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Remember i wrote about the interview i had with the three Italian singers from the group IL Volo consisting of Piero Barone, Gianluca Ginoble and Ignazio Boschetto? The day of the showcase finally came – Experience an Enchanted Journey with Il Volo Live in Malaysia.

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The tagline of the day was “I’m here to be Amazed!” and for anyone watching them perform for the first time.. they were truly amazed. I spoke to a couple of people that night, and they mentioned they never knew about Il Volo, let alone enjoyed opera music. After that night – it was a different story for them. :)

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The auditorium was seriously jam packed with screaming fans.. young and old. I couldn’t help smiling as i saw the much older audience, that sat right in front, jump up and down while waving their hands in the air… very much like the younger generation at the back of the room. I bet the young girl fans of the boys were sulking at the back as the audience in front – some old enough to be grandma’s – enjoyed the close up view of the Il Volo singers.

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The boys were astounding! You wouldn’t believe that those mature smooth sounding operatic voices came from just boys at the young age of 16 and 17. Marvelous performance. They were very comfortable on stage and they had just the right amount of charm to make the girls swoon in the audience.

And guess who we met along the way ^_^ winners from the IL Volo contest that RedFM had the week before!

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here’s Mynn, Yohanna, Tasha, Yaacob (at the back), Me and the lil brother Armin.

Was a real pleasure meeting you girls that day, and i’m quite certain that you are now hardcore Il Volo fans hehe. I sure do hope you guys had a blast at the showcase ^_^

For those of you who missed out on the showcase, here are videos of their performance. My favourite songs of the night IL Mondo and Painfully Beautiful. Oh my gosh.. all the songs were amazing, but Painfully Beautiful.. shucks.. i’ll just end up blushing if anyone were to sing a song with those lyrics to me. hehe i digress :P

I think it’s absolutely nuts. nuts. nuts!!! This maybe considered old news but this young girl is still a very hot piece to talk about. This girl, Rebecca Black is – as Lady Gaga would say – a genius! Her video which became an overnight sensation is insane and i have never seen anything go this madly viral before. May i please divert your attention mostly to the statistics below. Bare in mind.. i saw this video again at approximately 9.11pm on march 24th… and it was only 42 million over views. It is now 2am on the 25th of march and it’s showing me 43 million views. Wth??????? and also please note the red bar.. that shows how many dislikes it has.. Seeing that red bar is just hilarious!!!   Last Thursday, i updated my status saying i had the song stuck in my head!  It was -  if i clearly remember, i told him it had already gone up to 10 million views. This was Thursday!!!! And now it’s Friday….. lol… It’s Friday, friday – you have to read in context, i’m blogging about this on a FRIDAY! ahahahahahahhah – and it’s over 43 millions views. And now i’m reading this!  

Rebecca Black Scores Top 10 Debut on Social 50 Chart

The Social 50 chart welcomes its highest debut ever, as Rebecca Black arrives at No. 9 thanks to the enormous social media buzz she’s generated over the past week.

In short order, her much-maligned “Friday” clip went from over 2 million views on March 14 (already a feat in itself) to over 30 million on Mar. 21. Couple that with over 30,000 new followers to her just-launched official Twitter account over the weekend and you’ve got enough activity to generate her top 10 entry.

Lady Gaga: ‘Rebecca Black Is a Genius’

As previously reported, her “Friday” single arrived at No. 57 on Digital Songs with 37,000 sold according to Nielsen SoundScan while it also debuts at No. 72 on the Billboard Hot 100. Black isn’t the first so-called Internet meme to make the charts recently. Less than a year ago, on Aug. 28, 2010, Antoine Dodson hit No. 89 on the Hot 100 with the infamous “Bed Intruder Song” thanks to a remix by the Gregory Brothers.

Read full article here

 

You have to hand it to the girl. I pity her but man… she has turned everything upside down for me. The views she gets.. and now Lady Gaga’s approval OMGosh!! The song is bad, the lyrics are bad, the whole production is BAD… but… and there’s my BUT. It’s also GOOD! People usually talk about stuff that is bad and this song is just beyond horrendous and yet is stupidly smart. I see that there are a lot of conflicting statements here. Seriously whatever happened to good old music that HAS GOOD singing and GOOD lyrics. Whatever happened to all the Diva’s like Whitney Houston and Aretha Franklin… now we respond to good ol stupid music? If i have to suffer with the song in my head. Permit me to play it and infect your minds as well..

I haven’t updated for a while now and there are good reasons for that. Been terribly busy in other words. There are tons of things i actually want to post about but out of all of them, this really deserves a mention and also because it’s soo related with all the things i love. Music and some occasional gaming. hehe.

Got this from a friend asking me whether i was interested to watch an orchestra performance and not just any orchestra. It is Video Games Live! Ja Ja ja jeng!!

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What’s Video Games Live?

In short, for those of you who love gaming and/or who also happen to appreciate the fine music that is played for the theme songs and run in the background of any game (aka the soundtrack la). Then this is for you!

Highly worth it! I’m a huge fan of soundtracks, so to watch a live orchestra play songs to some very memorable games is a must see.

Video Games Live was started of by Tommy Tallarico and Jack Wall. I give my thanks and hates of to these two because they are literally bringing in a new demand to the music industry. Yes there are gamers, yes there are people who love their music and yes there are people who happen to be both! I think a lot of people miss out and take for granted how much time, effort is placed into composing music for video games to enhance one experience in the game.

 
Tommy Tallarico: photo credit to his facebook page by Alexandre Rosa

 

jackwallJack Wall the co-founder of VGL/conductor, photo credit: google >.<

This is a show that is worth my money being given to them hehe. An article with Hotxpress about Video Games Live here with an interview with Tomm y, Jack and featuring Laura Intravia (who is a beautiful flutist and she has an amazing operatic voice!) here’s a lil something something of what she has to offer at the concert.

 

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For further reading material.

You can see an interview with Tommy at Nintendogal here. Very in depth and worthy read for those of you just trying to see about a bit more about the founder who also happens to be a composer and about the video game/music industry.

I’m definitely booking my seat again next year.And this time front row! So i get to take better videos, pics and shake the hands of the people playing on stage!

P.S. Please please VGL if you are reading this pleaseeeeeeee for all that is humane and in love with gaming. Pleasseee put in Guild Wars! Even if the community here in KL don’t know about it, intro it! ^_^

I’m quite zonked out so I’ll give a full review with pics and videos in my next post. :)

Awesomeness! Absolutely awesome. I’m referring to Michael Jackson’s movie stage performance “This Is It”. Ladies and gentlemen, this really is “it”. The last and final works of MJ about to show the world that he is still King of Pop and always will be the ultimate performer. If you notice I’m not using “was” past tense here. Because I believe very much that MJ’s music is still alive with all of us. And it is because of that he himself will never die.

Watching the man perform at 50 and seeing creativity develop right from the core is spectacular. You are seeing the man himself preparing for millions and millions of fans out there who are eagerly waiting for him in London.

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This Is It” was the final curtain call for Michael Jackson as he stated this to the crowd during the press conference held inside The O2 arena. MJ had many reasons to perform this show. To let his kids – Prince, Paris and Blanket – watch the real performer their father was back in the day. Even at 50 years, the man is still the best performer in the world. Honestly if you were to watch him rehearse, you can see why he always comes up with the most fantastic performance. What caught me buy surprise though as I sat down in the cinema, was that the cinema was not even half full! The movie released nationwide on the 28th of October and when I had bought my tickets two weeks ago, according to the guy behind the counter, he told us that the movie was sold out. Oddly enough.. there weren’t that many people checking out the movie, despite it only being shown on the silver screen for two weeks. Maybe it has to do with the fact that it is shown around the same time as Halloween. Causing movie goers to skip a show or two. All the same, I enjoyed watching the last bits of MJ preparing for his best performance ever. La Toya may have her reservations that MJ won’t be pleased that the world may not be seeing the perfectionist at his best – cause after all, what we are watching is a rehearsal. However i think otherwise. Whilst the movie “This Is It” may just be a rehearsal of the legendary MJ making a come back, but it really goes to show much effort was placed into it. This is it mj “Everyone (the audience) is looking for escapism. They want to be entertained. So go at it at your best,” Michael Jackson. I paraphrased it a bit, but that was what he encouraged his crew members, dancers and singers as they huddled in a big circle after a rehearsal. How great is it. Just imagine, the fans.. FANS are dancing with Michael Jackson and these are fantastic dancers, singers included. They get to watch their idol perform for them.. for ‘free’. Eat your heart out So You Think You Can Dance, for this audition i think beats even that show. Performers, whom from a young age were inspired by MJ and started dancing or singing because of him, get their ultimate dream which is to perform right beside him.. I can only imagine how devastated the entire production team must have felt when MJ left them. MJ didn’t give a full out performance. Obviously not as he would probably be drained from doing it over and over again. You could see during the  rehearsal for ‘Thriller’ he didn’t go all out on the dance routine. His dancers however were going at 100%. Who wouldn’t, it’s Michael and he would expect nothing less. Speaking of that, I was really looking forward to at least catch a glimpse of the wonderful costumes that were prepared for the show. The costume designers were saying that there was technology not even out there yet such. The crowd would have been bedazzled with 4 million Swarovski crystals and lighted up using LED technology. Read more about that here. this is it costume MJ’s This Is It did not make anything big in the box office yet but it is well on its way to making history for a musical documentary. It already grossed in 2.2 million domestically on it’s first day. Read on here. Behind the glitter and glamour, the sweat and mistakes during rehearsals. MJ never once kicked up a tantrum. He knew his music and he knew what he wanted out of his production cast and crew. Whenever something went wrong, he would mention it politely saying, that it is not going right and they would have things rectified immediately. You can’t afford to waste time in not getting something imperfect for his last show ever. Every once in a while MJ would murmur.. “This is why we rehearse”. Knowing full well that by the time the show hits the road, everything would already be in place. MJ you are still King of Pop and we can say it is a waste that you left us too soon. There will be some of us who are glad that in your death.. whatever bad publicity that was out there has been washed away. People will now truly remember you for the performer that you are and were. None would be able to disagree with that. The man who brought the internet to a stop and caused all sorts of media to get jammed. As a young boy MJ started at his peak. And now even in death, MJ has left at his peak. Head on to Itunes to hear a snippet of his song “This is It”.

It’s now 2a.m. here in KL. Staples Center in Los Angeles has now begun the remembering of the man, the son, the father, the brother, the performer, Michael Jackson.

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I couldn’t watch all of it, but I’m glad that most of it is on CNN.com, Ustream/CBS News and Hulu/Fox News. All alternatives for those who can’t watch it on tv.  I also am glad for Astro Max which will allow me to tape it.

From what little I’ve watched, I want to say again how much I’m saddened and shocked by this wonderful legends death. Just only last week, one could still say that Michael was a living legend. But now he has gone on to join the great performers of our time in a better place.

Musician Smokey Robinson speaks during the memorial service ...

AP     Tue Jul 7, 1:44 PM ET

We had him as Queen Latifah mentioned, he was and is the biggest star on this earth. When he was alive, he commanded such presence and even in death – now – he commands the biggest presence ever in history probably. The whole world now mourns for him. He made new web history when he managed to even jam the internet. He JAMMED the internet! I never even thought that I would live to hear that.

You can view more of the memorial pictures here on yahoo. Click on the image below to take you to the gallery.

Michael Jackson

AP Photo/Mark J. Terrill, Pool

He will be sorely missed. The wonderful thing about his memorial is that, all those who have now travelled to pay their respects and even the millions of viewers who are watching his memorial now. They are all remembering him as the person that he was and not the personality. May we all remember the heart he had for others.

A fan holds a framed picture and a ticket to the Michael Jackson ...

AP     Tue Jul 7, 11:54 AM ET

Rest In Peace Michael!