Local musicians have released a slew of EPs over the last month. Alyph, a rapper, singer, and producer, breaks from collaborating with other artists to release his EP. Nathan Hartono and Jasmine Sokko, label mates, have both released new EPs inspired by pandemic life. Carpet Golf, a new moniker for a band comprised of various indie bands from around the country, makes their debut with an EP centered on toxic masculinity. The albums are available via streaming services such as Spotify, Apple Music, and Bandcamp.

Alyph, a rapper, singer, and beatmaker, delves into intimate portraits of betrayal, hope, and absolution on his three-track EP, III/III. The songs span genres, from ethereal R&B to trap. "It can't sound exactly like everything I'm hearing at the moment," he says of his motivation for creating music. Alyph first gained notoriety as a member of the hip-hop duo SleeQ. He is also known for producing hits for Singaporean and Malaysian artists. Alyph first gained notoriety as a member of the hip-hop duo SleeQ. He is also known for producing hits for Singaporean and Malaysian artists. The second artist, Jasmine Sokko's EP (photo), Snell's Law of Reflection, was inspired by her life over the last year. "Due to the pandemic, I've been forced to spend so much time alone that I'm unable to avoid confronting certain emotions and forming a new sense of self. Numerous songs on this EP deal with reflections "She clarifies. Six songs are included on the EP, including 25 (co-written with fellow Singaporean singer-songwriter Gentle Bones) and Magnet (sung in both English and Mandarin).

The third artist, Nathan Hartono's EP Edge Of Days is a self-described "random collection of sounds and feelings" inspired by life during a pandemic. "It was written during the year's first half, which was, to put it mildly, erratic. Life's rules were constantly changing, "he proclaims, "And I was bouncing between days, pausing and restarting, unable to establish a firm grip on anything, thus the moniker 'edge of days.' I will be eternally indebted to music for sustaining me. Additionally, you get to hear the outcome of it all." The Difference, a dreamy ballad produced by acclaimed Singaporean electronic music artist Myrne, and Simple, a song about coping with love's impossibility is among the album's tracks. The other Singaporean artist is Carpet Golf, a new band comprised of Subsonic Eye, The Neptune Waves, and Charm members. The title of their debut EP, Not As Good A Fisherman - Brock Lesnar Is A Man, reflects the quartet's eccentric outlook, and the songs address issues such as toxic masculinity. The album's lead single, Brock Lesnar, is named after the American-Canadian wrestler.

The jazz singer Joanna Dong's single is the first in a series of compositions inspired by the London Philharmonic Orchestra's performance of Russian composer Vladimir Martynov's Utopia Symphony. The symphony was commissioned in 2003 by Mr. Michael Tay, Singapore's then-ambassador to Russia. Dong collaborated with composer Chok Kerong on the song Utopia Reimagined: The First Chapter, which incorporates passages from the Tao Te Ching Taoist text. Mr. Tay founded the Foundation for The Arts and Social Enterprise, which is hosting the series. Subsonic Eye, a quintet specializing in indie rock/noise pop, has had a busy month. The band gained a global audience when they filmed KEXP (At Home), a Seattle radio station's online music series. Their first Malay songs, Dijangka (Expected) and Matahari (Sun) was also released as singles. The romantic lyrics were inspired by singer and lyricist Nur Wahidah's relationship with songwriter and guitarist Daniel Castro Borces.

Keyana, an 18-year-old singer-songwriter, has written a song titled Afterglow that is both uplifting and reflective. "In Afterglow, my inability to determine where I'm going, who I want to be, what I represent, and my fear of losing myself in the process becomes the central narrative of my current self," she explains. "However, while I am speaking to myself, a part of me reaches out and reminds me that I have always been the ideal woman. This conversation teaches me that if I embrace who I am and follow my heart through every step of this journey, I will develop into that ideal woman and experience my Afterglow." KakakAdik is a collaboration between two female rapper generations. It is a compound word that combines the terms for elder sister and younger sibling. Mawar Berduri is a great singer and rapper who rose to prominence in the early 2000s in Singapore and Malaysia as a member of the hip-hop trio Ahli Fiqir. Qis Maraj is a newcomer whose recent single Fatalis topped the local music charts on Mediacorp's Malay radio station ria897.

Undoubtedly, Singapore is massively blessed with musical talent that has seen many local musicians chart a successful international career. The country has many brilliant musicians who were either born here or immigrated to what is known as the Lion City. Would you like to know some of Singapore's most prominent musicians? We suppose you would. Here's a list of a few of Singapore's best known and most successful music stars:

Stefanie Sun

Stephanie Sun is one of Singapore's most successful singers and songwriters; she has had an amazingly successful international career. Stephanie is today well known throughout diverse areas like Singapore, Malaysia, Mainland China, Hong Kong and Taiwan. The celebrated musician's vocal abilities are simply exceptional. Indeed, with more than 30 million records sold, Stephanie ranks among Singapore's best-selling music performers. She won a Golden Melody Award with her first album (known as Yan Zi). In the year 2000, Stephanie won national recognition as Singapore's best new artist. In 2004, Stephanie's self-titled album made her earn the Best Mandarin Female Singer award.

Olivia Ong

Olivia's music career debuted when she was only 15 years old. At that time, the young musician signed up to the $25 Pte Ltd. Olivia became even more famous when she successfully performed the theme track for the popular series the Little Nyonya. Olivia became only the second Singaporean singer to win selection and recognition as the Global Chinese Music Awards Music Ambassador.

Leon Jay Williams

Leon Williams notably released his first album in 2005; it was titled Sweet Inspirations. Leon has received wide acclaim and great recognition for various hit releases. Among these are albums like I Love You So and Can't Smile Without You. Leon also notably won recognition for starring in several popular Taiwanese drama series, including Green Forest, Heaven's Wedding Gown and My Home.

John Klass

The famous Singaporean artist John Klass has thrived well since 1991 and is widely recognized as among the most successful Singaporean music performers. The singer first rose to prominence by performing as lead vocalist at KICK, the 1994 Best Local Music Group. He gradually won credit for writing more than 200 successful kid songs for In Our House, a popular TV show. John Klass received the most coveted 3X platinum prize for his tribute song Red Cross and Through Your Eyes. He was eventually featured on several leading international media outlets, including the BBC World Service and ITV news.

Shabir

Shabir initially proved his impressive music prowess when he was named the winner of the Vasantham Star award's first season in 2005. He soon became a multiple award-winning artists. He later proceeded to write several songs and subsequently received the Singapore Youth Award sometime in 2013.

Tanya Chua

Tanya Chua is a well-known Singaporean artist who won accolades for her debut album in 1997. The album is known as Bored. Among Tanya Chua's notable works include hits like Sing it Out of Love (of 2011), the 2007 Goodbye & Hello and others. Tanya Chua is also known for several successful musical releases (like the Amphibian of 2005). These achievements eventually earned her accolades and recognition as the Best Mandarin Female Singer. She received this recognition at the Golden Melody Awards.

Corrine May

Corrine May who is currently based in Los Angeles. is a well-known singer and songwriter. Corrine is respected as being among the Lion City's most prominent music artists. Corrine May received the gold certification with her Crooked Lines album in 2012. The album peaked at position 1 on the national music charts within the first month of the Crooked Lines' release. In 2010 Corrine May composed a special song for Singapore; she was picked for this role and produced the special song to celebrate Singapore's 45th National Day.

Dick Lee

Dick Lee is well known all over the country for his famous music achievements. The Singaporean singer notably received international acclaim in 1989 for his highly successful song, the Mad Chinaman. Several award grants marked dick Lee's successful music debut- these included the coveted Compass Award for Top Local Composer (awarded in 2000, 2001, 2006). Dick Lee is widely celebrated for helping to produce several classical music pieces. Some of these are: the Beauty World, Sing to the Dawn and Phua Chu Kang.

Sarah Cheng-De Winne

Sarah Cheng's music release, which was known as Love Shape Void, quickly became a runaway success among Singaporean music lovers. The achievement earned Sarah much recognition and awards during Singapore's 12th Independent Music Gala. Sarah also won wide acclaim for her other albums, including Brand New (2012) and Let's Pretend (2010).

Did you know that BTS featured the bestselling album in 2020 in the US, Japan, and South Korea? It's great to identify some of Singapore's best-selling music. Think of it: In 2020, Abba Gold topped the charts with the greatest hits that shook the Singapore music scene for quite some time.

Other albums that did quite well in Singapore within the same period include Michael Learns to Rock, Paint My love, Celine Dion's Falling into You, Savage Garden, Alani Morisette's Jagged Little Pill, Savage Garden, Aquaaaquarium, West Life's Coast to Coast, Celine Dion's Let's Talk About Love, Spice Girls' Spice, Brittney Spears' Oops! Talk on Corners by the Corrs, Backstreets Back (Backstreet Boys), Ace of Base (Happy Nation), Feels Like Home (Norah Jones), Fever (Kylie Minogue), Enigma (MCMXC AD) and Elvis Presley's Elvis.

Several productions also sold well, including the Corrs in Blue, Black-eyed Peas (Elephunk) and No Need to Argue (Cranberries). Baby One More Time (Brittney Spears), Supposed Former Infatuation Junkie ( Allanis Morisette) and Dido ( No Angel) also performed exceptionally well. The story doesn't end there- we still have; Savage Garden's Affirmation, Back for Good (Modern Talking), Dido No Angel and Blue One Love made the list as some of the top-selling albums in Singapore. Norah Jone's Come Away With Me, Andrea Bocelli's Sogno, the Cross of Changes (Enigma), Blue All Rise and Christina Aguillera's Stripped also made the big list.

Not to be left behind were other blockbuster pieces- these include Keep the Faith (Bon Jovi), George Michael's Older, Nelly Furtado's Loose, Nothing to Lose ( Michael Learns to Rock), Space Jam, High School Musical, Unplugged ( the Corrs), Sting Brand New Day, to the Faithful Departed ( The Cranberries), Live at the Acropolis, All That You Can't Leave Behind, The Best Damn Thing ( Avril Lavigne), Nothing Left to Loose ( Foo Fighters), Cher Believe, Blue Guilty, Made in Heaven ( Queen) and Madonna's GHV2 1G. Others were: Whitney Houston's The Greatest Hits, Toy Box's Fantastic, the Cranberries Stars, The Smashing Pumpkins, Red Hot Chili peppers ( The Way), Dream Land ( Robert Miles) and Pure Instinct's Scorpions.

Apart from albums that did well within Singapore, other music productions sold many copies throughout Asia and elsewhere in the world. For example, when BTS released Map of the Soul, the new Japanese album, they probably didn't expect to produce the bestselling album in Japan, Korea, Singapore and the US in 2020. Nevertheless, it took only one week for the blockbuster album to top the charts in Japan. Within a week of being released, the hit sold well over 564,000 copies. In its native South Korea, the album sold more than 4 million copies, claiming the coveted spot as the all-time bestselling album in Korea.

Overall, the crème de la crème of Singaporean music includes several top-selling albums that have ruled the national music charts for some time. Here are some of the best local songs that must feature in the individual Singaporean's personal playlist.

Geniuses and Thieves - Gentle Bones

When he first came up with several popular songs, including Settle Down and Until We Die, Joe Tan was hugely celebrated as ";Singapore's Ed Sheeran."; Later, some of Joe Tan's bestselling songs included Thieves EP and Geniuses in 2016.

Only Yours- Bani Haykal

Only Yours has done quite well, raking up some big sales. The hit features Bani Haykal, the well-known Offcuff and b-quartet member. The song is essentially a hypnotic track that brilliantly captures just about everything it should.

Mirage by Sezairi

As they say, a picture really speaks a thousand words. The painted mirage (that adorns this pop tune) actually does the same. The song starts as a short two-cord piece that slowly blossoms into a highly irresistible 3-minute track. Anyone who has ";dancing feet"; cannot possibly resist. No wonder the song did very well on the local music charts.

Kalah by Fariz Jabba (featured: OmarKenobi)

If you really love music, you'll find it hard trying not to vibe to the Kalah (or ";lose"; in Malay). This is the veritable brainchild of specific hip hop trailblazers, OmarKenobi and Fariz Jabba. The rapping comes out both in Malay and English. This is one unapologetic track, amped with highly infectious synths, witty bars and trap-inspired beats. A really wacky music video accompanies it. Yeah, this one did quite well in sales.

The winners of the awards, organised by the International News Media Association (INMA), were unveiled recently during a virtual announcement. The Straits Times (ST) scored second place in the "Best Initiative to Register Users" category with its "Gift an Article" feature. Launched in November 2020, the "Gift an article" feature allows subscribers of ST to share paywalled content with friends and family. Non-subscribers who receive gifted links can read the premium articles that have been shared with them, after registering for a free mySPH account. This feature was developed in response to feedback from subscribers, and allows more readers to sample original and exclusive work(s) produced by the ST newsroom. SPH also received honourable mention for "Best Use of Data to Drive Advertising" with its "Brand Safety Classification to Aid Inventory Exposure" solution.

The in-house machine-learning solution was developed to improve content and brand safety classification of articles published across SPH titles. Advertisers typically rely on topic keywords provided by publishers to ensure their advertisements are placed alongside content that is appropriate for their brand.

Experiments with this new solution showed that content and brand safety keywords can be served at lower latency with higher accuracy than the existing third party solution, resulting in an increase in brand safe, servable advertisement inventory.

Mr Warren Fernandez, editor-in-chief of SPH's English/Malay/Tamil Media group and editor of The Straits Times, said: "We will keep trying to improve on the experience for our audiences, to make our content more engaging and easier to access and share. This has to be a relentless effort, and we will keep striving to do more to serve our audience well."

Dr Deb Goswami, Head of Data & Analytics at SPH, said: "We are delighted to win this award, and it is a testament to the strong synergies between our business and growing data units. The most powerful outcomes arise when we combine a customer-centric mindset with actionable data. This is an important milestone in our efforts to enable data-driven outcomes within the organisation."

This year’s competition garnered 644 entries from 212 news brands in 37 countries. The finalists were from Africa, Asia-Pacific, Europe, Latin America, and North America. The Awards include 20 categories, focusing on excellence in news brands, media platforms, subscriptions, business development, and data and insights.

The International News Media Association (INMA) is the world's leading provider of global best practices for news media companies looking to grow revenue, audience, and brand amid profound market change. INMA aspires to be an essential resource in the multi-platform transformation of media companies that produce quality journalism and relevant content. INMA identifies for its members the best ideas to grow audience, revenue, and brand of news media companies. INMA also shares its vision with cutting-edge presentations and interviews involving media industry conferences, media industry leaders, the advertising community, and private consultations. INMA manages multiple news industry initiatives designed to lead on key issues and guide members where need be. INMA also shares its vision with cutting-edge presentations and interviews involving media industry conferences, media industry leaders, the advertising community, and private consultations. INMA members are executives at the world's leading news media companies. INMA today has 18,169 members at 800+ companies in 77 countries. Members are typically c-level executives involved in leadership and executive management, advertising, audience, digital, marketing, product development, and research.