his older generation had done, but less effective and more boring. If he steps out of the written melody, puts in some fresh changes like changing up the tempos (I don’t mean club tempo), sings in different keys, and gives some personality into the songs, I am sure he could please both the old and new comers.
I disagree with Lam Dien’s comment about my comment.
nhien, i can’t read your post properly
a reader, thanks for wasting your couple of minutes on me, unfortunately, i care not for punctuations, especially on blog/chats
I cannot absorb some of QD’s mispronunciation. In Ha Trang, he phat am qua “ngong”, ruined the whole song. QD is overated.
I agree that young singers should cover old songs differently.
Among young singers, I find that only Duc Tuan can cover old songs best. He puts his personal stamp in there, sings them differently and still good.
khanh, you still don’t get it do you? Of course, I don’t really care about how you’d write. I just sometimes did it for fun with anh donny, but in your case, did you forget it was YOU who started the whole grammar shit with toyota? If it’s just blog and chats,than you should be just quiet in the 1st place,ignorant!
Sorry anh donny
a reader,
get what?
apparently you do care, otherwise you wouldn’t be so upset
did what for fun with donny?
no, i didn’t forget any thing
hrm, i posted my opinion about toyota’s grammar, was that starting shit? if so, what does that have to do with you? and if it does, what have i forgotten? you confuse me a lot
isn’t the whole point of chat and blog to put out an opinion? why tell me to keep quiet?
confused – some people are quite funny
I prefer my old man TuanNgoc !
Infact I think he and Khanh Ha
are the only 2 Viet artists that
I actually buy CDs.. :)
Yup.. never did buy any others..well I did bought a couple of Ngoc Lan’s CDs and videos cause she also sounds great in a very
different way.
Dear a reader,
I really appreciate it when you did it ;)
Oh thanks anh donny :) You’re so cool…Best wishes…
Chi. Thu Hoai, I wish I could listen to your singing. Do you have any links to your songs? Have you ever recorded any?
Reader, you’ll fall in love with Thu Hoai if you listen to her voice! Very captivating & sexy voice! Her music sense is Khanh Ha & Tuan Ngoc, so I think you’ll figure it out!
wooh !! I feel sexy now that you said my voice is sexy !! :) Thanks Toyota :)
If you live in the Philadelphia area you can hear me live almost every weekend. Email me and I will let you know my band schedule.
hinht@hotmail.com
I have some live recordings they are very soulful, lively but distorted because of the background noise. When I have
something worthwhile I will let Donny know so he can hook it up.
okay,thanks
I’m, however,from Canada. I can only wait ’till anh donny hook something “worthwhile” up :). You’re being so modest here chi. TH :)
@ Thu Hoai,
I’m glad that I have made the right comment about your voice Thu Hoai! I have indeed listened to your voice via your band’s website. Your vocal technical skill is great & your feeling is awesome! Please keep up the great work!
@ Reader,
I’m sure it’s worth the wait! If you like Khanh Ha’s & Tuan Ngoc’s style, then Thu Hoai’s voice is another new KH-TN’s era!
Have a great musical day!
http://www.myspace.com/thuhoaimusic
http://www.myspace.com/thuhoaimusic
http://vids.myspace.com/index.cfm?fuseaction=vids.showvids&friendID=368417598&n=368417598&MyToken=ee41c713-acf7-4045-884f-32ec3b8ed6d8
Hi friends,
Since you all make me feel so confident about it.
This is the site where I put live
performances so friends can see it
but you can hear that this recording session is not hook up directly to the equipment. It was just recorded from the sound within the room our band play.
Thanks for your kind words. You guys make me feel brave enough to give you this link. I will hook up
the songs I sang at Donny’s wedding soon then for you to listen to.
Th
Opps, someone hooked myspace to the website already.
I will work on transfering Donny
’s wedding songs to this site.
Have a great day !
TH
since he is married to jenny he cant hit a tune….!! she is jusst like a bitch with the bad face
Khanh you need to shut the fcuk up! Going around telling people that their grammar is bad while yours is VERY LAUGHABLE itself – HA! Get off your high horse, you imbecile =)
anonymous,
why would i need to do that?
can one not voice their opinion up on others? do you have an issue with that?
or perhaps, you do, because you think that your english is so much better than every one else’s?
i find it quite funny, how some one can be so “educated” like yourself to be using such colourful language
obvously education does not go hand in hand with decency
Thu Hoai, I’ve tried,but couldn’t hear well. Maybe I should wait for a better link or something. Thanks a lot ok?
Well, Khanh just loves to fight for fun. At least I can raise my points about QD’s new CD as well as other people.
Khanh just could not write a single line about what he/she thinks about the original post from Donny but started the whole b/s with my bad grammar. Very shallow minded & need to grow up!!!
No more comments about you Khanh & no need to correct my grammar thank you very much!
Khanh, just 1 more for the fun of it:
“a shame” not “ashame”
He he
Everyone, that WAS for me. I deserve every words of it. I am such an ignorant bitch!
Not a bad album at all. I can listen to Quang Dung all day long because none other vietnamese singers out there that have the same voice. Tell me if I’m wrong but Tuan Ngoc’s voice is too “tho” not as soft. Singer Tuan Ngoc can sing “some” songs no other singers can compare. However, that’s “some” songs. Quang Dung does it all. I’m not a big fan of this type of genre mainly because I can’t find any singers that have the voice to show it. Yet, ever since Quang Dung started singing, I felt in love with this kind of music.
I don’t know much about viet songs. But all I know is that Quang Dung came out with more albums and cds compare to Tuan Ngoc, Nguyen Khanh, and Tran Thai Hoa. That says a lot about the singer.
I still can’t work Quang Dung out. I would prefer Tuan Ngoc. Who would not?