The UrbanWire

After a 3 year hiatus, Benjamin Puah is back with a visually unsettling exhibition at Forth Gallery to shake the senses off all art and non-art patrons leaving them in a state of “Luan Qi Ba Zao” (Mandarin for Very Messy) which, of course, is the title of the exhibition.

During his break, Puah held the workshop “Colours of Life” which aims to allow primary and secondary students to enter the artist’s world and to create their own. The youths’ artworks were then displayed on Singapore’s National Day Parade in 2006. Other exhibitions of his were “Twinkle Twinkle Little Star” and “Rats In A Lab”.

At the opening on Sat, May 19, people well acquainted with Puah’s work or those who were simply curious walked in for a world of possibilities. Instead, what greeted them was shock and unbelief. Clearly, the 10 year veteran achieved the effect he wanted.

Revolving around the theme of “Post Surreal Monopolyism”, Puah’s paintings explore a world of messiness and childlike innocence and at the same time reflect his mental state of mind. Interestingly enough, it took him just 1 month to finish the entire collection.

“The paintings are an investigation into my uncertainty state of mind in an organised structural space,” says the Lasalle graduate, “The tons of self-questionings have resulted in different routes that I took with life.”

With a little more than 80 square metres to display his collection, Puah was more than happy to explain that as an artist, “I have to be sensitive and be able to adapt to changes”.

In one aisle of Forth is a set of canvas with a bald man wearing different clothing in a seemingly different world. Labelled “Gong Gong” (colloquial tongue for ‘dumb’), Puah spoke of an insight where “being too clever is being too stupid” and being “Gong Gong” is a form of greater wisdom.

It can be said that “Gong Gong” is a representation of himself but yet the veteran seemed shocked when similiarity of baldness between the creation and the creator was pointed out. It was almost as though he did a self-portrait on a subconscious level.

Fellow artist and owner of Forth Gallery, Justin Ng, believes Puah’s work provides us with a new perception in life and to realise “it’s time to break out from the walls that we have been encased in”.

However, such philosophical thinking was lost on the other patrons.

“I feel that his new art has too much resemblence to a primary school drawing” says Nayang Academy of Fine Arts (NAFA) student, Chew Zhen Ling, 18, “Although, I quite like his previous work with the celebrity portrait back in 2004.”

Another patron, Terence Lau, Singapore International Airlines intern, 20, recalls seeing a painting with the chinese words “I think of suicidal thoughts everyday” and felt so perturbed that he simply left the place.

Ironically, Puah “wants to create artworks with/about the young ones to spread the message of peace, love and the celebration of life across to the masses”. In a weird way, the artist’s works and philosophy blends perfectly into the title of his works. In short, it really is all very messy.

Whenever someone used to utter the sentence, “there are good English SINGERS (here’s the emphasis) in Singapore.” My mind would draw a blank; literally.

You see, after the fiascos called Singapore Idol 1 and 2 where Jerry Ong and Joakim Gomez drew my ire but certainly not my votes respectively, the only singer who could be technically labelled as “good” in my opinion was not, Taufik Batisah or Hady Mirza.

Fans of Singapore Idol, please don’t clamour to kill me. Yes I agree that the 2 winners are decent, but I don’t rate them highly, especially after I heard one of Taufik’s songs which sounded eerily like a National Day song. The song’s definitely not the duet “Reach Out For The Skies” with Rui En by the way.

Rather the good singer I had in mind was singer and songwriter Corrinne May, the lady who sang theme songs for Ch 5’s dramedy, Chase, back in 2004 like the unforgettable “Save me”.

Then by some luck, I managed to chance/stumble upon singer-songwriter, Shirlyn Tan’s first solo album, Newfound Jealousy, thanks to a recommendation from a local music advocate and close friend of mine. And well, at least the word “singer” applies now.

For starters, like May, she isn’t exactly as young as she appears to be. Actually she’s already 31-years-old. Hey, at least she’s got tonnes of experience (I’ll explain this part later) which has helped to create a pretty decent album.

But that’s where the similarity ends, because unlike May, this lady’s one cool rock chick with a great dose of class and complexity as well who’s path to her album differs greatly from the more angelic sounding May.

Her path to glory includes a 10-year stint in the local bar circuit, at establishments like Wala Wala (the drinking haven for my co-editors) with bands such as UnXpected. But that’s not all, have I mentioned that she was the opening act for Jason Mraz’s performance at the 2006 Mosaic Music Festival?

Anyway let’s get down to business. It’s been noted that when Tan sings, listeners are able to sense the emotions and raw energy that she’s able to emote (probably honed from her time as a singer on the circuit) from her music.

But at the same time, there’s also a certain degree of angst in her voice that has caused me and a few other listeners to liken her to Canadian singer-songwriter Alanis Morissette.

Newfound Jealousy which is a 10-track pop-rock album produced by Leonard Soosay (he’s worked on the albums for bands such as Parking Lot Pimp and Electrico), was composed entirely by Tan which adds another brownie point to her repertoire of skills.

Tan’s songs are generally written with an intense outpour of thought and have a great degree of depth to them which surely helps to provide a certain amount of colour to the album.

Personally, I generally hate albums which pay no heed to the variety of the songs in it. I feel that the idea of merely plonking the songs here and there to form a mismatched arrangement spoils the listener’s hearing experience.

So thankfully with Tan’s ability as a songwriter and Soosay as the producer, there seems to be a careful train of thought planned on the song arrangement in the album that makes for delightful listening on my part.

The album first starts off with a bang, before the tempo slows and then slowly but surely building up speed to end off on a high.

The first single, “Window“ like explained earlier is upbeat and catchy, and simply infectious, acting like a magnet, drawing me in and making me to want to hear more from the powerhouse Tan.

And as the tempo slowed, one of the songs that stayed in my mind was the track, “You”, because it offers a very jazzy feel to the album, portraying a different side to the rocker and seriously showcases her versatility as a songwriter.

However, out of the 10 songs in the album, besides “You”, there is another track that warrants the listener want to listen over and over again.

The song’s none other than the lead single on the album, “Newfound Jealousy”, which is focused exactly on what the title suggests; jealousy. Its not one of the faster paced songs, but Tan’s emotions in this piece is particularly evident and the song definitely shows a vulnerable side of Tan as well.

And as the end draws nigh, Tan gets back to her roots ands closes the album with the song, “Walk Away”. With its more rock liked quick tempo influence about lovers walking away and sweeping the past under the carpet, it’s generally a feel good piece that leaves listeners feeling satisfied.

All in all, the 10 years that Tan has spent traversing the bar scene seems to have done her a world of good. Her songs in Newfound Jealousy are well written, her powerful voice beautifuly showcases her work brilliantly, it’s made me rethink the negative perception that I once had of local singers.

To me, Tan with her original compositions, spunk and voice definitely offers something that’s been lacking in the local recording scene here for a long time which has since been filled with Singapore Idols and Idles (Olinda, I’m still waiting for your album after 3 years!)

Alas, so now whenever anyone asks about good Singaporean singers, I know that there is at least Shiryln Tan as well.

UrbanWire gives Newfound Jealousy 4 out of 5 stars.

Very often, newer phone models are only marginally better than their predecessors and released just to keep brands in the radar of buyers. This isn’t the case for the Blackberry 8800 however, which altogether is an impressive mobile device.

First up, the Blackberry 8800 is the new Blackberry device from Research In Motion, a technological and stylistic update of the previous model, the Blackberry Pearl, and the differences, though not many, certainly do make a difference. It starts off with the size: the 8800 is wider than the Pearl but is thinner. Another difference is the 35-key, full QWERTY keyboard that the Blackberry 8800 sports, compared to the 20-key keypad running on SureType keyboard technology that the Blackberry Pearl has.

Looking at the Blackberry 8800, it is one sleek and sexy device. In hand, it has a very solid feel, and the finish on the plastics look high quality, and feels a lot smoother and more valuable than the typical mobile phone. The sides have a chrome-mirror finish, like the iPod, which makes stylish design. The 8800 comes with a full QWERTY keyboard that makes typing emails and messages smooth and quick (once you get used to it), but the keys are a little too. It also comes with a new navigation roller of a trackball that makes scrolling around the different applications and icons on screen easy and responsive.

By default, the 8800 will adjust the screen brightness on the impressive high-resolution 320×240 landscape TFT colour display (that supports over 65,000 colours) based on the ambient light conditions, but the display is difficult to see in bright direct sunlight.

The new Blackberry 8800 performs snappily without lag, powered by its 312mhz Intel Xscale processor. Web pages load fast, music and video files play well, and opening attachments and applications are a breeze . The 8800 comes with the whole range of standard Blackberry functionality that has made it such a popular device: the powerful, peerless email system, seamless web browsing, third-party application expandability and a host of other functions that makes the device very useful for the typical office worker on the go.

The large 6 cm screen gives more screen real estate that many phones today and users will definitely find that useful, especially with the bundled GPS navigator (works depends on your mobile service provider).

The 8800 also comes with expandable memory on a micro-SD slot, which actually serves the device well as it comes with a built-in media player. This reviewer found that the best way to load music into the Blackberry is by organising your music into appropriate subfolders on the memory card.

The Blackberry 8800 device has an insane battery life. The 1400 mAhr removable / rechargeable lithium battery has been rated at having 5 hours of talk time and up to 22 days of standby time, compared to 3.5 hours of talktime and 15 days of standby that the Blackberry Pearl has.

However, the fact that the Blackberry 8800 is not a 3G device, nor does it have WiFi might be an issue for web surfers. As mentioned earlier, the keyboard also has a cramped layout but the tightly packed keys are compensated with slightly raised grooves that keep your thumbs from slipping when typing. There is also no stereo Bluetooth support, and UrbanWire had problems figuring out how to transfer Bluetooth files between the device and his laptop.

The bottom line is that the Blackberry 8800 is a tremendously effective messaging phone, which is hardly surprising, as messaging has always been the brand’s forte. The Blackberry push-email system is still unmatched in eases of use and flexibility of merging multiple email accounts. The Blackberry 8800 is a truly amazing, stylish, sexy phone that you know you want, if you have the need for a powerful business phone.

Technical Specifications:

Size (LxWxD): Approximately 114mm x 66mm x 14mm
Weight(batt included): Approximately 134g
Memory: 64MB flash memory
Expandable Memory: MicroSD
Display: High-res 320×240 landscape TFT colour display (over 65,000 colours)
Battery Life: Standby: 528 hours (22days), Talk Time: 300 minutes (5 hours)
Keyboard: 35 key, backlit QWERTY keyboard
Convenience Keys: Send key, End key, Power key, Mute key, Volume key and a programmable key
Navigation: Trackball, ESC key, Menu key
Voice Input / Output: Integrated earpiece and microphone, hands-free headset, integrated speakerphone
Ringtones: Polyphonic – MP3, MIDI
GPS: GPS enabled and preloaded with Blackberry Maps application
Media Player: Supported audio formats:

MP3, MIDI, AMR-NB, AAC/AAC+/eAAC+, WMA

Supported video formats:

MPEG4 Part 2 Simple Profile, H.263, WMV

Bluetooth: Bluetooth v2.0; headset, hands-free and serial port profiles supported
Headset: Stereo headset capable
USB Ports: Enables charging and data synchronization via USB to mini-USB
Power Adapter: +5V DC / 500 mA AC power adapter with interchangeable, region-specific plugs
Modem: Embedded wireless modem, plus tethered modem support for EDGE
Network Support: Quad-band 850/900/1800/1900 Mhz GSM/GPRS and EDGE networks
Desktop Software: Synchronizes calendar, address book, tasks and memos between your smart phone and desktop
Smartphone security: Password protection and keyboard lock.