In the mid-1980s, china, which had been reformed and opened up, began to become more fashionable, and many fashionable young people wearing toad mirrors, leather jackets and flared pants could be seen in the streets and alleys, carrying a tape recorder and playing music.
However, a girl named Zhang Qiang is probably one of the most familiar female singers on the street, her voice is all over the corner, even the store selling buns will put a tape recorder at the door, play Zhang Qiang's song to attract customers.
Some people commented that this era was the beginning of Chinese mainland pop music, and Zhang Qiang was the "founding father" among local singers. At this time, popular music is no longer a quiet sound, this era began to slowly become open, become tolerant, and the whole society began to have a correct understanding of popular culture.
In the early 1980s, due to the Chinese mainland pop music was just beginning, most of the young people were actually comforted by the pop music of Hong Kong and Taiwan, at that time, the finale program of the annual Spring Festival Gala was not a language program, only the appearance of Hong Kong and Taiwan pop singers was the climax stage of the whole party.
Due to the relative shortage of literary and artistic works in our literature, a song could be popular for several years, and almost everyone in the young people listened to it and everyone could sing it. Due to the growing demand for popular music in Chinese society, coupled with the scarcity of literary and artistic workers in the whole society, various singer grand prix competitions have been held throughout the country, with the intention of selecting excellent singers. Some people describe it well, they say that this is the earliest talent show in Chinese mainland, the originator of "Supergirl".
At this time, Beijing, as the center of national art and culture, bore the brunt of the competition, and held a young singer grand prix, and Zhang Qiang, a 16-year-old Beijing girl, was one of the contestants who signed up for the competition.
On the stage, this little girl sang a song by the famous American group Carpenter," "Jambalaya", and the judges present were all dumbfounded, and who were sitting below! All of them are bel canto singers, classical music players, old scholars who wear glasses and do not smile, see Zhang Qiang twisting her waist on the stage and singing English songs, they shake their heads continuously, in their opinion, even if we are open to this extent, it is really offensive, into what a system, typical capitalist singing.
Some of the older people's words were more ugly, mocking her for making sounds like "stepping on a cat's tail."
After getting off the stage, Zhang Qiang's friends were disheartened, seeing her performance, they knew, it must be over, someone told Zhang Qiang, you can't win an award, but your foundation is good, your voice is good, you have more knowledge, it is better to go to the Guangzhou tea house to sing, and only Guangzhou, Shenzhen, those relatively more open cities can accept your musical style.
Zhang Qiang was a little reluctant, was I destined to be a tea house singer? Just when she was in a dilemma, she received a letter, generally praising Zhang Qiang's beautiful singing, and in the next few days Zhang Qiang received bundles of letters.
At this time, the young Zhang Qiang suddenly realized that although the judges did not favor themselves, because the grand prix was broadcast on TV through a live signal, live broadcast. In addition to the uncles below the stage, there were thousands of spectators watching their performances in front of the television, and the fashionable youth had no resistance to her music. She knew that the spring of pop music was coming, and that this society needed itself.
Indeed, at that time, China's mass culture was just emerging, people's demand for this aspect was huge, and the audio-visual products industry began to grow barbarically at that time, and a company in the Pacific Audio-Visual alone made ten million a year, and saw his building rise on the ground. In the words of music critic Jin Zhaojun: "At that time, the era of Audio-visual products in China was an era when machines could be used to make money."
With the overnight rise of Pacific Companies, hundreds of record labels popped up in China almost overnight, and leading companies recorded dozens of albums every month and then quickly put them on the market. The fastest time can record an album a day, no way, the market demand is large, the majority of the people are waiting to listen to it, when the record industry is like a seller's market, for cultural products simply in short supply.
Under such a background, how can Beijing let go of such a girl with great potential, the judges can not like, but can not stop the market's pursuit of her, this is the characteristics of the market economy.
So, Zhang Qiang successfully waited for this opportunity in 1984, the record company found her, successfully recorded the first album "Tokyo Night", at that time, like Zhang Qiang, a newcomer, the record company directly released 600,000 tapes as soon as it started, you can imagine how good the pop music albums were at that time.
However, the 600,000 tapes were quickly sold out, the record companies were speeding up, the workers were working three shifts 24 hours a day, and the machines were working for several days. In the company's distribution department, various suppliers carry bags of money waiting to pick up the goods, and the gate is surrounded by water. In the end, this debut "Tokyo Night" completed its historical mission with 2.52 million sales, which is breathtaking.
The little-known Yunnan speaker products company made a lot of money overnight and immediately threw itself into the production of Zhang Qiang's second album. During Zhang Qiang's most popular period, she released six albums a year, and for a time the entire record market Luoyang paper was expensive.
In fact, in that era, China actually had very few original songs, few good creators, everyone was "take-ism", using foreign songs that had become popular all over the streets and alleys to Get China to fill in the lyrics, at that time, everyone's copyright awareness was relatively weak, and there was no need to pay copyright fees at all.
Like Zhang Qiang's songs, this is basically the case, Germany's Modern Talking, Sweden's ABBA, the United States' Carpenters are her important melody sources, of which her most widely sung song "Love You Are Hard to Open" is also a cover of foreign singer Bobby Vee.
In fact, this phenomenon does not only happen to Zhang Qiang, but also more common in Hong Kong and Taiwan singers, like Liu Wenzheng, Dick Cowboy actually rely on other people's songs to become famous, and even Jacky Cheung, Rene Liu, Faye Wong, including the later Fan Weiqi and so on, all of which are the same.
But for most Chinese listeners, it's dreamy, because many are new to the so-called world melodies and the world-famous disco music, and the traditional music has long been unable to impress them.
After becoming famous, Zhang Qiang once received an invitation from a famous Chinese composer, who liked Zhang Qiang's voice, hoped that she could sing her own songs, and promised that everything would give Zhang Qiang the best conditions, the band, equipment, and remuneration were all top configurations. And when Zhang Qiang listened to the composer's sample, she smiled: "Don't you have a better song?" ”。
This was a bit disrespectful at the time, but it was also the status quo of that era, people were tired of those melodies that were not innovative, they liked the exciting, dynamic, disco music melodies, melodies that could make people stand up and dance to the music.
In 1986, Zhang Qiang's name spread to the United States on the other side of the ocean, and The American Times Week published her story, which also made her the first mainland female singer to appear in the American Time Magazine, at this time Zhang Qiang did not care about the so-called foreign magazine, because she had already proved her value with millions of record sales, purely from the perspective of album sales, she could even make Teresa Teng look back.
Many people have their own understanding of Zhang Qiang's earth-shattering popularity, some people think that this is a release from the cultural tastes of mainland listeners that have been suppressed for many years, others think that it comes from the aesthetic impact of foreign melodies on Chinese listeners, and some people think that it is created by simple "sexiness".
Someone did a survey, Zhang Qiang's number of fans is far greater than women, the reason is that when listening to Zhang Qiang's songs, you will have a feeling of true love, Zhang Qiang's voice perfectly interprets women's sexiness, which was still very rare at the time, before the reform and opening up, most of our women were neutral and introverted, our culture does not advocate women to show their gender characteristics excessively, which is largely regarded as degenerate.
One of the most common phrases we hear is: "You take the initiative to talk to other boys, I really don't want to face you."
But Zhang Qiang broke this red tape, she boldly expressed love in the lyrics, expressed her thoughts, and conveyed them through her own crisp voice to the bone, which made most young boys overwhelmed, and Taiwan's Teresa Teng was able to conquer fans in the mainland, and there were also reasons for this.
On the cover of each album, the girl with a pair of small eyes, a big mouth, a round face, a hot head, smoky makeup, a hot personality, and a free-spirited girl also brought a visual impact to young people, which was the most rebellious young woman image in China at that time.
At this time, Zhang Qiang was in the ascendant, and the enlightenment stage of any art form began with imitation, which is beyond doubt, but if the culture wants to continue to develop, take root in the local area, and ultimately want to develop, it must go through its own originality. In the late 1980s and early 1990s, original music occupied the high ground, and Zhang Qiang, who returned from a year abroad, had long since lost her original position, and an era had passed.
After that, Zhang Qiang has become farther and farther away from music, but she will still be remembered by that generation, the new pants band of the band founded in 1998, as a group of fans of Zhang Qiang, they specially created an album for Zhang Qiang, took her to the stage of young people, when Zhang Qiang's recognizable voice rose again, at that moment, "disco" returned.