elfs | Twelve Girls Band

Scour the classical music conservatories of China for twelve utterly beautiful women in their mid-20's who also happen to be exceptionally proficient at their instruments, mix and match them with a producer who understand what's really popular with the consumer classes of various wealthy nations, assign them to a team of arrangers who can craft that music so that it sounds somewhere between correct and native on instruments like the yang qin (a sort of hammared dulcimer) and the eru (a two-string cello-like instrument), and add a couple of studio engineers who can bring in a funky sound effect or two as needed, and you've got Twelve Girls Band.

I ought to like them. I like Chinese classical music, and I'm reasonably hip to Jack-format stuff, but after listening to their (Japanese release only) album Mei Ii Yin Yue Hui, I can only conclude that I don't. And the problem can be isolated down to one word: slick.

You know how there are CGI models whose skin looks waxy and fake, but otherwise they're so convincing that it's that very flawlessness and artificiality that twigs you and you start having uncanny valley effect? That's how I feel about Twelve Girls Band. This is music so polished and precise that the humanity of the women who produced it is obscured behind the many layers of digital cleanliness. This is not helped but a complete and utter lack of courage on the part of the arrangers and producer. Not a single piece on this album moves me one way or the other. No one strikes out on her own, solos, or otherwise shows any interest in anything more than getting the track down and collecting a paycheck. This is music you can toss into the CD player at a party and receive kudos for your "wide ranging tastes" without actually risking offense, a music fit mostly for the elevators of some Chinese THX-1138 apartment complex.

Maybe it's because I actually like Chinese classical music and have listened to albums such as Zeng Zhao-Bin's Fishing in Spring Tides or traditionals like Dance Song of the Yao Tribe, that ruins it for me. Most of the reviews I've read absolutely adore this "new" and "refreshing" music, but to me it's neither: it's well-packaged, mass-produced new age pop music without a shred of individuality. They have two American releases, Romantic Energy and Twelve Girls of Christmas, but unless something has changed since the release I'm listening to, I can't recommend the band to anyone.