Maybe you've heard of this pocket-sized girl with a larger-than-life voice, plucked out of obscurity from some backwater Phillippine island and given the most influential patrons a young artist could hope for - David "The Hit Man"Foster and Oprah. I won't belabor the point; if you're interested you can check out the oodles of YouTube videos tracking Charice's journey from singing local contests in the Phillippines to her dream duets with Andrea Bocelli in Tuscany and Celine Dion in Madison Square Garden.
I wasn't particularly paying attention to her album release, but release it did, a couple months ago, and I just read about Charice joining the Glee cast for season 2, and started poking around the interwebs, and found her first single, which I find impressively well-produced and well-performed.
I also for some reason really love this other song on her album, "In Love So Deep." Not so terribly deep, despite its name, skirting the edge of bubblegum pop, but somehow it gets under your skin because in reality it's so much richer in emotion than a lot of the vacuous dredge that passes for R&B on the radio these days. It's great to see Charice older, more confident, trying to find her own style and niche rather than riding coattails and imitating the greats that came before her (Mariah, Celine, Whitney...). I hope she gets some decent airplay and takes the world by storm!
Oh and um, if you feel like watching the BEST YOUTUBE WEBCAM COVER SONG EVARRR, check out Charice nailing the song by Justin Bieber, "Baby." She's amazing to watch, especially the part where she raps. Anerable.