Our Time Has Come + Ten Most Wanted

Haa...long overdue post!

Since "Dress Me Up!", I've always been feeling a little nervous whenever hocc releases a new album...I guess my expectations as a fan are getting higher.

On first listen, "Our Time Has Come" might come across as a little bland esp when you compare it with "Glam" or "Butterfly Lovers". But it asserts itself in its own quiet right after you take time to savour its contents slowly. This time hocc comes up with three melodies each with a different style. Frankly I am quite looking forward to hear her sing "滿城盡帶黃金甲" live! Of course I love her ballads too, and after listening so many times, my favourite from the album is still "圓滿", which gives me a very warm feeling every time I listen to it. I love the arrangement esp the use of strings and real drums which seems to be used less and less often nowadays. I must say hocc and Green Mountain Orchestra made quite a lot of effort on the music arrangements this time and the results are rather pleasing.

I didn't think much of "Ten Most Wanted" on my first listen, but it just gets better each time. There is a much greater variety of music styles, other than the usual ballads and dance tracks, and I think that much effort had been put into the music arrangements. A number of the songs feature pretty intense arrangements and my favourite is "最後的朱麗葉", which sound just a tiny bit like hocc's "花迷戀" at the end. Perhaps Joey is trying to pull away from her K-songs image. I like this album.