text | Linghu Boguang
Recently, the domestic program "Godsent Voice3" has gone out of the entertainment industry, but it is not that variety show songs have gone out of the entertainment industry. But in the second episode of the show, Xin's remarks were out of line. He was probably talking about why variety shows have so many cover songs. The guests and musicians on the show expressed their own opinions, but in the end they were unable to convince the audience.
finally decided to quit this variety show, so this incident made this variety show popular.
Xin’s remarks and withdrawal from the show in “The Voice of Heaven 3” made me personally think of two questions. First, the development of domestic music variety shows has clearly reached a ceiling, and there is an urgent need for breakthroughs. Xin said that now variety shows cover classic songs and do not pay attention to originality is a problem.
The other one is Su Jianxin. , the band before , also came from a cover singing background, so he understands the benefits brought by such covers and the lack of originality, so he is not too supportive of covers.
This matter is also like the status of Su Jianxin and the Xin Orchestra in the Chinese music scene , or to be precise, the status of the Taiwanese music scene.
The most well-known pop bands of that era were Mayday , Xin Band, Soda Green and Feier Band. Of course, at the same time, there were also independent bands such as wangfu and Lin Shengxiang. Since they were all independent bands, they were not in the same group. But the historical status of Xin Band, let alone Mayday and Soda Green, is obviously inferior to that of Fei'er Band.
The reason is that Su Jianxin went solo, and when it comes to Chinese bands that are similar to and Wang Feng, , but after his solo career, Su Jianxin was obviously not as good as Wang Feng in the Chinese music scene. Why?
is also a rock band. Why did Xin Band fail to become the second Mayday?
Why did Xin Band fail to become the next Mayday or Soda Green? In fact, it was mentioned at the beginning. It is probably two questions!
First, there are too many cover songs. As a band, there are too many covers of hit songs. Even though Mayday and early Soda Green were criticized for their early songs being just pop rock , at least they wrote the songs themselves, with lyrics, music, arrangement and singing all by themselves, while Shin Band performed too many covers.
Shin Band's " Separation Song " is a cover of Kim Soo-mo 's "Love Song", Shin Band's " Vast Sea and Sky " is a cover of "Reason for Leaving Me", " Love You Even to Death " is a cover of Park Wan Kyu 's "Thousand Years of Love", "If" is a cover of Lee Seung Chul 's "God's Jealousy" and so on.
If the Hong Kong and Taiwan music scene of that era was dominated by covers of Japanese music, this band was the first to cover the Korean music scene. Because this cover of a classic sounds good, it certainly won’t affect its spread in the market, but it will naturally affect its status in the music world. How high can your status as a cover band be?
still said that they debuted early. At that time, there was no Internet and the discussion requirements for copyright and originality were not too strict. Can you imagine that a Chinese band’s most famous songs are all covers?
Secondly, Shin Band and Su Jianxin’s originality is weak. If famous songs are all covers, then a band always has songs that are not covers, right? In fact, Shin Band and Shin Band also have original songs in addition to covers, but the problem is that many of the original songs are not written by them.
In fact, Su Jianxin only released two albums in the band, which is the same as Wang Feng in No. 43 Baojia Street. But the song Baojiajie No. 43 is basically composed by Wang Feng, and the two albums of Xin Band are basically covers. If you look at the composer column, they are either foreign songs or covers of Korean songs.
Later, Xin went solo like Wang Feng, but Wang Feng’s nearly ten subsequent albums were all written, composed, and arranged by himself, while Xin’s solo albums are like "I Am Me", "Jile Planet", "While I Am", etc. It is not that he has no original songs. The problem is that the most popular songs are written and composed by others.
is like many of the hit songs during his solo career, "Soul", " Cold Fire", "Burning Loneliness", "I Hate You" and so on.
These songs were composed by Li Ronghao . Yes, it is that Li Ronghao, which is a bit embarrassing. Because this is equivalent to Wang Feng's "Beijing", "Fly Higher", "Blooming Life", " exists in " and so on, all written by others after Wang Feng's solo career.
Generally speaking, Su Jianxin is one of the Hong Kong and Taiwan music singers of the past 30 years. He has a recognizable voice and good singing skills. Unlike a pure singer, he also has certain creative abilities , but this is a hit classic song regardless of whether he was a band or a solo artist. Either it’s a cover, or the song was written by someone else.
Combined with the communication power and status evaluation of rock across the Taiwan Strait and the three places, this market communication is due to the popularity advantage of Hong Kong and Taiwan. Xin and his Xin Band have indeed gained a certain status (which is also his current status) due to their recognizable voices and various hit songs.
However, due to too many covers and lack of originality, compared to the Taiwanese music scene of the same era, he was not as good as Mayday, which was mainly original, although it was also pop rock, but not to mention Soda Green, which was later upgraded; compared to the mainland music scene of the same period, he was not as good as Wang Feng, who went solo after the same two albums.
Why are covers so common in Hong Kong and Taiwan music circles? This answer is simpler than imagined
Now when it comes to the Chinese music scene, I miss the music scene in Hong Kong and Taiwan, but at the same time I can't help but complain about the proliferation of cover songs in Hong Kong and Taiwan. When it comes to why the Hong Kong and Taiwan music scene sings covers, the answer is very simple.
is probably the same as the mainland music scene in recent years. The audience's level of appreciation has not improved, and they only like to listen to good-sounding songs; capital will promote good-sounding songs for profit (in the past few years, singing and dancing idols were promoted, and later singing and dancing idols died and promoted short video songs), but the original creation of is already difficult, and this good-sounding original will be even more difficult. is the fastest and easiest at this time. There are two options.
The first is to cover excellent foreign songs. The success of these songs abroad proves that they have been tested by the market and the tastes of listeners around the world are very popular, especially the songs with simple and brainwashing melody, bright and easy to dance to. If you fill in the Chinese lyrics well, coupled with the recognizable voice and singing skills, it is easy to become an instant hit.
The second is to plagiarize such foreign songs. As for the operations, they are the same. The difference is that the cover has copyright, but the plagiarism has no copyright. As for whether you get on the bus first and then buy the ticket, or there are two versions of the song.
The Hong Kong and Taiwan music scene has always had a proliferation of cover songs. The reason is that their economies developed early. In the 1970s, citizen culture had developed to a certain extent, and there was a lot of demand from the people. At that time, the capital in Hong Kong and Taiwan was not much different from the capital in the mainland now. It was difficult to fully support original singers, so purchasing foreign songs, especially copyrighted covers of Japanese songs, became the mainstream. Hong Kong people are very pragmatic, so if good works are filled with Cantonese lyrics, they can quickly become hits and make local stars famous.
The Hong Kong music scene does not just cover Japanese songs. In the early years, songs such as "Nanniwan" and "Nothing" from the mainland were also translated into Cantonese works. It can only be said that Hong Kong people are too commercial. This was indeed the case in that environment, and many singers at that time did not have much knowledge of music theory, and they were just looking for a job. Singing may not be enough for them, let alone composing.
Those who can compose have cultivated musical literacy since childhood, or those like Alan Tam, Lin Zixiang, Huang Jiaju who participated in bands in the early days, naturally composition will be relatively simple. But they also started to make their debut by singing covers of English songs and slowly transformed into original songs. This transformation is slower than that of mainland rock music.
On the one hand, Cantonese song culture developed relatively late, and its cultural heritage is not as profound as that of Mandarin. It needs to absorb a lot of foreign culture to provide creative soil; on the other hand, cover songs make money very quickly for record companies, so they are rampant.
The Taiwanese music scene at the same time was larger, had a larger population, and had a much deeper historical background. Everyone should remember one thing. When the Chinese music scene developed, there was a rock movement in the Mainland in the 1980s, and there was a "folk song movement" in the Taiwanese music scene in the 1970s.
In the Hong Kong music scene, only the first generation godfather Xu Guanjie brought Cantonese songs into the Hong Kong music scene. The following four kings Jacky Cheung were completely the product of the commercial industry chain . The Hong Kong music scene has never had any defining cultural movement (there is a new wave of movies).
After the Taiwan Folk Song Movement, Luo Dayou , Li Zongsheng , etc. opened the living soil for creation. In the late 1980s, the Taiwanese music scene also recognized the Four Heavenly Kings, namely Qi Qin, Zhou Huajian, Wang Jie, Tong Ange. Basically, they were all singer-songwriters who could write their own lyrics and music (occasionally they sang covers).
Among the original singer-songwriters in Taiwan in this era are Zhang Yusheng, Jiang Yuheng, Wu Bai, Zheng Zhihua and so on. Strictly speaking, everyone's level is not inferior to Hong Kong's Chan Pak-keung , Wong Ka-kui, etc., but there are only these few singer-songwriters in the Hong Kong music scene. The mainstream ones are all the Four Heavenly Kings, Hacken Lee, and other commercial musicians (songs written by others and covers are overflowing).
This is the strong side of Taiwan’s music scene. This original creator has a better environment and has accumulated experience in the industry. That’s why we ushered in the era of songwriters such as Zhou Wang Taolin around 2000. Another good aspect is that in addition to singers and songwriters, there are more creators who support singers and their levels are higher.
Around 2000, they supported Ren Xianqi ( Xiaochong ), Stefanie Sun (Li brothers), SHE (Yuan Weiren, Shi Rencheng , etc.), Hsiao Hsiao , Jolin Tsai and other singers.
Although the Taiwanese music scene is much better, in the end it still cannot get rid of the problem of covering Japanese and foreign songs during its peak period. This is reflected in the fact that except for the Shin Band mentioned this time, other musicians who became famous through covers will not talk about it.
Because of this lack of support for the original system, the Hong Kong music scene failed after 2000, and the Taiwanese music scene also failed to hold up after 2010. Although bands such as New Romance appeared in the background in 2015, economic development was weak, and although there were excellent works, it was difficult to reproduce their glory.
Hong Kong and Taiwan are flooded with covers, but mainland short videos are popular? Can the Chinese music scene be saved?
Finally, let’s talk about the current Chinese music scene. Why are Hong Kong and Taiwan covers so prevalent but they can hold up, but the current Chinese music scene can’t do covers? There may be several reasons for this caused by the general environment.
First, the music industry all over the world is in decline. In the past, the Japanese music scene, which used to be the most popular cover singer in Hong Kong and Taiwan, had a solid foundation, but it has indeed declined. The mainstream of the Korean music scene now directly adopts the singing and dancing route. In the past few years, when the Chinese idol talent show was at its peak, it was not that they had not covered Korean songs.
Eventually you will find that covers of Korean songs are not suitable for China, and there are very few hits (only one song "Calories" became a hit).
Second, the cost of performing covers is relatively high nowadays, and the public opinion environment has changed. In the Internet age, young listeners pay more and more attention to copyright and originality. Musicians who are popular through covers are not highly regarded, unless you are just a cover star.
In fact, there are some musicians in the Mainland who are popular for their covers, such as Chopstick Brothers from " Old Boy ", " The Wind Rises " who also used coupons to buy chili peppers, etc. Eventually, you will find that the more musicians become popular through covers, the singers who used to cover songs could even become musicians, but now you just become an internet celebrity if you just cover songs.
Finally, the ability and level of Internet celebrities who rely on covers and plagiarism are really not good. After all, the Internet age is disappearing faster. Sound cards, singing, selling meat, and character design have become the biggest attractions. Voice recognition and singing skills have become the final . Even the top ones like next door Lao Fan , Liu Yuning , etc. are difficult to become mainstream musicians, not to mention a bunch of other cover Internet celebrities.
These Internet celebrities who cover and plagiarize their songs, as well as the singing and dancing idols who sell well but are not out of the music industry, have taken over the entire Chinese music scene, so it seems that the Chinese music scene is not good now. As for musicians who really understand originality and are good at it, I have written about it many times.
There are a lot of independent music scenes in mainland China now. If the capital does not promote the music, the audience will not listen to it.
