The relatively anonymous illadub sent me an e-mail telling me about Asia Cruise, a multi-ethnic [Asian, Native American, White] Jacksonville Pop/R&B artist signed onto Jive Records. The way she was marketed was interesting - her music was leaked first onto MySpace with music, but without any photographs - only a female silhouette with a title, “who is Asia Cruise?” and a countdown to her video. Bloggers questioned her identity - at least until the video that came out for her song, “Selfish”:
She talks about her initial identity being a mystery on her MySpace page:
I know some of you are wondering why the big mystery. Well, to be honest with you, it really didn’t start that way. The whole “Who Is Asia Cruise” was more of a question to myself. When I started working on the album, the main question that kept poppin up was “Who is Asia?” I really wanted to pick songs that reflected me and who I am…so when you listen to the album, you’ll definitely get a sense of who I am. Then I wanted everyone to like me for my music instead of my image. That was really important to me. So, we decided to take a risk and not put my face out there and GUESS what? Ya’ll love my music!!
Okay, so I’m 31 and her links to teenmusic.com make me feel incredibly old, but the A&R guy in me believes Asia Cruise actually has a fighting chance of being a successful artist. The Asian activist in me wonders if the marketing of her music before her video is to prevent her from being typecast as an Asian artist, which haven’t had much success in mainstream radio. Nonetheless, I’ll be channeling the sixteen year old girl inside me and listen to this song repeatedly the next time I go through a break-up.
Send to: E-mail - del.icio.us - digg - Facebook
Other posts you might be interested in:
Blog RSS Blog Comments RSS
ancient one wrote:
I am surprised that no one has mentioned him (well, maybe I’m not surprised), but there is another multiethnic Asian American in R&B/Pop who is very “successful” - Allan Pineda Lindo (aka apl.de.ap) of the Black Eyed Peas. He does some pretty good Asian oriented work: see Bebot bep generations 1 and 2 (http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-JPPCIboL4A). My nephew works for APL as a sound engineer. Lots of historical Asian American references in generation 1. The Jasmine Trias cameo is funny in generation 2. Another good song is the Apl Song (http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=jqggYc3Ra1c), which goes over the plight of Filipino veterans. The video features Dante Basco and Joy Bisco. It’s helpful, but not totally necessary to understand Tagalog for both of these songs.
In the 1990s, there seemed to be a surge number of Asian American groups and individual who had some dance hits and ballads, like Jocelyn Enriquez (”I’ve been thinking about you”, “A little bit of Ecstasy”, and “Do you miss me?”), Buffy (”Give me a Reason”), and Kai (”Say you’ll stay” - I love the fast version - brings me back). As “Freestyle” faded, that surge seemed to end.
Posted on 01-Feb-08 at 5:57 pm | Permalink
pitbull wrote:
ASIA CRUISE was in Hawaii on radio tour this past week and when BOWWOW didnt show for his part of the{sat,sun] CHRIS BROWN CONCERT. CHRIS ask her if she could fill in, with the show only hours away and a lot of mp3’s being sent to laptops the show went on as planned. ASIA CRUISE had thousands of people singing SELFISH and put on a hell of a show in a moments notice [#1 SONG IN HAWAII “SELFISH”, ASIA is here to stay and is a class act, she shows up on time where ever she is scheduled to be[ a rare thing in the music business}. Everybody will CATCH “ASIAMANIA” this year! One last thing she is much better “live”, her voice is so pure no studio affects needed. When she comes to your city go see her her show is off the chain especially the dance segments{yes ASIANS can dance just as good if not better than everybody else. keep’in ya posted PITBULL! P.S CHRIS BROWN AND ASIA ARE PLANNING A DUET TOGETHER STAY TUNED
Posted on 04-Feb-08 at 4:12 am | Permalink
pitbull wrote:
USA TODAY just finished interviewing ASIA the article will be out soon she was picked as one of the top 3 female artist to watch for 2008! ‘ASIAMANIA’ coming to a city near you ! keep’in ya posted PITBULL
Posted on 04-Feb-08 at 4:20 am | Permalink
pitbull wrote:
rotation on MTV starts feb 11 also TRL FEB 13 LIVE APPEARANCE THE FEB 24 ON TRL
Posted on 05-Feb-08 at 5:37 pm | Permalink
Jennifer wrote:
i thought that she Asia cruise was filipina !!!
Posted on 30-May-08 at 7:16 am | Permalink
Drake wrote:
Isn’t she the winner of the Pussycat Dolls reality show?? then she went out on her own?
Posted on 09-Jun-08 at 4:09 pm | Permalink