Journal

2009, The year I discovered the Asian pop scene, in which J-pop, K-pop & C-pop, have broken into my music in a MAJOR way. So it is time for my 2009 awards for albums & artists of the year. Because the Asian scene had such a major effect on my music interest this year, it got its own awards.

& The Nominees Are:.....

Asian Album of the Year

浜崎あゆみ (Ayumi Hamasaki) - NEXT LEVEL
安室奈美恵 (Namie Amuro) - Past<Future
alan - My Life
Brown Eyed Girls - Sound G.


Euro/Russian Album of the Year

Serebro - Opium
Ані Лорак (Ani Lorak) - Sun
Винтаж (Vintage) - Sex
Hadise - Fast Life


Asian Artist of the Year

浜崎あゆみ (Ayumi Hamasaki)
安室奈美恵 (Namie Amuro)
BoA
蔡依林 (Jolin Tsai)


Euro/Russian Artist of the Year

Винтаж (Vintage)
Hadise
Serebro
Ані Лорак (Ani Lorak)


Album of the Year

浜崎あゆみ (Ayumi Hamasaki) - NEXT LEVEL
安室奈美恵 (Namie Amuro) - Past<Future
Serebro - Opium
Ані Лорак (Ani Lorak) - Sun



Artist of the Year

浜崎あゆみ (Ayumi Hamasaki)
安室奈美恵 (Namie Amuro)
Винтаж (Vintage)
Serebro




& The awards go to!!...........

Award for: Asian Album of the Year:


安室奈美恵 (Namie Amuro) wins Asian scene album of the year with 'Past<Future', even though this album just hit the streets in Japan, 2 weeks ago (mid December 2009). Its easily the most ingenious j-pop album this year & even the sales in 2 weeks have topped the next best albums all year & in just 2 weeks! While Ayumi Hamasaki came a close runner up with a perfect album in Next Level, the deciding factor was Past<Future has 12 tracks, all songs & 'Next Level' has 14 tracks but 3 interludes, making Namie's album just scoring out as the winner.


Awards for: Euro/Russian Album of the Year & BEST Album of The Year


This surprises me, giving both these awards Ані Лорак (Ani Lorak)! Ani was of "wow she's so hot, but her music albums are just so/so", that was until this years album 'Sun' , Ani's new album was a perfect 14/14 & just blew me away this year, it goes right up there with Laura Pausini's past albums as a freakin masterpiece of adult pop/rock! Every song is amazing. Noteworthy mentions & props go out to Serebro on the Russian scene for a perfect 11/11, & of course Namie Amuro 12/12 & Ayumi Hamasaki 14/14, but with those 3 interludes. All perfect albums, but 14/14 wins out.


Euro/Russian Artist of the Year:

This is 'Винтаж (Vintage)' the are a pop/rock group from Russia, or are they Ukrainian? Whatever...they get my award for Artist of the Year, excluding Asia. They released their sophomore album 'SEX' this year, & while not as good as their 2007 debut album, its still damn near close to it. I discovered Vintage this year, and they have surpassed all but my absolute favorites of all time & I've only just discovered them this year! What a brilliant group this is!! LOVE'EM!



Artist of the Year, along with Asian Artist of the Year & lets throw in Best New Discovery, as this was my Asia Scene discovery year:

Here we have the big award, Artist of the Year. It is based on my overall scrobbles this year, and I take into consideration when I started scrobbling the nominees. My Asian scene discovery started with 浜崎あゆみ (Ayumi Hamasaki) & Namie Amuro at the same exact time. Therefore with Ayumi being scrobbled about 20% more than Namie, I give both these awards to her for this year. If you never heard of Ayumi, she is the Empress of the Asian Scene, from Japan, many may say Namie is slowly taking over this title on the J-Scene, but while I love Namie's sound & flow. Ayumi wins out this year.





Additional Awards worth a mention:

Domestic (U.S. Released) Album of the Year:


First let me explain, I don't really follow the domestic scene here. It was just by chance that this album crossed my path when xmas shopping at Borders. I never heard of Marie Digby & I don't buy a lot of domestic albums. Her new album 'Breathing Underwater' was on a featured display case. I gave it a quick sampling instore & loved what I heard, bought it & at home gave it my full attention. WOW was all I could say, it was absolutely breathtaking & beautiful. I looked her up here at last.fm & what you know shes Japanese/American! Go Figure!! If it was bad I would have traded it in, but hell no, this is amazing & gets my award for U.S. release of the Year!!


Greek Artist of the Year & Album:


The Greek scene was pretty quite in 2009, as it seen no new releases by Despina Vandi, Elli Kokkinou, Helena Paparizou, Apostolia Zoi, Maria Iakavou, If any of those would've released a new album I'm sure Xryspa wouldn't have been awarded these honors. Xryspa, I discovered several years ago, but her albums have never been mind-blowin great, they've been just above average, enough good songs to keep around, but always falling short of their potential. & so goes her new album 'ΜΕΧΡΙ ΕΔΩ' 11 tracks, 5 great, 4 good, 2 beh. None the less here go your awards Xryspa!

Best New Artist & Debut Album of the Year


These awards go to Serebro. Serebro emerged on the Russian scene with a strong running in 2007's Eurovision Contest. Shortly thereafter they kinda disappeared from the public spotlight for over a year. Finally in 2009, Serebro showed themselves and dropped their debut album 'Opium' on the scene. Its a amazing album & they easily were my new artist of the year in '09. I loved this group, and scrobbled them with only 1 album, more than 63 other artists!! Even though the Asian scene was all new to me in '09 none of those top artist from the Asian scene were actually debut artist & so can't be considered for these awards.



Thanks for reading my post & hope you enjoyed it!