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Posted: 23 Apr 2013 02:17 AM PDT

SEOUL (AFP) - Gangnam Style star Psy's new music video has garnered 200 million views on YouTube in the nine days since its release and smashed the video-sharing site's record for single-day hits.

The video of Gentleman -- the much-anticipated follow-up to the South Korean singer's global hit -- reached the 200-million milestone Monday after its 13 April debut, YouTube said in a statement.

"From a stats perspective, it's one of the biggest music video launches the web has ever seen," the statement said. The video recorded 38.4 million views on 14 April, destroying the previous single-day record of 31 million views set by KONY 2012 -- a documentary about a Ugandan warlord made by the charity group Invisible Children.

It was the video of Gangnam Style, and in particular Psy's signature horse-riding dance, that pushed him to global stardom after it was posted on YouTube and turned into a viral sensation.

A satire on the luxury lifestyle of Seoul's upscale Gangnam district, it has become the most-watched YouTube video of all time, registering more than 1.5 billion views since it debuted last July.

The Gentleman video shows Psy, wearing his signature shades, performing his new hip-swinging dance at various locations in and around Seoul including a high-end clothing store, restaurant and a swimming pool.

The storyline features the 35-year-old singer playing pranks on women such as pulling their chairs away or untying a woman's bikini top at a swimming pool.

The new dance song was ranked Tuesday in the top 10 on iTunes music stores in a number of countries including Britain and Canada and 12th on the US Billboard's Hot 100 music chart.

It also helped earn Psy six nominations for the 2013 Billboard Music Awards to be held in Las Vegas in May, including top dance song, top streaming song and top new artist.

Karen Mok cuts new jazz album

Posted: 23 Apr 2013 01:50 AM PDT

Asian superstar Karen Mok writes a new chapter in her career with a jazz album.

A CANTO POP star from Hong Kong recording a jazz album infused with guzheng (Chinese zither), you say? Sounds like an awkward combination, but Karen Mok, the mega star that she is, is used to that.

"I like to be different!" said Mok, 42, with an endearing and slightly goofy laugh – one which punctuated many of her sentences. "Even as a kid, I was aware that 'oh, I have a different background'."

Mok's father is half Chinese, half Welsh. Her mother is half Chinese, a quarter Iranian and a quarter German. She speaks German, French, Italian, Cantonese and Mandarin.

"It's funny, because I definitely think I'm a true 'Hong Kong-er', and even my background is quite reflective of what Hong Kong is all about," she said, in a distinctively British accent, ironically.

"But it seems the people there don't really see me as typically Hong Kong-ese. They just assume that 'oh, she's really western, she grew up in the UK', which isn't true."

No surprise then, that her latest passion project – an English language album of jazz standards and covers on which Mok plays the guzheng – is titled Somewhere I Belong.

Mok was in town recently to promote the album, but unfortunately, she didn't have any live performances here.

The wait for a Karen Mok concert here continues, but for now, her fans have her new jazz-orientated album, released by British label Decca, to investigate.

On the album, she takes on standards like Stormy Weather, Love For Sale and My Funny Valentine, as well as Portishead's Sour Times, and a jazzy version of a Beatles classic (While My Guitar Gently Weeps). Anyway, the truth is, Mok grew up in Hong Kong, but studied Italian literature in London for several years.

That was where she would inadvertently be launched into super-stardom, after recording some demos for a couple of Hong Kong friends also studying there at the time.

"They're both big producers back in Hong Kong now, but back then they were just passionate about writing their own music, and they needed someone to sing for them in Cantonese," said Mok.

"I had never done it before, so I was like 'why not?' It was just for the heck of it, basically. The point was to help them sell their songs, not for me to become a singer. But certain people heard my singing, and they were like 'who's that girl?' And it all just happened from there."

It has been 20 years, 15 albums and 40 movie-starring roles since. Mok has established herself as one of Asia's brightest, most consistently prolific stars. An identity crisis is something you'd hardly expect from her.

And yet, as settled, self-assured and successful as she is, Mok says she still struggles to figure out where she truly belongs, hence the theme of the new album.

In 2011, she married her first boyfriend, German Johannes Natterer, whom she met when she was 17 and studying in Italy. The couple now live in London.

"London is basically home now. I go back and I chill out," she said. "Hong Kong has always been a work place for me, even though it's home and my parents are there and I grew up there. But yeah, it never feels like I'm going home when I go to Hong Kong."

The one constant in her life, however, has been her drive to become a performer.

"At the age of three, I had already made up my mind that one day I had to be a performer, and I kind of worked towards it. I learned all these different skills – drama, dance, instruments – because I just loved to perform," she said.

Even now, Mok still harbours big ambitions. Releasing a jazz album – and playing the guzheng on it – was just one item off the list.

"This album was a new venture. It's not every day an Asian singer gets to do an English album – and a jazz album – and then launch it globally. It's a dream come true for me, definitely."

Even when discussing married life, and being a stepmother to Natterer's children, Mok talks about "forging ahead" with her career and meeting new challenges head on. Nothing's changed, she said.

"Getting married these days doesn't mean you have to replace one thing with another. I just have an extra role as someone's wife now!

"Being with someone, it should complement everything else. It should make your life better. And if it doesn't, then you're probably in the wrong relationship," she added.

> Karen Mok's Somewhere I Belong is released by Universal Music Malaysia.

Lauryn Hill given reprieve on tax evasion sentencing

Posted: 23 Apr 2013 01:49 AM PDT

NEWARK (Reuters) - Grammy Award-winning singer Lauryn Hill was given a two-week reprieve on her sentencing for federal tax evasion on Monday as a federal judge admonished her defense counsel for failing to come up with most of the tax money promised prior to her scheduled hearing.

Hill, a solo artist and a member of the Fugees rap trio, pleaded guilty in June 2012 to failure to file federal tax returns from 2005-2007, when she earned US$1.8 million. She faces up to a year in prison for each charge.

Lawyers for Hill, who burst to stardom with her 1998 album the The Miseducation Of Lauryn Hill, said they made a US$50,000 payment toward the back taxes and penalties, but still need to come up with another US$504,000 no later than 3 May.

They had expected Hill to raise money from signing a new recording contract by the fall of 2012, but Hill was unable to complete the recording sessions. She has not released an album since 2001.

Hill, a mother of six children, including five with Rohan Marley, the son of reggae legend Bob Marley, claimed she failed to pay the taxes while she was sheltering her family to get away from excessive publicity and threats.

Attorney Nathan Hochman, representing Hill, said the singer had lined up a deal with a "hard money lender" for a loan that was secured by two real estate assets, and that she was expecting final approval of the loan sometime this week.

"For Miss Hill, the only question was when she was going to pay those taxes, not if," Hochman told reporters after the hearing.

U.S. Magistrate Judge Madeline Cox Arleo rescheduled the final sentencing hearing until 6 May, but warned lawyers for the hip hop star that the court would not allow another slip up.

"This is not someone who stands before the court penniless," Arleo told the court.

Kredit: www.thestar.com.my

Selasa, 23 April 2013

The Star Online: Entertainment: Music

The Star Online: Entertainment: Music

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