Song Review:: Jay Chang (ONE PACT): NEIGHBORHOOD- LaSalle Ave

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  • Release date: 2024 November 22
  • Album tracklist: Paper Cut, LaSalle Ave, Four Seasons, What You Need (feat. TAG)
  • Album runtime: 13 minutes

Ah, my boy, Jay. He's had a journey, hasn't he? And even though ONE PACT just had a comeback, he's with B.D.U, so he couldn't perform with his original group, and I'm a little curious about the fact that he is putting out a solo album while he's with B.D.U. Not that he couldn't, but with the short time frame of most project groups like this, I'm surprised he has the time. Unless the company isn't doing anything with them, in which case, shame on them. Who even has B.D.U? As is typical when I have questions like this, I went sniffing to find the answer is a company called Orca Music that I can find no information on. Is the company specifically for them? Does the company have another group? When was it founded? Inquiring minds want to know.

This has a lovely jazzy vibe to it, but it's not 1940s jazz. It's a lot more similar to 1970s jazz, which is an interesting genre to be hearing, and is rather old school, instead of golden oldies. In my head, there's a difference. Listening to the song, I was reminded a lot kind of Barry Manilow's Copacabana in tone, but not in genre. There are some sections of the instrumentals that sound an awful lot like that song, but jazzy rather than latin-infused or disco. Unlike that song, however, the energy is maintained at a stable level through out the song, with some brief variations that neither shove nor retract the energy of the piece.

This genuinely sounds like if Jesse McCartney sang a Barry Manilow cover. It's a strange combination that seems a less than stellar fit for Jay's very expressive voice. I've seen Boys Planet. I've seen Build Up. I've heard what he can do with that voice at each end of the energy spectrum with both the explosive growl and the soulful ballad. Dangerously got added to every playlist I thought it even moderately suited. LaSalle Ave, while a very pretty song, doesn't loose his voice in a way I was expecting or really let it linger, and so that's on me. But why keep his voice within a small dynamic band? Out of curiosity, I checked the credits. Jay is lyricist and composer, which didn't surprise me as he is a song-writer, but when I saw "M.O.N.T", I genuinely wasn't expecting to see Roda there instead of Bitsaeon, the M.O.N.T member he's with in B.D.U. The acronyms are killing me a little. I have to assume Bitsaeon introduced them, but that also raises more questions. The song itself is perfectly nice, but I'm surprised that Jay didn't take an opportunity to really flex his voice. It wouldn't have to be the same flex as in Dangerously, and I'm not sure it's healthy for his voice to belt in that way all the time anyway nor would it be appropriate for every songs, but that wouldn't stop him from slowing it down and really giving his voice room in the lower notes. He has one belt that tries but it just doesn't linger like it should to really drive his voice home. And because of what the instrumentals sound like, there wouldn't need to be much adjustment to them for that allowance. I do think the jazzy, soulful tone fits him well though. He just needed more audible Jay in the song, other than the lyrics which are so sweet. But whatever happens, he needs to keep his vibrato. I will cry if he ever stops using it, and that's the most Jay thing about his vocals the song has. And it's a gorgeous song. Don't get me wrong. Objectively speaking, if I didn't know what he could sound like, I'd likely have no issues with the song whatsoever. 

Blond Jay is a little weird to be seeing, given how familiar I am with his brown hair, but he's smiling and he looks healthy, so as long as those two things remain true, I'm happy. And the music video really resonated with me, but that's to be expected given that I lived in Small Town, U.S.A., where the population of my town growing up was smaller than my senior class in Vegas after I moved there. By about a hundred or so people. I've managed to ignore it for years because it's entirely unhelpful for my life anymore, but the open spaces combined with the lyrics reminded me how much I miss our property. Also, the cat is adorable. The little nose boop was precious.



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