STOP LIFE. STOP IT RIGHT NOW: NEW GIRL GROUP ALERT!!!

Anyone who’s ANYONE knows that one thing we LOVE (besides Godney) is a girl group.

Anyone who’s ANYONE knows that the other thing we LOVE (besides a girl group) is music of the Asian persuasion.

Meet BLUSH: Five girls making “edgy and fun” music. Together. AND ALL OF ASIAN DESCENT.

I AM ABSOLUTELY SEIZING.

Above is a viral animated clip (created by animator Shawn Harris with the iPad Brush App!) for “Undivided,” the groups’ lead single featuring Snoop Dogg (!).

The song is an summery mid-tempo electronica/R&B scorcher, much in the same vein as the recent output of Jessica Mauboy or Girlicious: “I love him and everything in me says don’t fight it / When I look into his eyes, I know we will be undivided,” the girls croon above the infectious, slow-grinding beat that bumps with an early ’00′s power-pop punch.

(PS: Do you hear those cries of “Aishiteru!” and “Wo Ai Ni” at the end? MY HEART. WON’T SKIP…A BEAT.)

And now, the roll-call for your new favorite band:

• Victoria–‘Queen V’–is the regal and poised singer/dancer with model-looks and an extensive gymnast background who while being raised in Hong Kong recorded several successful singles for the Chinese market.

• Natsuko–‘Nacho’–is the Japanese dance-crew veteran with a Hip-Hop vocal soul.

• Angeli is the sensual singer from the Philippines who was former lead singer of two bands as well as a top contestant on Pinoy Idol.

• Ji Ha born and raised in Korea, is the seemingly shy former law student with an R&B heart who has earned the nickname ‘Tiger’ because of her wild side.

• Alisha–‘L’il Ali’–is the youngest member, a multi-talented and multi-lingual Hindi singer/dancer who brings together Bollywood and Salsa with Hip-Hop and World Pop.

Regal and poised singer?! Multi-talented Hindi dancer?! MY GOD…YES!!!!

According to their official website, their upcoming studio album will feature production by several MuuMuse approved acts including Tal Herzberg, DJ Alex Guadino and Morgan Page.

For more information, check out their official website where you can currently download a free copy of “Undivided.”

BLUSH, LADIES AND LADYBOYS:
ENDING LONGSTANDING CULTURAL RIVALRIES, EASING BORDER TENSIONS AND SLAYING YOUR FAVES WITH HOT BEATZ SINCE 2011.

“Undivided” was released on June 21. (iTunes)

Joe Jonas–perhaps better known ’round these parts as my future husband (TO THE LEFT, JOE MCELDERRY*)–will be releasing “See No More,” the first single from his upcoming solo campaign, on June 3.

From the press release:

San Diego, CA — Joe Jonas will release his debut single as a solo artist, “See No More,” on June 3rd. The highly anticipated debut solo album on Hollywood Records will be in stores on September 6, 2011 and will feature production by Danja, Brian Kennedy and Rob Knox. “See No More” was co-written by Joe Jonas and Chris Brown and produced by Brian Kennedy. The song will be available digitally for sale on June 13th.

“Working on this album has been a rewarding but intense experience. ‘See No More’ especially carries a lot of personal emotions with it and I am hoping people listening to it will get a sense of where I’m coming from with this new sound,” says Joe Jonas. “I’ve had an awesome team working with me on the music and I am excited, anxious, but more importantly… ready… to share it all with my fans. It’s as much for them as it is for me.”

Brian Kennedy is responsible for producing some majorly MuuMuse Approved favorites, including Rihanna‘s “Disturbia” and “Fire Bomb,” Chris Brown‘s “Forever,” BoA‘s “Obsessed” and Jessica Mauboy’s “Saturday Night.”

“See No More” will premiere to radio on June 3, followed by a digital release on June 13. His debut solo album will be released on September 6.

After his album’s launch, Jonas will reportedly whisk me away to a castle in the countryside where we will eat Oreos together and pour boiling water on tweenage Jonas fan-girls attempting to breach the manor with pitchforks fashioned out of old issues of J-14.**

MY BODY IS READY.

*You can still watch if you want, though.
**MuuMuse Excluusive.

Mya‘s back!

Much like every other act this side of the ’10′s, Mya’s gone and shed her R&B roots in favor of a good ol’ synth machine to assist in her dance-inspired return to the music scene–perhaps inspired by her recent stint on the ninth season of Dancing With The Stars. Well…that, or she’s gone and listened to Pop radio for, like, fifteen minutes to see what the kids are listening to these days.

To my giddy delight, the singer will attempt to break two major territories at the same time: America and…Japan! Eee! DID SOMEONE SAY J-POP? ^.^ (Oh God. I’m sorry for that.)

After the release of her first Japanese album in 2008 (Sugar & Spice), Mya is now continuing to pursue a Japanese recording career with “Fabulous Life,” released on January 19 on iTunes Japan.

As The Prophet Blog reported, the song was co-produced by Jeff Miyahara, producer of such gems as AI‘s “Fake (feat. Namie Amuro)” and Crystal Kay‘s “One.” It was also co-produced by Fredro, the Swedish producer responsible for one of my favorite tracks from Jessica Mauboy‘s latest album.

“Fabulous Life” is genuinely adorable–a clearly J-Pop inspired, glittery little electro-pop ditty. It’s like Britney‘s “Anticipating”! Except more Japanese and stuff. I LOVE to bits and pieces!

If it were warmer ’round these parts, you know I’d be blasting this jam with the windows down while I was driving around town. For now, I guess I’ll just listen to it while I’m shoveling.

The second single in question–the Cedric Gervais-produced “Love Is The Answer”–is Mya’s offering for the North American territories.

A bit RuPaul, a dash of Donna Summer circa 2008 (Crayons, y’all!), Mya’s other offering blares into the speakers with an onslaught of ravey, hi-octane synthesizers a la Madonna‘s “Celebration.” “Love is the answer to all your problems,” the singer sweetly croons atop the hectic chorus. It’s no “My Love Is Like…Wo,” and certainly no “Case of the Ex,” but it’ll do for now.

Click here to listen to an extended preview of “Love Is The Answer,” courtesy of E! Online.

According to the E! article, Mya is currently working on both her seventh and eighth studio albums. We here at MuuMuse can’t wait to hear ‘em–especially that J-Pop record. Sock it to me!

“Fabulous Life” was released on January 19. (iTunes Japan)

So here’s a post I’ve meant to do for over a month.

Jessica Mauboy is the runner-up from the fourth season of Australian Idol.

For those who haven’t encountered her name yet in their musical journey, a very brief history: Jessica Mauboy has a very listenable and melodic voice, comparable to that of Jordin Sparks, Alexandra Burke or Charice. Following her exit from Idol, the singer released her electro-tinged R&B debut in 2008, Been Waiting. The record spawned about a half dozen radio smashes, including the two very good singles that first caught my attention two years ago: “Been Waiting” and “Burn.”

On November 5 of this year, Mauboy released Get ‘Em Girls, the follow-up to her debut. ‘Urban’-flared and even more radio-friendly than her first album, Get ‘Em Girls nearly bursts at the seams with a dizzying array of American and Australian producers and co-writers, including Bangladesh, Harvey Mason Jr., Audius, Brian Kennedy and even the legendary Billy Steinberg (who penned Madonna‘s “Like A Virgin”)–not to mention the artist guest list, featuring Snoop Dogg, Ludacris and Iyaz. Not too shabby!

Though a somewhat eclectic bunch, the talent medley totally worked for Mauboy, resulting in a what proved to be one of the better albums of the year. (See–it even made the MuuMuse Top 40 list!)

Two songs from the album have already been released as singles (“Saturday Night (feat. Ludacris)” and “Get ‘Em Girls (feat. Snoop Dogg)”), although both songs were coupled with shoe-string budget clips that make Girls Aloud‘s “Something Kinda Ooooh” video look groundbreaking.)

Singles aside, I wanted to share one of my favorite album tracks: “Maze,” which was produced by Fredro (who’s also responsible for album tracks “Can Anybody Tell Me?” and “Forget Your Name”) and co-penned by one of my current songwriter crushes, Claude Kelly.

Fredro, the song’s producer, is a Swedish-born writer who first began making waves in the early ’00′s producing for about a zillion of MuuMuse’s most approved acts including Shontelle‘s “Ghetto Lullabye” (!), The Sugababes‘ “Switch” (!!), and Holly Valance‘s “Hush Now” (!!!), as well as another former Australian Idol contestant–Season 1 winner, Guy Sebastian.

Claude Kelly is the same man responsible for co-penning Britney‘s “Circus” and “Shattered Glass” (I know, I KNOW…deep breaths!), Miley Cyrus‘ “Party In The U.S.A.” with Jessie J, and a handful of the better offerings from Christina Aguilera this year, including “Woohoo,” “Desnudate,” and arguably Burlesque‘s best number, “Express.” As one of his latest productions now soars up the Billboard charts (Bruno Mars‘ devastatingly good “Grenade”), I’m fully anticipating the talented songwriter to dominate in 2011.

So that is that, and now we have “Maze”: A fantastically slick, electronica-infused R&B scorcher.

The song is particularly fantastic because it somewhat recalls JoJo‘s legendary “Too Little, Too Late” in that the chorus is very anthem-like and triumphant/inspirational sounding, when in fact the actual message of the song is rife with inner turmoil and a certain degree of sadness.

Speaking to its ‘explosive’ quality, “Maze” basically contains approximately two and a half choruses. First, there’s the pre-chorus (“Yeah, ’cause…one minute you want my tou-ee-uch, yeah / Next minute you don’t want none”).

Upon first listen, it seems like this could be the song’s decent chorus–but it isn’t. IT JUST FEEDS INTO A BETTER ONE: “OOOOOH! Should I stay or should I GOOOO?”

But then, something EVEN MORE AMAZING happens toward the end of the actual chorus: “Your heart is like a MA-EE-AY-ZE!” J. Melly bellows and repeats, rendering the listener physically incapable of doing anything except throwing their head back and hollering right along with the Aussie R&B songstress.

In conclusion: “Maze” is a-MAZE-ing. Do you see what I just did there?! LOLOLOLOL.

Get ‘Em Girls was released on November 5. (Australian iTunes) (Been Waiting is available on US iTunes).

With the ominous silence emanating from the Sugababes‘ label (and Keisha‘s otherwise chit-chatty Twitter page), I thought I’d fill the void with a small research project on any and all things to know about the possibly burgeoning ‘Babe, Jade Almerie Louise Ewen.

• Jade was born in a council estate (English equivalent of the American term, ‘the projects’) in Plaistow (East London) to two disabled parents, which is actually quite sad.

• It gets happier: She won a scholarship to the Sylvia Young Theatre School, where she got her big break as Nala in The Lion King at age 12.

• But then it got a little sad again: She joined a failed girl group called Trinity Stone (which I faintly recall), was signed to Kwame‘s label, and released a dire single called “Stolen Love.”

• According to her MySpace write-up, Jade has “the technical abilities of Whitney and Mariah, and the aspirational cool of Rihanna and Lady GaGa.” This, if you haven’t figured it out yet, means that Jade Ewen is literally the greatest pop star of all time.

• Her favorite color is purple. Major points for that one.

• Her favorite number is 13, which is actually not nearly as ‘zany’ as one might think.

• Ewen was this year’s UK pick for Eurovision, singing the Dianne Warren and Andrew Lloyd Webber-penned “It’s My Time.” She placed fifth overall.

• She writes songs that sound good: She did “A Little Bit” for Booty Luv and “Let Me Be Me” for Jessica Mauboy.

• Conveniently, her real debut single is being released TODAY. It is called “My Man,” and it is very modern sounding (read: if you’ve listened to radio in the past two years, you’ve basically heard this one before) and is generally good on the first play, somewhat dodgy on the second, and fairly irresistible by the third.

In summation, I would not mind a Jade Ewen addition to the ‘Babes. Even though the British tabloids keep questioning the accuracy of the rumored Amelle rupture, the radio silence on their end can only lead to one obvious conclusion: SOMETHIN’ GON’ HAPPEN SOON.

Purchase “My Man” on iTunes UK | MySpace | Official Website

Riding high off the success of the first single, Jessica Mauboy‘s “Burn” is now impacting Australian radio. Like the first single, “Burn” is quite modern in terms of production, and equally addictive upon replay. It’s a bit more up-tempo, a bit more stomptastic, and the chorus is quite ear-friendly.

Still loving her voice. Very Alesha-esque, minus the more grating cat-like yelps that often plague a typical Dixon track. Oh, and she’s only 19 years old, which makes her sort of like the superior, Australian version of Jordin Sparks, no?

The single was released digitally on November 29th.

Two years ago, she lost out for the top spot on the fourth season of Australian Idol. Now, Jessica Mauboy is “Running Back.” (Like what I did there? No? Me either…Apologies.)

In all honesty, it’s a pretty decent track, featuring some state-of-the-art, strictly modern sounds from producer Audius Mtawarira. I’m a fan of Mauboy’s voice–Sort of a less raspy Alesha Dixon. The song goes on for a bit longer than it should, and there’s not much of a departure from the verses into the chorus, but I do like the bit of the song with the repetitive “running back.” Which, I realize in hindsight, was probably the writer’s intention.

Also, who knew Flo-Rida was so muscley?

The track hit #3 on the ARIA charts, proving to be quite a successful start to Mauboy’s delayed beginnings. As it turns out, Mtawarira has become a bit of a hit man (of the music variety) for the Aussie Idol folks: Producing smash hits for Rickie-Lee Coultier and Paulini.

Jessica Mauboy will be releasing her debut album Been Waiting on November 22nd, which is this Friday. Good luck!