Dear God.  This week was brutal in terms of amount of releases… and I’m still missing some of them, which is why this post is late. I had hoped to find everything before Wednesday, but looks like stuff will still be trickling in for awhile. It was, however, a very good week! Here are some of my favs

alan - Hitotsu [Single]
nfo: Official // wiki.theppn
Support: amazon.co.jp // CDJapan

01. Hitotsu 02. Kimi Omou Sora 03. Tokyo Mimei 04. sign 05. Hitotsu (Instrumental) 06. Kimi Omou Sora (Instrumental) 07. Tokyo Mimei (Instrumental)

Chinese-Tibetan singer alan’s second Japanese single, and once again she proves that damn she can sing! I love all the songs, but sign is especially cool sounding!

ayaka - Te wo Tsunagou [Single]
Info: Official // wiki.theppn
Support: Global Yesasia // US Yesasia

01. Te wo Tsunagou 02. Ai wo Utaou 03. Mikazuki (2007.12.20 Nippon Budokan LIVE ver.) 04. Te wo Tsunagou (Instrumental) 05. Ai wo Utaou (Instrumental)

ahhh, ayaka! This is another slow song to show off her voice, and I love the live version of Mikazuki! Ai wo Utaou is a little too similar sounding to others, but overall I think it is a strong single!

Sotte Bosse - Blooming E.P [Album]
Info: Official // no wiki
Support: amazon.co.jp

01. intro 02. Hirari 03. in the world 04. SAKURA DROPS 05. Cherry Sky (Instrumental) 06. Hitomi CAMERA

New artist for me, and one I think has a lot of good things going for them, though the way they did the tracklist is a little off for me. Crowning glory of this release is the first track, which is really, really nice. Definitely for fans of easy listening!

Stephanie - Stephanie [Album]
Info: Official // wiki.theppn
Support: Global Yesasia // US Yesasia

01. Kimi ga Iru Kagiri 02. Friends 03. Life 04. ANGEL GIRL 05. Fallin’ 06. Shiny Days! 07. Smile and Turn Away 08. Beyond Myself 09. Truth 10. To.Be.Me 11. Winter Gold 12. because of you

I… hate that cover. But I’m definitely buying this album because with the exception of Winter Gold (which isn’t even that bad), this album is AMAZING. Her voice is SO good and strong and I love Friends, because of you (no it isn’t a Kelly Clarkson cover though she’d do a good job of that too) and Kimi ga Iru Kagiri. SO GOOD.

Haven’t had a chance to listen to Rie fu’s new album, or SHOWTA.’s Also think GRAPEVINE, the stud’s, and redballoons releases will be good. Other notables this week are AAA’s single-collection/best of album, which I will NOT be buying because I have all their albums and therefore their songs, ASIAN KUNG-FU GENERATION’s WORLD WORLD WORLD which I need to give another listen to, and Tomiko Van’s second attempt at a cover album which I’m a bit leery of listening to. And that accounts for only maybe a 3rd of what was released. MAN.