China Time

I have a subscription with EMusic and I usually find at the end of each month that I have two or three downloads to spare. So what I like to do is go to the international section and try out a few albums from countries that are under-represented in my collection. Which is how I came to acquire these two Chinese performances.

The first is from Xiang Xiang, who evidently is/was a bit of an Internet sensation in China. The song's title in English is "Summer Insects", taken from her 2005 CD with the catchy title "Song of Pig".

http://www.box.net/shared/4aop4uyoba

To be honest if that was sung in English I would probably dismiss it as Katie Melua-type pap, but somehow in Mandarin it works for me. Whereas this next one I suspect would sound delightfully bonkers in any language. Here is Hu Songhua, I guess from some time in the 1980s, with "Song of Harvest".

http://www.box.net/shared/usg9tclsul

I am not sure what it is - the voice, the drum machine, the plastic horns - but for some reason that reminds me of this: