Star Sparkle Blog

This week's video is INTENTIONS by Nigerian singer Juno  (also written as JUNO). It's her latest single and was released on 7th August. The Afropop/R'n'B song is described as a "mirror to desire, doubt and the silent tension between two hearts". This is the lyric video.     For more Juno check out these links: Music video for Love Life (released last December):  https://starsparklex.blogspot.com/2025/07/weekly-music-video.html   Lyric video for Love Life (uploaded on 7th August):  https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=YnQPlDesX0s  

Time for another instalment in my Asian Groups series! Today I'm featuring Indonesian girl group no na . :)  Note: Currently, Indonesians are going through a difficult time, after the killing of a delivery driver led to protests in several cities , which have spread to some other South East Asian countries. Thinking of people in those countries. :)  They are a 4-member group and were formed by American record label and mass media company 88rising , with 3 of the members meeting at their 2022 Head in the Clouds festival in Jakarta in 2022 and the 4th joining later. Their name (which is written in lower case) comes from the Indonesian word "nona", which means "young lady" or "miss" in English.   no na joined several other Indonesian acts on 88rising, including Rich Brian ,  NIKI  and  Stephanie Poetri . The members are Christy (full name Denial Christian Gardena), Esther (Esther Geraldine Simanjuntak), Baila (Bailia Shaquanda Fauri) and Shaz (full name ...

This week's video is Back Outside by American singer Nija . It's her latest single and was released on 15th August. Back Outside follows Nija's previous 2025 singles- 32nd Floor (released in March) and Heaven (which came out in June). It's a smooth R'n'B song, with laid back vibes. This is the visualiser.    Want more Nija? Check out these posts: Visualiser for 32nd Floor:  https://starsparklex.blogspot.com/2025/04/weekly-music-video_23.html Official audio for Heaven:  https://starsparklex.blogspot.com/2025/06/weekly-music-video_18.html    

Canadian singer Justin Bieber released a surprise new album last month. It's called SWAG and is his 7th studio album. News of SWAG  only emerged just before its release on 11th July. I think I came across songs from it on YouTube and realised they were from a new album. It had been quite a while since Justin had brought out new music, so I was pleased to find out about it! :) SWAG follows Justin's 6th album Justice and 2nd EP Freedom (both released in 2021). To date it has reached No. 1 in several countries , including Canada, Australia, Norway and Portugal and charted within the Top 10 in more, including the UK, US, Australia, Spain and Japan. The release of SWAG comes after Justin has been through a difficult time in his personal life. There have been rumours of problems in his marriage with wife American model and businesswoman  Hailey Bieber (daughter of actor Stephen Baldwin, one of the Baldwin brothers ) and worries over Justin behaving erratically as well as...

In June I wrote a post about the 20th anniversary of my fave singer Mariah Carey's The Emancipation of Mimi album. It ended up being a long post, so I split it into two parts! You can see Part 1: https://starsparklex.blogspot.com/2025/06/20th-anniversary-of-mariahs.html I also did another post featuring a special live performance that Mariah did to celebrate the anniversary:  https://starsparklex.blogspot.com/2025/06/mariah-carey-20th-teom-anniversary-live.html Now here is Part 2! Today I'm featuring some songs from The Emancipation of Mimi: Ultra Platinum Edition and the new 20th anniversary edition. :)   Don't Forget About Us Don't Forget About Us was the lead (and only) single from the re-released version of the album (the Ultra Platinum Edition) and came out in October 2005, ahead of the re-release in November 2005. It's one of my favourite songs from TEOM. :) Don't Forget About Us is about a past relationship, although Mariah has stated that the  true mean...

I last shared a New Music Releases post at the beginning of June . So now that we're well into summer, I thought I'd share some new music from a mix of genres, for the current season! :)   KARD- Touch  First up, some K-pop! This is Touch, the latest single by Korean mixed gender/co-op group KARD . It's the lead single from their 8th mini album DRIFT and both came out on 2nd July. DRIFT features 7 tracks, including BETCHA, Touch, Pivot and instrumental versions of Touch and Pivot. Touch is an English and Korean language song with sexy lyrics, which reinterprets 2000s music . Click "Subtitles/closed captions" on YouTube for English subtitles! :)    There's also a performance video: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=IKRAgL7THOg   Stream/buy DRIFT here:  https://lnkfi.re/KARD_DRIFT   And for more music from KARD, visit my New Music for 2025 post from the beginning of the year (features the visualiser for stand-alone single Detox):  https://starsparklex....

This week's video is Woman To Woman by Nigerian singer Simi . It's her most recent single and came out in March. Woman To Woman is the 4th single from Simi's 5th studio album Lost and Found, which was released in July last year, through her independent record label Studio Brat . It's an Afrobeats, R'n'B and soul album.  Woman To Woman follows previous singles All I Want, Men are Crazy and Borrow Me Your Baby. It's all about celebrating women and I think the lyrics are a mixture of English, a Nigerian language and Pidgin . This is the original music video and there's also a viral video (see below).      And here is the viral video (also released in March):  https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=APUjYM7PiTI   Want more Simi? Check out this post: Music video for her 2020 single THERE FOR YOU feat. Ms Banks (plus links to more music): https://starsparklex.blogspot.com/2021/01/weekly-music-video_20.html

This week's video is Do It Right by Em Simmaly . She's an American singer who also models and acts.  Do It Right is from Em's EP Bloom in Violet, which was released in May. Her previous singles include On One, Roll With Me and Replaceable with Jango Flex.  Do It Right is a sensual R'n'B song and the first track from the EP. The music video was uploaded in May.   Listen to Bloom in Violet on Spotify  https://open.spotify.com/album/6jpDdXrlAPohcrqvf0r2m9 And you can find more videos/audios from the EP on Em's YouTube channel:  https://www.youtube.com/@emsimmaly/videos   For more on Em visit these links:  TikTok: https://www.tiktok.com/@emsimmaly Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/emsimmaly YouTube channel:  https://www.youtube.com/@emsimmaly/  

Time for another instalment of C-pop Saturday, my semi- regular series sharing Chinese music! I've only done one other post this year ( in February ), so this is the 2nd one of 2025. Today I'm featuring C-pop and R'n'B. :)   ELL&s- Elevatah First up, a Taiwanese girl group! This is Elevatah by  ELL&s , who are signed to KJM Entertainment. The group consists of 5 members- 4 of whom were previously in pre-debut girl group SUNNY PARFUM . According to their Kprofiles , they are a sub-unit of SUNNY PARFUM. The members are lead vocalist Ashlee (real name Chan Hsai-chen/Xinchan), Theia (Zheng Yuhsin), Cherry (Chen Chen-wei/Huang Xiuwan/), Rosie (don't know her full name yet) and Shan/Shanshan (Chen Yu-shan).   All the girls apart from Rosie were members of SUNNY PARFUM * ELL&s debuted in July 2024 with the digital single Elevatah. They also released the special single Ride or Die (2024 Remaster Version) last September, a remake of a song originally released by ...

Today's video is ALL I WANT IS YOU by Australian rapper and singer THE Kid LAROI . It's a recent single and was released on 6th June. It precedes his latest single HOW DOES IT FEEL? which came out later this month. ALL I WANT IS YOU is a laidback pop/R'n'B song with romantic lyrics. It marked LAROI's  first solo release of 2025 , following his single I know love with his girlfriend Canadian singer Tate McRae (released in February). This is the official audio.   The Kid LAROI fan? Check out these posts: Music video for I know love with Tate:  https://starsparklex.blogspot.com/2025/04/weekly-music-video_9.html Video for his newest single HOW DOES IT FEEL? (released on 20th June):  https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=bIDRLLVaLlQ

A couple of weeks ago, I wrote a post about the 20th anniversary of my favourite singer  Mariah Carey's  The Emancipation of Mimi album. I ended up splitting it into two parts. You can see Part 1 here:  https://starsparklex.blogspot.com/2025/06/20th-anniversary-of-mariahs.html I'm planning to write Part 2 soon. But today I thought I'd share a special live performance that Mariah did to celebrate the anniversary.  In addition to releasing a deluxe 20th anniversary edition of The Emancipation of Mimi (or TEOM for short!) on 30th May (see Part 1 ), Mariah also recorded a live performance of select tracks from the album.  It's called Mariah Carey: The Live Sessions and is presented by MC and musical director  Daniel Moore . Daniel accompanies Mariah on the piano.   The songs featured are Don't Forget About Us, Circles, Say Somethin', Your Girl and We Belong Together. My faves are Don't Forget About Us and Say Somethin', although I like all of them....

This week's video is Heaven, the latest single by American singer Nija . It follows her previous single 32nd Floor, which came out in March. Heaven is a chilled R'n'B song. Someone in the comments on YouTube describes it as "outer space R'n'B"! It's one of my current favourite songs and I bought it on iTunes.  The single came out on 30th May. This is the official audio. I'll update this post if there's a music video in future. :)   Visit my Weekly Music Video post from April to see the visualiser for 32nd Floor:  https://starsparklex.blogspot.com/2025/04/weekly-music-video_23.html  

Today's video is LaSalle Ave by American singer  Jay Chang . His real name is Jay Steven Kapossy and he has a Filipino Chinese mum and Irish/Hungarian dad.  Jay was born in the US but moved to South Korea for his music career. He followed in the footsteps of his dad, who was a musician in the 80s .  He started out by competing on the Korean survival programme Under Nineteen in 2018 and while he didn't make the final group, he went on to make his solo debut with the digital single Is you in November 2020. He released two other digital singles- LIAR and I'd do anything. Jay later signed with FM Entertainment . In 2023 he competed on another audition programme,  BOYS PLANET and although he didn't make it in to the final line-up for the project boyband ZEROBASEONE , he became well known and it kickstarted his career.  He made his official solo debut in October 2023 with the EP LATE NIGHT , which is a mixture of Korean and English tracks. The lead singles were I'll...

My favourite singer Mariah Carey is celebrating the 20th Anniversary of her 10th studio album The Emancipation of Mimi. It was released back in April 2005. I'd planned to write just one post about the album but it was turning into a really long one, so I've decided to divide it into two parts! Here is Part 1. :) The Emancipation of Mimi (or TEOM for short!) was considered Mariah's "comeback album" at the time, following on from her previous two albums, Glitter (2001) which was accompanied by the film of the same name and Charmbracelet (2002). Neither the Glitter movie or album were very well received and after going through a difficult time in general, Mariah had an emotional and physical breakdown and checked into hospital that summer. She was diagnosed with bipolar II disorder , although didn't feel ready to speak about it pubicly until several years later .  Although Charmbracelet (MC's first release after leaving Virgin Records America and singing w...

This week's video is Mine by American singer Amerie . It's her latest single and was released in March. It's been a long time since Amerie has released music, so it's good to see her back! :) Her last studio album was almost 16 years ago (!!), In Love & War which was released in November 2016.  She has brought out 2 EPs in the years since though- (Drive (2016) and the double album 4AM Mulholland/After 4AM (2018). The latter was called an album at the time of release , but it was actually more of an EP. In recent years, Amerie has also become an author, having written children's book  You Will Do Great Things (2023) and contributed to/edited several anthologies, Her first adult book This Is Not a Ghost Story: a Novel is due out in July. In addition, she hosts a book club . She is set to release a new album  (her 5th studio one) this year. Mine will likely be on it, along with another song called Undeniable. Mine is a romantic ballad co-written by Amerie and re...

Sorry the 2nd post is later this week; I didn't manage to get it finished yesterday. :)   It's been a while since I've done a New Music Releases post (apart from my New Music for 2025 posts at the beginning of the year, my last one was in December ). So here is some new music for spring (almost summer) 2025! :) LISA feat. Tyla- WHEN I'M WITH YOU First up, an Asian/African crossover! :) Thai rapper and singer LISA (member of Korean girl group BLACKPINK turned solo star) recently brought out the single WHEN I'M WITH YOU, a collab with South African singer Tyla .  LISA's full name is Lalisa Manobal (her birth name is Pranpriya Manobal; she  changed it to bring herself good luck ). She started her career becoming a trainee with YG Entertainment (one of South Korea's biggest entertainment companies) and debuted at a member of BLACKPINK in 2016. In September 2021, LISA made her solo debut with the single album Lalisa and single of the same name. The single albu...

Time for another instalment of my Asian Groups series! Today I'm featuring two Thai groups- girl group THX  and boyband/boy group NEVONE . :)   THX THX are an 8 member girl group from Thailand. Their name stands for "Together, Heading to the Xtraordinary". The group was formed through E29 Trainees , by Thai record label E29 Music Identities . The members are leader Bambam (real name Butree Kaljurek), Tata (Punnawan Leelaburanatanakul), Barrie (Apichaya Mollin), Fresh (Jibhassorn Laoluechai), Cindy (full name Cindy Schmid), Cheer (Jiyapat Tantikittichaikul), Ray (Ravisara Chiewvej) and Puttjung (Napassanan Ronnakiat).   THX debuted in November 2024 with the digital single HORIZION LOVE. They released their 2nd single You Like Me Too? in February. HORIZON LOVE This is Horizon Love (also stylised as HORIZION LOVE), the girls' debut single, which was released last November. It's a pop song with a mix of Thai and English lyrics.     You Like Me Too? And here is...