A Perfect Day (album)

On October 29, 2004, Sun released her seventh studio album, Stefanie, which sold more than 2.2 million copies in Asia.[3] In Taiwan, it sold more than 180,000 copies, becoming the year's sixth highest-selling album overall.The album also earned two Golden Melody Award nominations for Best Mandarin Album and Best Female Mandarin Singer in 2005, and she finally won Best Mandarin Female Singer.[4][5]

Stefanie Sun can be regarded as the music director of A Perfect Day. The entire plan for the production of this record was personally discussed and decided by Sun, and the songs were all selected only if she was fond of them. The entire album represents Stefanie Sun's own views and attitudes. In an interview, Sun stated that the concept of the album is defined as: "You like it, you don't like it, it's all very intuitive. The most direct things are the most touching. The music doesn't need to be fancy. If it's already like that, you just need to add the icing on the cake without blurring the focus."[6]

Mayday (left) and F.I.R. (right), two of Sun's collaborators on the album

A Perfect Day presents new musical and sonic elements. The piano, erhu and strings overlap to concoct the torch song "Poems & Tears", which was composed by Liu Bao-Long while the lyrics were written by the well-known lyricist Albert Leung. Chet Lam, the composer for Sun's 2003 smash hit "Encounter", composed "Honey Honey" for Sun, while Peter Lee and Sun followed "Green Light" and developed the fast-paced song "Flying With Dreams" with the instrumental sounding reminiscent of a marching band. One of the most popular songs on the album, "First Day", is co-produced by Stefanie Sun and the groups Mayday and F.I.R.. The artists' names also cleverly matches the song title (First Day, F.I.R. Stefanie May Day). The album's title track is composed by Chinese musician Yu Yang, marking the first time that a composition made by someone from the mainland appears on a Stefanie Sun album. "Wandermap" is a mid-tempo ballad composed and written by Shuo Hsiao. "Invisible" is a touching slow song written by Xiao Han and composed by Jim Lim and Eric Ng.

"Honey Honey" was tailor-made by Chet Lam and is coupled with Sun's narration, children's harmonies and laughter, ukuleles, triangles, castanets and has a child-like sound. "Wish" is a richly produced pop rock ballad composed by Sommerdahl Harry, Hamid Kinda and Hortlund Rebecca while lyrics were helmed by Shih Chen Hsu. "Another Face" is a jazzy sounding song composed by Peter Lee and written by Poly Lin. The closing track "Sunny Day Tomorrow" was composed by Sun herself with lyrics written by Jennifer Hsu.

Warner Records also invested a lot of manpower in the shooting of the album's cover and inner page photos. Stefanie and the crew made a special trip to Hualien County for filming, and the filming lasted for three full days.[7] The album cover was shot in Qixingtan Beach in Xincheng Township. On the cover Sun is standing on the seashore while smiling ear to ear. Sun herself showed off her explosive red hair for the first time, and her look was really eye-catching.

On September 29, 2005, Sun announced that the album would be released on October 7, 2005, which, in turn, sparked a pre-order frenzy. What was particularly special is that the pre-order included not only CDs but also cassette tapes for the first time. The CD and cassette pre-orders were limited to 200,000 copies and 50,000 boxes respectively. Starting from September 25, mainland fans could go to video stores across the country and pay the full price in advance to order an album CD and receive an exclusive Stefanie Sun "Perfect Day Private Photo Album" on the spot, including more than a hundred highlights. The photos allowed fans to peek into Sun's day. In addition, there was also a sticker sheet. Fans who pre-ordered the cassette received a set of Sun's "Perfect Day" photo postcards. In Taiwan, the high volume of pre-orders also stunned the Warner Music staff. In just 10 days, the number of pre-orders for Sun's ring tones exceeded 200,000.[8]

At one o'clock noon on October 8, 2005, to promote A Perfect Day, Sun moved into a temporary transparent glasshouse in the plaza of Taipei 101 for 24 hours, allowing fans to witness her daily life. For fans, "Perfect Day" turned into a "sad day" because not long after Sun moved into the glasshouse, it started to rain heavily, and it rained buckets almost the entire day. Seeing that her fans were still supporting her outside in the rain, Stefanie admitted that she was very heartbroken. She said: "It was really sad to see the fans outside in the rain. I was almost moved to tears." On October 10, 2005, at one o'clock at noon, she walked out of the glasshouse bleary-eyed and immediately held a signing ceremony for her new album at the scene. It was reported that the glasshouse and the furniture inside was auctioned afterwards, and the money was used to fund the construction of shelters in India.[9] When she slept inside the glasshouse, one hundred and fifty fans slept outside with her, but she only slept for more than six hours before being woken up by her dog. Due to the live broadcast of her whole day's schedule on the internet, 300,000 people went online to browse her life in the glasshouse the night before.[10] On October 28, 2005, Sun held an album celebration event in Taipei, Taiwan, and she announced that the total sales for A Perfect Day in Asia exceeded 1 million copies.[11] The album reached number eleven and number fourteen on the year-end album sales charts of G-Music and Five Music of 2005, respectively.[12][13]

On October 28, 2005, the album won the Best Album Award in the 6th Global Chinese Songs Ranking. At the 17th Golden Melody Awards the album was nominated twice; Sun was nominated for Best Female Mandarin Singer while Yu Yang was nominated for Best Composer Award. The album's title track was nominated for Top 10 Gold Songs at the Hong Kong TVB8 Awards, presented by television station TVB8, in 2005.[16] The album was awarded one of the Top 10 Selling Mandarin Albums of the Year at the 2005 IFPI Hong Kong Album Sales Awards, presented by the Hong Kong branch of IFPI.[17]