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Sodagreen’s AIR World Tour Singapore | 4/5

SINGAPORE – Sodagreen’s Little Love Song and Incomparable Beauty are some of my must-sing Mandopop songs, when I indulge in the occasional karaoke session. So when I knew I was to review the Taiwanese indie band’s 10th anniversary concert at the Singapore Indoor Stadium on Saturday evening, I spent a few days getting ready to take part in the mass sing-along session by spending way too much time than is healthy on YouTube. But when the band, whose six members include lead vocalist Wu Tsing-fong, bassist Shin-yi, viola player and keyboardist A-gong, acoustic guitarist A-Fu, electric guitarist Jia-kai and drummer Wei, started serenading the crowd with ballads like I Miss You So Much, What’s The Trouble On Your Mind and Like Loneliness, I found myself falling silent. You see, Wu has such a strong, expressive and unbelievably pristine voice – even though he claimed he was suffering from a cold – that it made more sense to just sit back and take it all in.

Taiwanese indie band Sodagreen serenaded the audience with hits like Little Love Song and I Miss You So Much. Photo: Jason Ho

Taiwanese indie band Sodagreen serenaded the audience with hits like Little Love Song and I Miss You So Much. Photo: Jason Ho

SINGAPORE – Sodagreen’s Little Love Song and Incomparable Beauty are some of my must-sing Mandopop songs, when I indulge in the occasional karaoke session. So when I knew I was to review the Taiwanese indie band’s 10th anniversary concert at the Singapore Indoor Stadium on Saturday evening, I spent a few days getting ready to take part in the mass sing-along session by spending way too much time than is healthy on YouTube. But when the band, whose six members include lead vocalist Wu Tsing-fong, bassist Shin-yi, viola player and keyboardist A-gong, acoustic guitarist A-Fu, electric guitarist Jia-kai and drummer Wei, started serenading the crowd with ballads like I Miss You So Much, What’s The Trouble On Your Mind and Like Loneliness, I found myself falling silent. You see, Wu has such a strong, expressive and unbelievably pristine voice – even though he claimed he was suffering from a cold – that it made more sense to just sit back and take it all in.

Of course, it helped that the group’s songs are beautifully written, mostly by Wu, with simple, moving melodies and unexpectedly profound lyrics. But I also liked watching the band members’ expressions as they played their instruments, especially Wei who closed his eyes and smiled to himself as he drummed, as well as A-gong, who got up to dance (somewhat awkwardly) to some of the faster tunes.

But Wu, who un-celebrated his 32nd birthday on Saturday (by giving a long speech to his fans about why he doesn’t believe in celebrating birthdays) isn’t just a brilliant singer-songwriter – he is also very funny, and wonderfully entertaining. The chatty and quick-witted singer spent much of the three-hour concert making jibes at his fellow band-mates, threatening first to expel and refund members of the audience who had bought tickets expressly to admire Jia-kai’s buff body, and thanked Wei for injuring his leg from a skateboarding accident so he could use the express lane at the immigration checkpoint for the first time. Even the audience wasn’t spared – one particularly over-enthusiastic fan was teased for shrieking too loudly, even as Wu playfully begged the audience of 6,000 to cheer when he announced the last song so he could feel what it was like not to be wanted back on stage.

And when it came to the encore, it was clear neither the band nor its audience wanted to leave. Sodagreen spent more than half an hour taking and performing song requests from their fans, who threw up names of some of the band’s more obscure tunes like Float and Scented Tea. The band then ended the show by bowing repeatedly to its appreciative audience, before gently advising them to leave before they missed the last train home.

Of course, what was so bad about missing the train anyway - if it meant we could spend more time listening to Sodagreen?

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