Star Sparkle Blog

It's almost the end of 2023, so here is my annual round-up of the best posts from the year! :) You can see my previous Best Of posts (dating back to 2016) at the links below:  2016's Best Of:  https://starsparklex.blogspot.com/2016/12/best-of-2016.html 2017's:  https://starsparklex.blogspot.com/2017/12/best-of-2017.html 2018's: https://starsparklex.blogspot.com/2018/12/best-of-2018.html 2019's:  https://starsparklex.blogspot.com/2019/12/best-of-2019.html 2020's: https://starsparklex.blogspot.com/2020/12/best-of-2020.html 2021's: https://starsparklex.blogspot.com/2022/01/best-of-2021.html 2022's: https://starsparklex.blogspot.com/2023/01/best-of-2022.html   And now here is 2023's! :)   Music I continued my tradition of writing posts sharing some new music for the new year: New Music for 2023- Bollywood/Asian  https://starsparklex.blogspot.com/2023/01/new-music-for-2023-bollywoodasian.html New Music for 2023- Various:  https://starsparklex.blogspot

Hope everyone had a good Christmas! Or if you celebrated another festival, I hope you enjoyed that. :)  Today's video is Nye by Guam born singer Pia Mia . She released her first Christmas EP Christmas in November 2021. It contains 4 tracks including Unwrap Me, which I shared in last week's Christmas Round-up post (see below) and Nye. Since it's New Year's Eve on Sunday, I'm sharing Nye, Pia's New Year's Eve track. Chilled vibes for the new year! This is the official lyric video.    Visit my Christmas Round-up 3 post for more on the Christmas EP and to listen to Unwrap Me: https://starsparklex.blogspot.com/2023/12/christmas-round-up-3.html   Pia fan? Check out these posts: Visualiser for HOT, plus the remix (2020):  https://starsparklex.blogspot.com/2020/09/weekly-music-video_23.html Music video for the 2022 single How We Do It with Sean Paul: https://starsparklex.blogspot.com/2020/09/weekly-music-video_23.html  

Sorry the 2nd post is later this week, I'm a bit behind in the lead-up to Christmas. Anyway, it's Christmas Eve today, so here's some last minute festive inspiration! :) In 2016 and 2018 I wrote two Christmas Round-up posts featuring a round-up of Christmas themed posts on the blog, plus some festive favourites. You can see them at the links below: Christmas Round-up:  https://starsparklex.blogspot.com/2016/12/christmas-round-up.html Christmas Round-up 2: https://starsparklex.blogspot.com/2018/12/christmas-round-up-2.html   So for Christmas 2023 I thought it would be good to do another round-up. :)   First, here are my Christmas posts from the past 5 years (all music themed):     Christmas Songs 2019: https://starsparklex.blogspot.com/2019/12/christmas-songs-2019.html Christmas Songs for 2020: https://starsparklex.blogspot.com/2020/12/christmas-songs-for-2020.html Christmas Music Round-up: https://starsparklex.blogspot.com/2021/12/christmas-music-round-up.html K-pop Christm

It's only 5 days till Christmas (seems to have come round quickly again!), so today's Weekly Music Video is festive themed. This is Wrap Me Up by American singer JoJo . It's from her Christmas album December Baby, which was released in October 2020. Wrap Me Up is an R'n'B song about being with the one you love at Christmas, perfect for relaxing to at this time of year. :) This an audio.     Visit my Christmas Songs for 2020 post to see the music video for the title song for December Baby, plus listen to more Chistmas music from JoJo (scroll down): https://starsparklex.blogspot.com/2020/12/christmas-songs-for-2020.html

Christmas is just over a week away, so today I'm sharing some festive music! :) I've previously written two other posts/round-ups featuring Christmas songs, which you can see at the links below: Christmas Music: https://starsparklex.blogspot.com/2018/12/christmas-music.html Christmas Music Round-up:  https://starsparklex.blogspot.com/2021/12/christmas-music-round-up.html For 2023 I'm sharing some new festive songs. :)   Brandy- Christmas Party for Two  American singer Brandy (full name Brandy Norwood) released her first Christmas album (and 8th studio album overall) Christmas with Brandy on 10th November. It contains 12 tracks- 6 classic Christmas songs, plus 6 original ones. Brandy is also co-starring in the new Netflix film Best. Christmas. Ever! , alongside Heather Graham , Matt Cedeño and Jason Biggs .  Christmas Party for Two is a smooth R'n'B love song with chilled vibes. It's the lead single from Christmas with Brandy and came out on 3rd November. Brandy

This week's video is Call Me by Rangga Jones. His first name is pronounced "Rang-guh" and he is an Indonesian born, Singapore based multi-instrumentalist, singer/songwriter and producer, whose self-produced music is pop and R'n'B style. In 2019 Rangga released the single Beautiful Mistake, which is considered his breakout song. He went on to release his debut EP A Little Bit Patient in December 2021. His other singles include Other Half, Favourite Things, confidence in me, Make Me Wanna, Waste Your Time, YOU with Singaporean rapper TENGY and not good enough. Rangga has just brought out his debut album Emotions (released on 8th December). The lead single from the album is not good enough (written in lower case). I randomly came across his music on Spotify recently. This is Call Me, which came out in March 2022. I like the chilled, reflective vibe of the song and the raindrops on the video screen are relaxing! This is the official lyric video.     For music from R

Sorry the 2nd post is later this week, I wasn't able to get it finished yesterday. :) Back in March I wrote a post featuring dance covers of songs by Japanese girl group XG . You can see it here: https://starsparklex.blogspot.com/2023/03/dance-in-public-xg.html Today I'm doing a follow up featuring more dances. They are covers of the singles from the group's debut mini album NEW DNA, which was released in September. Note: As I've said before, while XG are Japanese, they are considered a global group and their singles so far have been in English, so that's why their dance cover videos tend to be listed as "Dance in Public" (and sometimes J-pop in Public or X-pop). :)    [DANCE IN PUBLIC ONE TAKE] XG- GRL GVNG dance cover- Mermaids Taiwan First up is a dance cover of GIRL GVNG, the first pre-release single from NEW DNA, which came out in June. The cover is performed by Mermaids Taiwan, a dance cover group from Taiwan. The Mermaids have teamed up with some

Today's video is Whip It Up by American singer Justine Skye . It's her latest single and was released in October. It's been over two years since her last album Space and Time (a collab with record producer and rapper Timbaland ), so maybe it will be included on an upcoming album. Whip It Up seems more of a pop/dance song than some of Justine's previous releases. It has an upbeat vibe but the background music is also relaxing. And I like the sunny video, since it's cold here now and I miss summer! The lyrics are on screen, which is cool.     Justine fan? Check out these posts: Music video for Twisted Fantasy featuring Nigerian singer Rema (2021: https://starsparklex.blogspot.com/2021/06/weekly-music-video_30.html Live performance of the single We (2021):  https://starsparklex.blogspot.com/2021/06/weekly-music-video_30.html NYE 2022 live performance of her 2014 hit single Collide (post also features Singaporean singer Gen Neo): https://starsparklex.blogspot.com/2023/

Filipina R'n'B singer Denise Julia (real name Julia Denise Lee) recently released her debut mini album. It's called Sweet Nothings (Chapter 1) and came out on 17th November.  I first came across Denise around a year ago and liked her song superficial energy (written in lower case). After listening to more of her music on Spotify, one of my favourite songs was Pity Ya. And then this summer I really liked her single bum 2 me , so I was looking forward to the release of her first mini album. :)  Sweet Nothings contains 7 tracks (all English language), including the singles bum 2 me, butterflies and B.A.D. featuring P-Lo. It's R'n'B style (some songs have a 00s vibe!) with some jazz and hip hop influences, and Denise says that the album is "like a journey through all the different parts of love". Read more about it here: https://www.parcinq.com/post/denise-julia-releases-debut-album-sweet-nothings-chapter-1 I like the mini album. I think if you also lik

Today's video is No love by Ninho and featuring Ayra Starr . Ninho (real name William Nzobazola) is a French rapper. His parents are Conoglese. He comes from a musical family,  since his dad Serge Kimabukuta and uncle Josky Kimabukuta were famous singers. Ninho began his career with the release of his mixtape Ils sont pas au courant (Vol 1) (which translates as "They don't know" in English) in 2013 and went on to bring out two more. His mixtape M.I.L.S (Maintenant ils le savent) aka "Now they know" in English,  was released in October 2016 and went platinum in France. His first studio album Comme prévu (As expected) followed in 2017. To date Ninho has released 2 more mixtapes- M.I.L.S 2.0. (2018)  M.I.L.S 3 (2020), and 3 more albums- Destin (2019), Jefe (2021) and NI (2023). His singles include Roro, Mamacita, Gotte d'eau, Maman ne le sait pas featuring French rapper Niska , Grand bain with Congolese-French singer Dadju , Millions with French rappe

Last week I wrote a post about the solo careers of the members of American girl group Fifth Harmony. I intended to write one post but ended up splitting it into two parts because it was long. You can read Part 1 here: https://starsparklex.blogspot.com/2023/11/fifth-harmony-girls-solo-careers-part-1.html The first post features Camila Cabello, Normani Kordei and Lauren Jauregui. And now for Part 2, I'm sharing music from the other 2 members, Dinah Jane and Ally Brooke.   Ally Brooke Ally Brooke (full name Alyson Brooke Hernandez) took the first steps in her solo career with the release of the single Look at Us Now (a collaboration with American DJs Lost Kings and rapper ASAP Ferg ) in June 2017. The following January she released her first single as lead artist, Perfect with Croation-German DJ Topic , which was well received. In November 2018 Ally teamed up with Dutch DJ trio Kriss Kross Amsterdam and Dominican rapper Messiah for the single Vámonos ("Let's Go" in Eng

This week's video is Don't Buy Me Roses by American singer Alina Baraz . It's her latest single and came out in September. Don't Buy Me Roses follows on from  this summer's Keep Me In Love and is about looking back at a relationship now that it's over. It also features backing vocals from London based singer Col3trane . This is the official lyric video, which was uploaded on 22nd September.   Visit this post to listen to the audio and/or watch the music video for Keep Me In Love (released in August): https://starsparklex.blogspot.com/2023/08/weekly-music-video_23.html

Sorry the 2nd post is later this week, I didn't manage to get it finished in time. :) I've actually had this post in mind for a while now but just getting round to it! Fifth Harmony (also known as 5H) is an American girl group, consisting of 5 contestants from the 2nd season (or series) of the of The X Factor USA . The members- Camila Cabello, Normani Kordei, Lauren Jaregui, Ally Brooke and Dinah Jane- all auditioned solo for the reality show. Not all the girls got through to the next stage but they were brought back as a group to enter the Groups category. They came 3rd place in the contest in December 2012 (behind runner up Carly Rose Sonenclar and winner Tate Stevens ). The group signed a record deal with Syco (the record label of The X Factor creator Simon Cowell ; now defunct) and Epic Records , and released their debut single Miss Movin On in July 2013. Their debut EP Better Together followed in October that year. In January 2015 they brought out their first studio albu