I attended the Spop Hurray Gala at the indoor stadium last night as my friend had an extra ticket.

I have to admit that I went mainly to see 蕭敬騰 in action. I wanted to see how powerful his voice really is 'live', having watched him on 星光. My friend went mainly to see Elva Hsiao in action hee hee. What a pair of unpatriotic Singaporeans we were!

I was blown away by his powerful voice, which literally cascaded over us wave after wave, although we were sitting at mid-level seats. Very shiok! My friend is now a convert hee hee.

Have to applaud the organisers for the line-up of performers that night; they had to either sing Singaporean-composed songs, or self-penned items. That was meaningful as it was a night to celebrate original music. I also loved the segment where Chen Weilian and Shi Xinhui sang my favourite xinyao duets 邂逅, 关于爱情 and 你的倒影.

What was not cool though, was... a lot:

(1) What was with the wardrobe and styling of our xinyao singers? Pan Ying was decked out in auntie hair and voluminous gown belonging to the 80s, and her thickly drawn eyebrows looked like they had never been erased since then. Ditto for Hong Shaoxuan's suit. Did Mediacorp not have enough money to provide a crew for these pioneers?

(2) Hosts Cuifang and 93.3FM deejay Peifen interviewed ex-SBC singers at the VIP seats. The supers went up on the screen as "Ex-SBC Singers", without displaying the names of those being interviewed. We saw Peter Chen (who had remained in the limelight so we were familiar with him) and a Mr Ye (who I luckily still remember is called Ye Zhen Wen). And four ladies, all whom were not introduced at all to the audience. At one point Peifen even looked directly at one of them as called her "这位小姐".

How disrespectful! It shows that the hosts did not do their homework, and that the organisers were more interested to sell their new finds rather than salute those who were no longer of financial value to them.

(3) Winner of the songwriting competition was a Malaysian. The song was rubbishy, the typical type that teenagers would write. Think 杨丞琳 or the earlier day 范晓萱. His competitor was a Singaporean, whose composition was mature and up to market standard. Of course, what should I have expected; the result was based on telephone voting. We all know who is more aggressive and willing to spend in that aspect.

Interestingly, a quick cruise through the Spop forum showed that people didn't even realise he was Malaysian until he let it slip during the concert. Hello, what's up organisers? Where's the 'S' in Spop now?

All in all... the event left a bitter taste in my mouth.

 

Labels: Cynic In The House, Sing A Song, The Patriot