Difference of artistic individuality in fashion

By Hafizul Hafis

Fashion is getting bigger and bigger and it keeps changing from years to years. I know some of today fashion looks weird but this is what some teenagers keep following the trends in fashion.

One of the example the fashion icon they follow is FKA Twigs.

Her wet baby hair and nose piercing styles became a hits in 2014 and it keeps growing and influencing people ever since. Her curly baby hair and hairstyle caught the fashion and media attention.

The artistry of her looks become a references for fashion people to express their creativity and a work of art.

Her nose piercing also give the creativity idea for fashion designer to make their art become astonishing. Nowadays, nose piercing is essential for fashion lover style.

FKA twigs is flexible style, artistic and aesthetically pleasing. You guys can look at her picture most of them can give an inspiration to fashion lover. Her performance outfit is very flexible and easy for her to do dance moves, and her iconic vogueing for her fans.

Next fashion icon is Grimes, her colorful hair give an inspiration to young teenagers to experimental with their hair.

She’s like use the light color such as like pink, green, turquoise, and etcetera.

She has a very decent and simple looks. Her style mostly looks like colorful style, and anime vibe. She can pull of any kind of looks and still look good.

She is very active and playful when it comes to her work.

If you take a look at her music video you will get inspiration if you get invite to costume event.

The last one fashion iconic is Brooke candy, for those like wild style you guys can follow her style.

She has a very explicit and controversial style. Her style is not suitable in Malaysia because you might get diss and bash by some citizen in Malaysia.

Eric Clapton's Slowhand: Album Review

BY AMIRY FAHMI

‘Slowhand’ is Eric Clapton’s 5^th solo album, released on 25^th November 1977 by RSO Records. Originally, the album only consists of nine songs, including two hit singles ‘Wonderful Tonight’ and ‘Lay Down Sally’, which reached various international music charts and were honored with numerous awards and recording accolades.

The name of the album was derived from Eric Clapton’s nickname, which was given to him by Giorgio Gomelsky – owner of Crawdaddy Club in London where The Rolling Stones, The Yardbirds regularly performed early on in their careers.

Later in 2012, the deluxe edition of this album was re-released and remastered that contained bonus tracks: a great version of ‘Alberta’, and previously unreleased tracks ‘Looking at the Rain’, ‘Greyhound Bus’, and ‘Stars, Strays, and Ashtrays’. These comprise Disc One of the set.  

Disc Two contained nine songs which were recorded live during Eric Clapton’s performance at London’s Hammersmith Odeon on April 27, 1977. These include riveting versions of ‘Tell the Truth’, ‘Knocking on Heaven’s Door’, ‘Nobody Knows You When You’re Down and Out’, ‘Stormy Monday’, ‘I Shot the Sheriff’, ‘Layla’ and many more.

All together this newer collection provides more than two hours of stellar music – a total of 22 tracks. Prior to the re-released of this album, the title of the album changed, ‘Slowhand 35^th Anniversary’, to commemorate the 35 years of this magical album.

While listening to this album, I was star struck at how eclectic Eric Clapton is. His range of music can vary from country, to blues, to pop and to even rock music. This album contained all elements of these genres.

As a guitar player myself, songs like ‘The Core’, ‘Cocaine’, ‘We’re All The Way’, ‘Lay Down Sally’, ‘Mean Old Frisco’, and ‘May You Never’ makes you understand how Eric arranges his musical concept and how he puts it into the final product. For instance, ‘May You Never’ is one of the peculiar method of song-writing that Eric Clapton contributed. The song starts off with the chorus in the beginning, instead, of the usual musical flow – that is the verse first, and then the chorus.

Other examples we can observe, is Eric’s blues rendition over a 12-bar blues (just three chords played over 12 bars), in which the guitar sings in correlation with the singer exquisitely – more or less like a call-and-response.

Overall, should you listen to this album? My answer depends on your taste of music. If you are interested and have been curious about Eric Clapton, and have not heard of him before, then you should give it a try. It is an album crafted by a master in song-writing, guitar playing, coupled with a husky singer in pop, blues, country and rock music.

Apart from that, this is one of Eric Clapton’s commercially and critically successful studio albums. Everything is interesting, from the familiar songs to the newer releases and live materials. Hits like ‘Wonderful Tonight’, and ‘Lay Down Sally’ will definitely get you moving one way or the other. At least I did. Just sayin’. 

Bob Dylan's 'The Freewheelin' Bob Dylan': Album Review

BY AMIRY FAHMI

            Robert Allen Zimmerman, or famously known as Bob Dylan, is one the most profound singer-songwriters ever to have graced our musical history. His brash and powerful lyrics driven of politics, philosophy, social and literary influences, have captured us all in awe. Although his songs were written way back in the 1960s, 70s and 80s, yet these songs are still lingering around our mind and has had overpowering memories for us to share.

            His second album, which I was able to fully experience last night, entitled ‘The Freewheelin’ Bob Dylan’ was truly a remarkable listening experience.

            Written in 1962 and released in 1963 by Columbia Records, Dylan’s second album consisted of 13 songs – 12 were acoustic and harmonica sessions and 1 (Corina, Corina) was a full band ensemble. Whereas his self-titled debut album, Bob Dylan, had only contained two original songs, Freewheelin’ represented the beginning of Bob Dylan’s song writing brilliance – eleven out of the thirteen songs on the album are Dylan’s original compositions.

            The album starts off with one of the most important and moving song of all, ‘Blowin’ In the Wind’. In this song, we listen to Dylan asking rhetorical questions about peace, war and freedom. Dylan depicts the song as a sad anthem of desperation for freedom in humanity. He poses a list of hypothetical questions that are questions people may say but cannot be answered. Dylan does not claim to know the answers, but beautifully sing in the chorus that the answers are out there, ‘blowing in the wind’.

            Other politically driven songs that gained heavy attention is ‘Masters of War’. With its rugged acoustic rhythm guitar in the background, Dylan’s voice and lyrics is truly powerful and superficial. Masters of War is not only a protest towards the Vietnam War, but towards war in general. It demonstrates the real nature of war – the ‘masters’ who initiate and orchestrate the wars are safe in their homes, while normal (and usually young) people are forced to go out to fight and fear for their lives. The song also talks about how these ‘masters of cowards’ think that by having an enormous amount of power, they can outweigh death and can buy forgiveness with money. Is your money that good / Will it buy you forgiveness / I think you will find / When your death takes its toll / All the money you made / Will never buy back your soul.

Bob Dylan

            As the album mainly consists of political compositions such as ‘A Hard Rain’s A-Gonna Fall’ which Dylan articulates the anxieties of nuclear warfare during the Cuban Missile Crisis; ‘Oxford Town’ a song about the first black-American to enroll at the University of Mississippi; ‘Talkin’ World War III Blues’ where Dylan writes about his dream of World War III and his visit to the psychiatrist; and ‘Down the Highway’ where Dylan sings religiously about his fear of not being able to land a position in the gardens of heaven, we can also dive into Dylan’s love life and social experiences.

            For example, ‘Girl from the North Country’ is a song that Dylan sadly sings about his former lover, Echo Helstrom who was Dylan’s high school sweetheart. Dylan’s lovely, sad and husky voice blends in exquisitely with the soft guitar plucking in the background and daunting harmonica playing in between. If you’re travelin’ to the North Country fair / Where the winds hit heavy on the borderline / Remember me to one who lives there / She was once a true love of mine.

            Apart from that, ‘Bob Dylan’s Dream’ is a song that I was immensely connected to. Drifting away from the love and political compositions he had written, this particular song sets apart from the rest. It is a sad depiction of the separation of friendship we all go through. The depressing thought of not having the opportunity to relive those moments with the ones we love, and how we long to reunite with the ones we had spent happier times with.

            In conclusion, ‘The Freewheelin’ Bob Dylan’ is one powerful, sentimental and musically simple album. It did not require such complicated musical concepts – although blues arrangements such as 12-bar blues was constructed in ’Down the Highway’, and folk-blues chord arrangements can be heard in numerous songs in the album.    

            One thing to remember, was that Bob Dylan was only 21 years old when this album came out. For someone at that age to blatantly and bravely come out and sing tunes that invoke freedom, peace and love is something to respect for at a higher degree.

            His music might not be one’s cup of tea, yet his words will definitely move you one way or another. Like the African-American jazz producer who produced this album, Tom Wilson recalled: "I didn't even particularly like folk music. I'd been recording Sun Ra and Coltrane (Jazz musicians) and I thought folk music was for the dumb guys. [Dylan] played like the dumb guys, but then these words came out. I was flabbergasted."

Yuna's 'Chapters': Album Review

BY AMIRY FAHMI

            As I put my earphones on, and listened to Yuna’s latest album Chapters, I realized something: I might have a little ‘crush’ on her.

            Chapters, her 5^th studio album, released on May 2016, is an album rich with soul and R&B influences with added elements of hip-hop and electronics – all of which combined with her soothing, sweet and silvery voice made the album a unique listening experience.

            The theme of this album revolves around overcoming heartbreak, which is typical in the midst of a multitude of heart-broken artists today. Although her songs depict the ups and downs of love, she also uses her originality by expressing her thoughts to words and music of her life experiences.

            The record starts with ‘Mannequin’, as Yuna’s soft vocals serenading an unnamed lover of her devotion in the face of love gone awry, and then entering her struggle to cope with the idea of love being a falsification, in an electronic-pop song entitled ‘Lanes’.

            Her famous song, ‘Crush’, gained much attention, especially with her collaboration with famous soul and R&B singer, Usher. Currently, this song is the most played song on her latest album on Spotify, being played already 20 million times around the world.

            Yuna also collaborated with young, new aspiring singer, Jhené Aiko, in a soul-electronic pop song, ‘Used to Love You’. The combination of Jhené’s strong husky voice, resembles with Yuna’s soft and angelic voice exquisitely.

            Besides her love anthems such as ‘Your Love’, ‘Too Close’ and her beautiful, sentimental ballad ‘All I Do’, are also songs that convey motivational messages as well as insights to her personal life experiences.

            ‘Places to Go’, is one song that separates itself from the whole album. It is a combination of hip-hop influences that corresponds with Yuna’s soul and sweet voice which strangely suit the occasion. Even listening to her sing in the first verse, resonates similarly to a well-known female R&B singer, Rihanna.

The beautiful and elegant, Yunalis Zarai.

            ‘Places to Go’, is a song that hits me personally, if not for many Malaysians. Here, Yuna talks about her difficulties in allocating herself comfortably to places around the world which she finds rejection on her doorstep regularly. Apart from that, the bevy amount of work she endures, and the amount of travelling she goes through, makes her feel a little homesick. ‘What’s the weather like in Kuala Lumpur / This time of the year / It’s so beautiful / I just need a place to call home / Cause I can’t be here no more, no more.’

            Her last song on the record, ‘Time’ is a beautiful one indeed. To end an album that contained such deep and meaningful messages, ‘Time’ was something that struck Yuna personally. She sings about her struggles and rejections in her early days, yet her love and passion for music continues to realize her dreams. She also sings about the death of her sister when Yuna was fifteen while her sister was battling cancer. But all of which comes down to the chorus, where her mother comes in and says: It takes time / It takes time, baby / It will be fine, yeah / It takes time, baby.

            As a Malaysian, I am proud of Yuna. Her success in breaking through the international music scene has put Malaysia in the limelight for the right reason. Her devotion and creativity has awarded her, currently, in the top Billboard R&B albums located at #16.

            Personally, I have huge respect for her, especially with her bold initiative to write songs about her difficulties. For her to allow millions of listeners to get a grasp of her personal life experiences, and successfully achieving it, is top notch.

            Why buy the album? Well, musically it compliments both her soothing voice and the different elements of her musical influences. This album shows her maturity in her music as she comes out stronger than her albums before. As a Malaysian, we should support our local talent to strive to achieve the American Dream. Many have tried, the likes of Siti Nurhaliza, Ning Baizura, and Jaclyn Victor, but none has made it as far as Yuna.

            Hopefully, this album will result her in a place among the nominees of the Grammy’s R&B album of the year. Personally, I reckon she has the chance to be nominated. However, to compete with artists such as Beyonce and Rihanna is difficult. Although, chances of her taking home the award are slim, even a nomination would get the whole Malaysian people up on their feet.

            With this being her most successful album of yet, it is a strong message and inspiration to young teenagers not only around the world, but here in Malaysia. For those young talented singers and musicians, their dreams can be achieved and that nothing stands in their way. Even if there is, Yuna has been through it, and she is where she is now.

            Apart from that, Yuna’s background education as a graduate with a Bachelor of Legal Studies (Hons.) degree in UiTM, Shah Alam, shows that having an educational foundation is perfectly fine in pursuing a musical career in the future.

            Yuna’s album Chapters, is appropriately titled as it is about the struggles of her life in love, music and family. As she depicts the end of her personal life in one chapter, we wish her luck for all of her success in a beginning of another chapter.