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| EASY ON THE EYES EVEN AT HIS AGE |
02 魔法って言っていいかな
03 告白
04 かわいいの妖怪
05 桔梗が丘
06 Missionary
07 ソレデモシタイ
08 驚異の凡才
09 君の鼓動は君にしか鳴らせない.
10 ON AIR.
11 おんなじさみしさ.
12 グロテスク feat. 安室奈美恵.
13 TIME
14 それでいいな.
"The Still Life" is Hirai Ken's first album in five years and I'm stating this like I listened to him back then. I know Ken in name but never gave his music the time of day until this year. I know he has had a time of popularity with a period of decline only to have Amuro Namie bring it back with the duet "グロテスク". Amuro tends to do this a lot with artists that have fell in a rut.( Look how good Crystal Kay is doing after the single "Revolution".) This shows that Amuro cares more about a singers artistry than their popularity. I won't disagree with Miss Amuro as " The Still Life" tries to pull out all of the chops of a well rounded musician.
The variety of music styles on this album is insane. I'm not sure if Hirai dabbled in this many musical styles before but he sure didn't waste any time here. You would expect a ballad a when looking at Ken Hirai but he is deemed an RnB singer. Did he use to do RnB? I really can't see it even as he tries to sings soulful inspired songs. He just doesn't give off that vibe to me. Now, he can sing some good ballads and the extra sounds of different insterments added in mass me think of the traditional culture of japan. That rich culture filled with emotion and delicateness. Other music styles are thrown in the mix such as rock and swing. Yeah... who knows where swing came from. Any trick in the book to make you seem more appealing to the masses. Swing is not his style especially with the cute side affect producers tried to put on the song. The rock inspired track was also a mess. The beginning made me have a little light of hope for some thing to remember from this album but the end result was a lot of different ideas strung together inconstantly. The best moments in "The Still Life" were some of the ballads and the duet with Amuro Namie. This duet brings Hiriai out of his element since we all know most Namie Amuro collaborations are songs set in the style that she can sing by herself. I hoped that this style would have stuck with Ken Hirai to the point that tis due would have bursted out dancing to a whole new dance pop version of hisself. Intead listeners are left with tracks like "Plus One" that are likable but not good enough to save this album from sinking to the darkest corners of the Oricon chart. Ok Ok Ok!!! I'm just playing around with you guys. "The Still Life" got the number eight spot which is pretty good. Top ten is always good for albums or singles.
Hirai Ken's vocals are good for some music styles and bad for others. He has a stand alone voice that doesnt sound like any other japanese singer but it's also not a mind blowing strong voice. This was the reason why I couldn't understand why producers didn't stick to one music style on "The Still Life" instead of doing a whole bunch of styles. fifteen tracks is too much for an album that doesn't do everything in its power to stay fresh for the listener. Anyone would get tired after awhile of listening to an album jump back and forth between styles with no real musical improvement. His vocals are light with a high pitched quality to the overal sound . A sound perfect for ballads and smooth sailing pop songs but that's it. If anyone reading this has heard other songs by Ken then please recommend them to me. I want to believe that he has better songs/ albums in his discography.
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