Day 336: The S2H RMA's!

One of the many advantages of being CEO of your own record company (I'm talking about the internationally-worshipped S2H Records, Inc. of course!) is that you get to host your own award ceremonies every year. That's right, it's the 2005 S2H Records Music Awards!, or the S2H RMA's as they're fondly known in the music industry. And the results are in! After careful contemplation the following songs are this year's winners:

2004 Song Of The Year:

Jump (For My Love) - Girls Aloud

It was really hard to choose this one, as I had so many favourites this year, but in the end it's these five frisky girls from the UK that took home the most coveted trophy in the music industry. Maybe it's the fact that this cover of the 1980's Pointer Sisters hit is as perky and sassy and revved-up as the Girls are, or that it was featured on the soundtrack that everyone fell in love with this year - Love Actually. Or maybe it's because I'm unabashedly biased by sentimentality, and this song was like my own soundtrack this year, from watching the video a million times with the kids at my first school back in Shihung, to roadtrips with my friends across Korea, to watching the Parrots rock out with air guitar to this track, but god I love this song! I will never be able to listen to this song without thinking of my year in Korea. (It's also my own 'dancing-in-my-underwear-while-getting-ready-for-work-a-la-Hugh-Grant' song!)

Best Pop Song:

Obvious - Westlife

With the departure of one of their members, Brian McFadden, and their most recent album, a swing-inspired jazz album entitled '...Please Allow Me To Be Frank' that tanked on the record charts, the fab five from Ireland, the veterans of all boy bands, Westlife, have had a pretty rough year. Until now. Released as the second single from their last pop album, Obvious is a pop ballad like none other this year. About loving someone so much it hurts, and being so close to them and dropping so many clues as to your own burning yearning undying love for them, but not being able to say it in words....(and who can forget the hot video!)...this song is amazing.

Best Rock Song:

This Love - Maroon 5

These boys probably should have won the award for Best New Artist as well, and they would have if it had not been for a bribe from the winner in the form of a promise to be featured in her next video, Maroon 5 have swept the global charts. Their album 'Songs About Jane' has pumped out hit single after hit single. Their lastest effort, 'She Will Be Loved', is currently Mr. S2H's Fave Song Of The Mo. I spent many a night rocking out to 'This Love' in bars across Korea, and everyone always knows all the words. Congratulations, Maroon 5 on the beginning of what's sure to be a very successful rock career.

Best R&B Song:

Superstar - Jamelia

This UK R&B songstress appeared out of nowhere earlier this year with a song that went to Number One in over a dozen countries worldwide. Jamelia's 'Superstar' was a smash hit everywhere, from the ghettoes of Philly to the dance floors of Sydney to the back alley pubs of London to the bedroom of the CEO of the world's biggest records company. Jamelia, you truly are a Superstar now, baby!

Best Musical Duet/Musical Collaboration:

Car Wash - Christina Aguilera with Missy Elliott

The movie 'Shark Tale' may have been no Nemo, but this song more than made up for the movie's fishy flop. Teaming up for the second time (the first was 2001's 'Lady Marmalade') Missy and the Queen of Dirrty herrself took a 1970's disco classic and transformed it into a funky, truly ghetto-fabulous track. Grab your bikinis and your garden hoses ladies and gentlemen, it's time to get sudsy and have a Car Wash!

Best Cover:

My Prerogative - Britney Spears

Releasing her latest single to promote her Greatest Hits album, 'My Prerogative' - a cover of Bobby Brown's 1989 hit - was the perfect choice for Spears. Even though she has announced plans for a temporary hiatus from the spotlight, here's hoping that's a load of crap and that she'll give us what we *really* want - Newlyweds: Kevin & Britney! Hello MTV? Are you working on this???

Best Remix:

Call On Me - Eric Prydz

It took a few listens before I figured out what 1980's song 'Call On Me' sampled to make it so infectiously addictive, but I finally got it down. Who knew that Steven Winwoods' 'Valerie' could have just one line looped over and over in the background to make this song so bloody brilliant! Somewhere in London there is a seventeen-minute-long extended version of this song that I just have to have!

Best New Artist:

Gwen Stefani

Okay so technically she's not a "new" artist, per se, but being on her own and solo is *new* for Gwen! I was saddened when Miss Stefani announced last year that she was taking a break from the boys of No Doubt to put together some work of her own, but after one listen to 'Love.Angel.Music.Baby' there is No Doubt in my mind that Gwen is a girl that kicks major ass! Her first single 'What You Waiting For' almost won for best song of the year, and her solo album is one of the most musically diverse and creative pieces of perfection out there in the record stores. YOU NEED THIS ALBUM!

Best Sophomore Album:

Under My Skin - Avril Lavigne

When Avril's freshman release 'Let Go' finally returned to Earth after churning radio chart-topper after another for most of 2001 and 2002, whispers of 'one album hit wonder' began to arise almost immediately. Well Miss Lavigne, that teen punky angst rocker from Neppanee, Ontario silenced all those critics. 'Under My Skin' has been one of the most commercially successful and critically-acclaimed albums of 2004, churning out hit singles like butter, and is a rockin' album from beginning to end. Could it even be better than 'Let Go'? It just may be...

Best Greatest Hits Album:

Ultimate Kylie - Kylie Minogue

With the coming of the Christmas Consumerism Holiday Season comes the annual massive release of greatest hits compilations. Several artists released noteworthy greatest hits packages this year, including Britney Spears, Shania Twain, and most definitely UK's bad boy Robbie Williams. However, it's the 5'2 wonder from Down Under that blew away the competition with her Ultimate greatest hits collection. Released as a 2-disc package, Kylie not only wins us over with her recent international hits, but reminds us that she was belting out solid gold pop Light Years before 'Can't Get You Out Of My Head' became permanately stuck in our heads. Kylie Minogue, in fact, is the only female artist (other than Madonna) to have Number One Hits in the in the 80's, 90's and 00's. This album won't leave you disappointed, I guarantee it.

Best Soundtrack:

Love Actually

Officially released at the very end of 2003 when the movie was released, the Love Actually soundtrack, actually, truly found its success in 2004. Featuring such diverse and talented artists such as Dido, Joni Mitchell, Kelly Clarkson, and of course Girls Aloud, this soundtrack if the perfect year-round companion. Moody, joyful, expressive, hurtful, raw, elated, emotional - this CD has it all. You can't listen to the Love Actually soundtrack without feeling like your own heart is out on your sleeve, bearing itself naked and vulnerable for all the world to see and feel. An album for anyone who has ever been in love, out of love, or caught awkwardly somewhere in the middle.