A friend of mine, David Mitchell, has been a regular at his local pool hall in Beijing for going on a year and a half now. It didn’t take him long after his first visit to notice the lack of care put into the music choice in this vast twenty table room. The management had made the effort to get nice pool tables and cues and, in doing so, had earned themselves a loyal crowd of patrons, but they seemed to just stick the same CD of offensively bland wallpaper music on day in and day out.
As a musician and DJ (and regular pool hall patron) David couldn’t take much of this. He politely suggested to the management that he make compilations for them to play. The bosses were thrilled with the idea so the next day David brought back a lovingly compiled CD of vintage funk and soul. The pool hall played it, loved it and asked him to do the same again, which he did, a number of times. Before long, however, David began to suspect how much people were actually paying attention to his finely crafted mixes. His friend Matt suggested that, as a test, he make a CD which featured the same song repeated 18 times on it, the song being ‘What A Fool Believes’ by Michael McDonald/Doobie Brothers:
As normal the management put the CD on loop and, after two hours of playing pool to the same song, David asked the management and some of the regulars what they thought of it. The assembled staff and punters unanimously declared it to be their favourite CD so far. They absolutely loved it. That was the last CD David gave them.
It is difficult to know what conclusions to draw from this story, if any, suffice to say that the Chinese engage with music in a totally different way to the west. Recognition through repetition is a stock feature of the Chinese psyche, the most obvious example of which being the teaching of characters in Chinese schools (with some 11,000 characters in use in modern Chinese, classes are a necessarily ‘parrot fashion’ learning environment where children repeat pen strokes and character recognition ad nauseam). If a song hits a chord with the country and reaches a certain level of exposure/repetition, it will take on a life of it’s own, become a MONSTER hit to be played, replayed, covered, sync-ed, performed live and sung at KTVs (Karaoke bars) with a fervor very rarely seen in the west – it will become a part of the fabric of everyday life.
If you were to compile a ‘Now That’s What I Call Chinese Pop Music’ you could get away with a five track EP (rather than the 40 track annual double albums we get in the west) and still cover 60% of the musical mindshare of urban China. The relentless repetition of these monster hits in almost every conceivable environment and incarnation mirrors the teaching of Chinese characters and the CD in the pool hall: There is an overriding comfort to be had from recognition alone.
That’s enough theorizing. Anyone who has spent any length of time in China, regardless of whether or not they listen to the radio or watch TV, will recognise at least one, and probably more, of the following songs. These are what the Chinese monster hits sound like, with Mouse Loves Rice being the biggest by some distance (a real phenomenon, the story of which neatly sums up the music environment in China, but that’s for another time):
NOW THAT’S WHAT I CALL CHINESE POP MUSIC Vol.1:
David Tao & Jolin Tsai – Jin Tian Ni Yao Jia Gei Wo (Today You Must Marry Me):
S.Wing – QQ Ai:
Yang Chen Gang – Lao Shu Ai Da Mi (Mouse Loves Rice):
A Niu – Tao Hua Duo Duo Kai (Peach Blossom):
Kenny G – Going Home:
© Ed Peto 2007
Why??!! Why put going home on here. I HATE it. I like the first one however.
Posted by Weng on October 31st, 2007.
wow, all of them feature pretty naff drum sounds. i’ve heard that somewhere………
it must be “chinese character” syndrome. striking similarities to japanese muzak or is the other way around? it has been said in japan that the japanese listen to more melody lines, whereas the western ears are comparatively more accustomed to rhythm. slightly unrelated, i have been told that “enka” music that used to be quite rampant in japan originates from korea (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Enka).
really good point on “parrot learning”, which also happens in japan, due to the use of characters that originate from china. language definitely is a dominating factor, since it does affect thought and process, i mean, how else are you going to consciously manage your brain? a bilingual bloke like me, is often having to swing both ways……… i like being bi.
Posted by minoru on November 1st, 2007.
The Chinese really love a good melody as well. One thing all those songs have in common is their infectious melody lines. Instantly memorable and translatable to every area of life. You hear people whistling all of the above down the street. There is almost zero attention paid to production in most cases – something we simply will not stand for in the west – with the melody line being the sole selling point for the track. The naff drum sounds you refer to are pretty representative of production generally.
Posted by Ed Peto on November 1st, 2007.
Good melody rocks! I think Ed summarized it well with the love of infectious melody lines, instantly memorable lyrics – all key features of a good ’saliva’ song. I am only NOW starting to dip my toe into the KTV music culture here in Beijing, and knowing the same song everyone ‘loves’ ensures you are part of the group. This and most people discover music from Baidu Mp3 …
Posted by Terzam on November 2nd, 2007.
the problem with being “melody heavy” is that the themes (lyrical content) all start to become about similar things. usually love and relationships or join hands in unity, sing-along type songs. exactly the same in japan.
production styles is not an easy issue to educate or create awareness, as i have experienced first hand in japan. first of all, you need a good coach, which means lots of good live shows. then next is getting rid of often misunderstood conceptions of musicianship. this is an issue even in america or europe. for example, with western ensembles, the quality of the rhythm section is paramount. example, motown, stax, etc. drumming is not about brute force. it is more about creating dynamics and being able to create and alter dynamics. however, for many people, it is still “rad” to beat on the drums to hell (you’re actually choking the xxxx out of the drums). if you talk to a drummer about these issues, have them examine good drumming videos closely (http://www.drummerworld.com/index2.html). there are good power hitter drummers, but they are usually an exception and not suitable for an asian physique. then there are other instruments that need to be addressed. then there is also the issue of recording, which is another whole can of worms with differing perspectives……… what can be said though is that despite all this advancements in recording technology, they have only improved upon makeup techniques. the fundamental does not change. sxxx in, sxxx out.
Posted by minoru on November 2nd, 2007.
This is rubbish. It’s not like you don’t hear certain western “chart hits” type pop songs played incessantly in the US or UK.
Actually, I’ve found Chinese pop music is pretty vibrant and different (my experience is mainly in Taiwan – but lots of Taiwan songs and stars transfer to the mainland, the David Tao/Jolin Tsai one being an example).
Sure, they don’t perhaps have the same styles you find in the west, but then this isn’t the west. Instead they have their own chinese influences which appear in their music.
Posted by Ben on December 3rd, 2007.
@ Ben,
You do yourself no favours by making a bullish remark like “This is rubbish” only to go on and say that your experience is in a completely different country.
Taiwan has a robust and vibrant pop industry compared to the mainland. Comparisons can not really be made, therefore, between the two places in terms of depth of style and quality.
Posted by Ed Peto on December 7th, 2007.
Interesting but so true observation of Chinese Pop Music, though the analogy of the Chinese characters is really far-fetched. (Simply because of the repetition of strokes taken to write better characters doesn’t necessarily mean we are fond of repetition,let alone the reason of our choice of music. )
Personally, I don’t think the majority of Chinese people have or want to have a good taste for music, even among the college graduates. They don’t care for the type or content of the music. The only criterion for good is that it sounds good and is popular. They don’t care much about ingenuity or what the message the artist is trying to convey.(This is partially the problem of the artist as well, as most of them can only talk about nothing but relationships.)
An American friend of mine once asked me if I thought Jay Chou was a true artist. I said yes. No matter how much some people dislike him, he has creative control over his own style. A more mature artist is David Tao, who has a clear message to send in each album. Music shouldn’t be restricted within the realm of pop culture, it should also engage in every aspect of the society within which it is produced. Lots of Chinese artists haven’t realized that. While John Mayer, Norah Jones, Green Day and Linkin Park are pointing their fingers on the other side of the Pacific Ocean, this side is suffocated with endless depressive relationship crisis.
Posted by JY on January 9th, 2008.
Another thing: Taiwan is part of China. Be careful of your terminology.
Posted by JY on January 9th, 2008.
Ah, the ‘Taiwan is a part of China’ debate. Point taken though.
Ed
Posted by Ed Peto on January 9th, 2008.
This is entirely true. These songs are all bubblegum pop and it is incredibly hard to find anything outside of the bubblegum genre, maybe except for Jay Chou, but recently his music is getting more and more repetitive. Basically for a song to be successful in China you just have to have a catchy melody and easy to remember lyrics, and instantly it’ll be played from street corners to tv dramas. I hate it.
Though, China isn’t totally devoid of alternative music, because I did find some post-rock bands that were decent, but needless to say they will never get airplay or become popular there.
Posted by Angela on August 3rd, 2008.
[...] I have moved my music industry blog to my new site OUTdustry. Follow this link for my article on Chinese pop music. [...]
Posted by ed peto — Now That’s What I Call Chinese Pop Music on October 23rd, 2008.
I think your friend David’s story should be interpreted within the context of the Chinese culture of “Giving face”. Maybe at least someone thought it inappropriate to tell him “you idiot! why the hell did you repeat the same song for 2 hours and have the guts to ask me how do I feel about it???” right in his face??
Also, even thou half of the people there do not admit themselves being Chinese but Taiwanese uses the same languages and have basically the same culture as Chinese. The fact that they have a vibrant pop industry means the theory that linking Chinese culture to boring music is shaky. The Taiwanese just have 30 more years of pop culture development. However I strongly agreed that the Asian cultures (Chinese, Japanese, Korean) are very susceptible to homogeneity. That also explains why the people ALL told your friend the CD was great.
Posted by Gary on November 14th, 2008.
@ Gary,
Thanks for the comment.
I don’t think David’s experiment was knowingly disrespectful, nor was it received as such. David is actually good friends with the management and hangs out there bantering with them regularly to do this day.
Posted by Ed Peto on November 14th, 2008.
[...] list provides as accurate a chart as any as to what China was listening to in 2008. These are the mega-hits - with a predictable trend towards Olympics and Earthquake themes – presented here for you in [...]
Posted by OUTdustry — China’s Top 10 Music Singles From 2008 on February 5th, 2009.