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| Leah Dizon’s debut |
| Wednesday, February 28, 2007 |
 It has been almost six months since the ex-gravure model Erika Sawajiri released her debut single, Taiyou no Uta. This single proved to be a huge hit, which led to the Japanese audience to take her more seriously despite of her bad reputation in the past. Her success led her to get tie-ins with the Meji, Kanebo and Sony Ericsson, for their new SE W51S cell phone product. Her success probably led to encourage another model, Leah Dizon to try her luck in the music industry too.
Leah Dizon is no newcomer to the entertainment industry. Apart from being a singer, Leah is a Japanese tarento and a model, a race queen and a gravure model to be more specific. However Leah is not Japanese. Her ethnicities include Chinese, Filipino and French. She was born in Las Vegas, where she spent most of her childhood. Leah attempted to start a modeling career as an import model in the states, but this did not fare so well.
Thus Leah attempted a different approach. Her modeling career took a sexier direction and Leah became a gravure model. Her photoshoots became more provocative and this approach managed to create a stable fanbase in Asia and USA. It is needless to say that most of her fans were males. Her fans encouraged Leah to start a musical career and she sent a demo tape to Victor Entertainment who was happy to sign a contract with Leah. She moved to Tokyo and released her first photobook in 2006 and a 2007 calendar. In the beginning of 2007 it was announced that her first single would be released.
Leah hasn’t changed much from her gravure days. She is featured in her single covers hugging a huge teddy bear and wearing close to nothing. Despite of the obvious “Buy me I’m hot” message, I have to admit Leah looks gorgeous. However Victor Entertainment was smart enough to promote a more female-friendly image, apart from her sexy image. This trend is similar to Koda Kumi’s dual image marketing scheme by avex. In most of her videos Kumi is sexy, aggressive and wild, but on other videos and magazine photoshoots, Kumi looks like a cute and innocent Barbie doll. Leah Dizon follows this trend, where in her promotional clip and photoshoots she looks demure and cute as a button, to the extent that you find it unbelievable that this girl is actually race queen and some photos of her are quite provocative.
The single came in two formats; a regular edition with a poster and a limited CD+DVD edition. Both had the same image, one of them being simply a cropped version of the other. Also the third track of both versions was different from each other. This single recieved a lot of attention by the Japanese media simply because Leah is a foreigner and everyone knows how the Japanese are fascinated by foreigners. However I doubt many knew that Leah has as much musical talent as Paris Hilton and has had little musical training. Despite the fact that Leah isn’t exactly fluent in Japanese, she still attended various television programs. Leah attended an HMV shopping outlet to promote her single. This single made its debut on Oricon ranking at #7.
1. Softly
I’ve seen weird titles, especially from Ayu, but I must say this title just sounds too weird to me. I imagine this describes the mood of the song and Leah’s vocal style, but still I think this title sounds too generic. Anyhow, the mood of the song is indeed extremely mellow and laid-back. This ballad varies slightly from being slow to having a mid-tempo chorus. The melody is quite pleasant to the ear, especially since the instrumentals used are quite minimal and soothing and thus they do not drown her voice.
Leah’s vocals are pretty enjoyable and they have a unique touch to them. However it is obvious that her vocals are pretty much average and far from being polished. During the chorus and high notes, backing vocalists were included too, probably to disguise the fact that this song would sound pretty flat if we had Leah singing alone.
The promotional video is mostly made of a lot of eyecandy and a low budget. However from my experience in watching promotional clips from Victor Entertainment, this is nothing new. Leah sings during the video, while looking beautiful, emotional and mature but that’s the only highlight of the video. The clip displays a lot of aesthetically pleasing settings. She is featured sitting on a pier at sunrise or sunset, walking on a beach and in an elegant house. Overall it’s a typically average video for a ballad.
2. Everything Anything
“Everything Anything” is a mid tempo track with an emotional mood. I also find this song as the proof that Leah sucks badly at high notes. I feel she starts off on a really bad foot with this song. Her vocals sound pretty unnatural and extremely strained at some points. However, as the song proceeds, her low notes are clearly much more better and the backing vocals in the chorus make this sound sound more presentable. I am especially fond of the chorus which is quite catchy and manages to grow onto the listener.
I was horrified at the evident “Engrish” in the chorus, especially since Leah lived most of her life in USA and probably her native tongue in English. The only explanation I can find is that the “Engrish” has a certain appeal and make her sound more “Japanese”.
The promotional video for “Everything Anything” looks like a continuation from where “Softly” left. Leah looks sexier with shorts but still maintains her mature image. She is again featured on a pier and in a gorgeous garden but seems more animated. I am especially fond of the scene where she’s singing next to a waterfall and the final scene, because everything looks so picturesque.
3. Fever
“Fever” is a cover from Kylie Minogue’s hit song and album which revived her popularity. I have to say that it was an excellent choice to cover since I think Kylie’s and Leah’s vocals are pretty similar and this song focuses on low notes. Kylie’s version is slightly better than Leah’s version, but nonetheless Leah manages to pull this song off with ease.
However I cannot help but feel slightly disappointed about how average this song sounds. What makes this song pretty much so “average” is the fact that Leah brings nothing new to this song. Most artists try to give a cover a flavour of their own by rearranging the music or singing with different and distinct vocals from the original singer. However Leah’s “Fever” sounds like a Kylie imitation. At least it’s a good imitation.
Conclusion
This single isn’t bad for a debut single, but it isn’t exactly impressive either. Leah’s vocals are decent at best and the songs are pretty much average in quality. None really do have an amazing composition or an extremely catchy beat. Victor Entertainment isn’t a huge label and so most of their artists are on a low budget, unless they become popular. Leah’s single wasn’t exactly on a high budget either. However their idea of putting two promotional clips and recording four songs shows an effort and producing something more worth it to buy.
In the end I can’t help but wonder why a single with this quality would sell so well on the charts. Probably if it was some random unknown girl making a debut, this single wouldn’t even rank on the top 20’s. Thus I cannot help but feeling that Leah’s single ranked so high because of her racy image. In the recent years, the image being marketed is vital for an artist and the image of being sexy and provocative seems to be hip in Japan. I feel Leah confirms the fact that artists like Kumi garnered their popularity from a specific marketing strategy of being sexy. However it is arguable whether the people are buying their releases because of their actual musical talent or simply because these artists are showing too much flesh.
Since this single was pretty successful, Leah shall probably be releasing more music in the future. However, I can’t help but feel that in the end her sexy image overshadows whatever musical talent she does own. I feel she has potential so I do hope that in the future Leah shall become more mature musically and release excellent releases rather than attracting buyers simply because she’s hot. |
| posted by DhaniBoy @ 7:34 PM |
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