Elegant, brilliant, and congenial, Ting Zhu quickly captured my heart when I first saw her (and she first) popped onto MTV, as New Artist of the Month. Her Yu Sheng (雨声) MTV constantly played, and the song just stayed in my brain. I found myself singing it often. So when I scanned a newspaper, and she was having a free concert at this location, I determined to go.

And I did. She wasn’t the only artist who performed, but she startled me. She whizzed through her short program, using a machine to record a chord pattern with her guitar, a little beat she tapped and clapped to create, and sung through the song. Very talented. She can sing, she can compose, she can write lyrics, she can play all the instruments well. And her new album shows that.

雨声 (Yu Sheng), the album, mixing slow and fast tempos, contemplative and cheerful moods, using the same style without boring us out – at all. The album’s name is a homonym of 张雨生 (Zhang Yu Sheng), her childhood hero. And like 张雨生, she’s a jewel among many – and she shows her many facets in the different songs. Cute (Xi Huan Ni), stubborn (Ping Shen Me), mature (Fu He), playful (Xi Huan Ni), ambitious (Meng Xiang Lei Che), she’s not pretentious at all. You feel like you actually know her after you’ve listened to her album.

There’s not really any songs for me to recommend, or to criticize. They’re all brilliant. She composed and wrote lyrics for about half of the songs. I’m especially amazed by her lyrics. They aren’t like most of the lyrics now, which don’t even connect each line to line, which digress from the subject every other line. Jasmine’s lyrics aren’t like that - they’re like poems, smooth and flowing, not disconnected and meaningless.

An example:

电话里的声音
The telephone’s sound
遥远却更亲密
Is from so faraway, yet is so intimate
不知何时开始
I don’t know when it started
已习惯身边有你的呼吸
But I’m already used to the sound of your breathing beside me.

Very sweet, very legato. Listen to her songs with the lyrics with you!

Now to her music. A unique cross between pop-rock-acoustic-funk-country. Her music can be compared to a cross between Alanis Morissette and the Isley Brothers. You hear the driving beat and riffs of rock, yet also distinguish the often electronic funk beats and chord patterns in the background. And she combines that with light-hearted and catchy melodies I find myself joyfully jiving to. Many of her songs also have a classic Country and Western feel to them. I’m also deeply moved in the gentle ballads she’s able to craft. And don’t underestimate her vocals – she has great control. Even at high pitches, her voice radiating with power, she doesn’t lose any of the sweetness and lightness that captured me first.

Jasmine is a spectacular, extremely talented lyricist, composer, singer and person. You won’t regret getting her album – she has explored an area of music that Chinese music has not reached yet, and has greatly succeeded. A solid 8/10, for pure effort, courageous concoction of a personal style. It’s one of the best albums of the year.