Ash Nair - Chameleon

Ash Nair
Chameleon
(Digital Skin)

If the name Ash Nair sounds familiar to you, you at some point followed the second season of Malaysian Idol. Ash was a former contestant on the show and is now ready to put all that "singing in front of a judge" behind him with the release of his debut solo album, Chameleon. With a title like that, you can probably guess there's quite a bit of music genre hopping going on throughout the album. I'm not going to really speculate on what possessed Ash to try so many different styles, but I do know he sounds most at ease when he's getting his inner Scott Stapp on. When he's rocking out to songs like “The Stage” and “A Day Before Tomorrow,” he sounds like he's really into it. On more accessible tunes like "Jangan Tinggal Ku," "Runaway" and "Crazy," Ash does an okay job but I'm just not convinced with the overall outcome. There are traces of U2 and other staple classic alternative rock influences throughout the album too. I would have preferred it better though if Ash just decided to forget diversity and focus on making the best Creed album he could. Scott Stapp is nowhere to be found anyway, so there's hardly any worry of competition. Overall, this is a pretty uneven release and it could have been so much better if Ash wasn't trying to please so many people with over extending himself.

** 1/2

Adlin

Also check out Creed, U2, Daughtry

http://www.myspace.com/ashnair

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