*****

Yuu Nai Jai Samue is Tai at her best and worst. The stand-out track is the second: Wan Ti Baw Me Ai. This is as good as luk tung gets: it has a surging chorus at its centre, well-balanced by a steady treading rhythm in the verses. Upward tweaks at the end of the vocal lines are paired with downward shifts ending the instrumental phrases. The writing and scoring are perfect, and the song is right at the edge of Tai's rather limited vocal and emotional range. Even the video is rather well done: a phantasmagorically coloured, constantly shifting city scene which can almost make you forgive the rabbit in the moon. Track 3, Saw Kaw Saw Haw Rak, exposes those limits. Tai is only comfortable with low-tempo pieces: here the music's going so fast that she looks scared that she's going to fall off. The pub-singalong chorus (lyrics: la la la la la, la la la la la) does not help matters. The tune in the verses is actually rather good, but only because it's lifted from the far superior Dao Ten Maw Ton on Tai's album 2.

These are sandwiched by tracks 1 and 4, which are just too Thai for a falang to digest easily. Both musically unexciting, they focus on how much Tai loves her fans (a lot) and how much she loves her granny (even more). The combination of sentimentality and self-promotion is not attractive.

Things get briefly back on track with song 5, Raengjai Nai Ngao Jan. This is rather a good solution to Tai's pedestrian pacing: she walks, while the musicians run. Somehow the gently swinging vocal line and the upbeat instrumentals fit together very well: more like this, and Tai would start making great albums rather than just great songs.

Most of the remaining songs on the album are mediocre: tracks 6, 8, 9,11 and 12 are inoffensive, but uninteresting. Track 7, Dawkya Nai Pa Pun, is better, with a nice flute accompaniment, and cheesy storytelling so manipulative as to make it a camp classic. Track 10, Gin Kao Rueyang, is also slightly above average.

Most of the tracks on this album seem to be designed with the karaoke client in mind — nothing too fast, or too taxing, or too emotional. For a listener, however, this is a hard album to digest in one sitting, with not much variety on offer.

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