Chinese Music Blog

Hins Cheung (Zhang Jing Xuan), a singer-songwriter from Guangzhou, China has been getting much popularity in Hong Kong. Composing and arranging most of the songs, this album is called “am/pm”, with the concept of music in the morning, evening and night.

It starts with an intro of a small piece of music of birds chirping in the morning, then goes to the smooth R&B ballad, “Spring” (Chun Tian). Following are two nicely written ballads. “Incapable” sounds excellent with Hins’s soothing voice. “Dear U” is a song written for his aunt who died of cancer. The lyrics and the melody are both sad and extremely touching.

Fifth track “They” (Ta Men), a song dedicated to our deceased heroes, especially the doctors and nurses who died in fight with SARS, is an amazing song. His voice is unique, very much different from other male singers in the market. It sounds especially nice in those high notes; powerful, expressive yet smooth. He put so much emotion into the song that the melody and the lyrics are delivered excellently. Try listen to it through a earphone, it’s even better! I always listen twice while listening to the song. Can’t have enough of it. ^^

It then gradually goes to the evening part of the day. Jazzy “Eyes” (Yan Jing) and mysterious “Envy”, both have an indolent touch, sleepy and lazy, yeah, like how we always feel during the evening. “Eyes” didn’t catch my attention at first, but after listening to it several times, I’m absolutely caught up. What an excellent Jazz song! Here, the mood changes with the interlude, a two and half minute contemporary piano piece, with the sound of Hins exhaling and sexily speaking “Come on, baby!”.

“Boys & Girls” is another alternative song, using a lot of electronic sounds. R&B styled “Front Park” (Gong Yuan Qian) sounds like the sequel of Hins’s previous hit “My Way”. Needless to say, the song is perfectly sung. The album finally ends with “Blessing”, the English version of “They”.

Hins included different genre of songs in this album. However, for me he’s still best in singing Ballad and R&B. By the way, I love the interlude. Don’t ask me why. ^^

Track listing:
1. Intro
2. 春天 Chun Tian (Spring)
3. 无能为力 Wu Neng Wei Li (Incapable)
4. Dear U
5. 他们 Ta Men (They)
6. 眼睛 Yan Jing (Eyes)
7. Envy
8. Interlude
9. ♀,♂,♀♀,♂♂ (Boys & Girls)
10. 昨夜, 早晨 Zuo Ye, Zao Chen (Yesterday, Morning)
11. 公园前 Gong Yuan Qian (Front Park)
12. Blessing

Recommended tracks: They, Eyes, Incapable, Dear U, Front Garden, Intro and Interlude