Music video: Emiko Suzuki calls on Jesus in "Fly my way"

I had to run Emiko Suzuki's video back three times before I took in the song. Because the first time I started to watch it, all I could think of was Namie Mars' "Only you". Then the second time, all I could picture was the album cover for Ayumi Hamasaki's Guilty.

Emiko comes from a Gospel background, which will serve her well, because she gon' need a prayer to stay in this pop game for more than a minute.

Firstly, she's signed to Avex and we know they have an expectation from those that they sign.

Second of all, with her overall package as it stands, it's difficult to see where she'd go. We have seen so many girls with Emiko's look and sound come, go and try to cling. Mao Denda's last album sold a total of 1000 copies. Yuna Ito ain't said shit since the Nana movie hype died down. Sauyri Sugawara was everywhere as a result of singing the main theme song to Final Fantasy XIII, which must've been her l'Cie Focus and turned her ass to crystal, because she's been mute since. This should be a warning to Emiko, who sang a the theme song for Final Fantasy XV: Comrades. Even affiliation with a franchise as big as Final Fantasy and a legendary name like Nobuo Uematsu can't save you on its own. And neither can having a good voice.

Gurl. Same.

Emiko does has a nice voice, but you can hear that she doesn't really know how best to use it and neither does whoever was in the studio during the recording of "Fly my way" - 'cos this shit isn't arranged in the best of ways to consistently compliment her vocals. Making her sing those earlier verses in such a low register was a choice.

"Fly my way" is a nice song, but it either needs special attention to detail where vocal arrangements and production is concerned, or just a vocalist who can knock this song clean out without them. Miho Fukuhara would have killed this.

Emiko just doesn't have that rawness or distinctness to her voice that will catch people's attention and hold it. Not every singer comes onto the scene knowing how best to utilise their voice, but they at least give you something from the offset that shows they have some awareness of it, and that special something that hooks you. Mariah Carey. Brandy. JoJo. Beyoncé. Jennifer Lopez.

It's not nice to see these girls get chewed up and spat out before they've had a chance to develop. I may be completely jumping the gun in regards to Emiko's future, but we'll see. It'd be nice to have some women in the game with nice vocals just putting out good music and showing us growth with each release. It's not like there's much in the way of competition on the ORICON right now.