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Wu's tracks not Wanting for sure
by Yeow Kai Chai
THE ALBUM title is a tad unfortunate, but otherwise, Wanting, thankfully, operates more as an active verb/gerund
than a sad adjective.
On his latest player, the one-man multi-instrumentalist Sky Wu lives up to his reputation as a risk-taking perfectionist.
Recorded in England, Wanting is a showcase of Wu's exemplary chops and undying thirst for music.
The first track, Vision, takes the singer into uncharted territory - all seedy, looping dub grooves and funky guitar
riffs - and yields unexpected dividends.
Wu vacillates between jazzy-scatting and down-and-dirty whooping and effectively pulverises any perception of him
as a prissy, meticulous balladeer.
On the discorelic ditty Love In Miniature, Wu appropriates the Latin pop template from Enrique Iglesias, but instead
of going for obvious sensual overload, he recasts it in his trademark melancholia.
Elsewhere, the guy takes far more chances in his musical adventure than his contemporary Jeremy Chang Hongliang,
who seemed stuck in the early 1990s.
Nowhere is this more evident than in The Message For 2001, an epic, fat, snazzy R&B anthem bolstered by Timbaland-style
booming basslines and strangely-appropriate Cantonese purlings by CoCo Lee.
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