Yesterday was Li Qiu, who also revisited Reiko's album "Spring Equinox, Li Qiu, Winter Solstice", revisited Wang Feng's "Youth" written for Junzi, and then naturally thought of Wang Feng's first solo album "Fireworks".
"Fireworks" was supposed to be the third album of the band "43 Baojia Street", but because Xu Xiaofeng, the regional head of "Warner Records" at that time, gave Wang Feng a contract for an individual rather than a band, So Wang Feng also took the work in his belly, bid farewell to his former brothers, and signed a contract with "Warner Records", one of the five major international records at that time, as a Solo singer.
For China, a society that has always paid attention to human feelings, Wang Feng's approach is undoubtedly treacherous, so many later reports, especially the marketing numbers in recent years, mention this past, and also regard Wang Feng as a sinner.
But when it comes to this topic, I think we can change the perspective, that is, the so-called international record companies at that time, their agents in China, the final head, is not Taiwanese, or Hong Kong, China, and even now, this high-level management structure is still continuing.
The bosses in Taiwan and Hong Kong have invariably brought about the traditional operating mode of record companies in Hong Kong and Taiwan. You see, even in the Taiwanese record industry, which has always been based on humanistic pop music, in their golden age, mainstream record companies actually rarely signed bands.
Like the "Oriental Express Choir" signed by Weng Xiaoliang's "Mingsheng", and the "Assassins" band was signed by "Friendly Dogs", they are all personal studios and small labels. Such a big factory as "Rolling Stone Records", aside from the later "Magic Rock Records" era, in the early years, it only signed the "Red Ant Choir". At that time, the folk song master "Xinge Records" was also considered to be the "Qiuqiu Choir" where the doll was signed.
This doll is not the doll Wei Ruxuan, but the doll Jin Zhijuan.
The "Phantom Eye Choir" of that year has always been followed by a prefix with a large font, that is, lead singer Xue Yue. The prefix of "Blue Angel Orchestra" is Li Yaming. Others, like the "Red Cross Choir", were not signed by the "Rolling Stones" as a whole, but only signed the lead singer, he is Zhao Chuan.
In fact, this kind of operation of Taiwanese record companies, which was also used in some mainland rock bands before Wang Feng, is also a routine operation. For example, the "Breath" band that had originally signed with "Rolling Stone Records" was later poached by "BMG Records" to poach the lead singer Wei Hua, and the last album of the band was first released overseas in the name of Wei Hua personally.
After that, the famous case was the "Dream" band that signed "Polly Jiayin" at that time, and finally after the contract was transferred to "Magic Rock Records", the latter said that he only wanted to sign the lead singer Dou Wei, so the original members of the "Dream" band, Wu Ke and Chen Jin, did not appear in the recording of the later "Black Dream" album. The album "Black Dream" has thus become Dou Wei's personal album, although there are many musical arrangement ideas, this album is derived from the "Dream" band as a whole.
Putting aside the question of what selfishness, Wang Feng's signing of "Warner Records" in his personal name is also derived from this unsimpressive tradition of the record industry in Hong Kong and Taiwan. After all, "Warner Records" in Europe, In North America, has signed so many bands, and has produced so many band records, how can it not tolerate a Chinese mainland "Baojia Street Lord 43" band? In fact, the roots came from the tradition of the record industry in Hong Kong and Taiwan at that time.
However, On the cover of this personal album, Wang Feng still specially marked "Wang Feng and Baojia Street", which is a temporary continuation of the band's feelings. I don't know if I didn't write No. 43 because I was afraid that the right of attribution would cause potential disputes.
Of course, the "Baojia Street" in this album does not have any relationship with the previous "Baojia Street 43", which has no relationship with any band members.
The musician lineup of this album, including lead singer and rhythm guitar Wang Feng, lead guitar Cai Zhengdong, drummer Guan Fei, bass boy, and recording keyboardist Zhang Zhan, after the recording, Liu Mu began to become the keyboardist of Wang Feng's band.
I have to say that Wang Feng still has a unique point in musical aesthetics, which is actually very similar to Cui Jian. This musical aesthetic is not only the creation itself, but also includes finding the right person.
The musicians that Lao Cui found did not need to be introduced much, only that Wang Feng, in addition to Long Long of the band "No. 43 Baojia Street", and then Xiong Lin, Feng Chong, Jia Yinan, and Cai Zhengdong in this album, are not only very good guitarists, but also guitarists with a strong blues flavor, and also guitarists who are particularly suitable for Wang Feng's musical style and can be used for him.
Of course, there is another important reason, when Wang Feng found these guitarists, these guitarists were in the growth and rise of their careers. It's easy to use, and it's not expensive.
It is also the use of bands to record personal albums, so "Hanabi" is actually a good continuation of the tradition of the previous "43 Baojia Street" band, and even from the temperament of the album, compared with the softer second album, this album is closer to a continuation of the musical style of the band's first album.
The producer of the "Fireworks" album is actually unable to imagine it, because it is Zhang Yadong. In the years since the turn of the century, Zhang Yadong has actually done a lot of rock band albums, such as "Skinny Man", "Underground Baby", "Fruity VC", etc., including albums by independent musicians such as Park Shu, Xu Wei and Dou Wei.
And almost all of Zhang Yadong's "infected" albums, more or less implanted in his musical philosophy, only this "Fireworks" album, I have listened to it for many years, I can't hear the traces of Zhang Yadong, it is basically like an album led by Wang Feng.
In the album, Wang Feng sang the song he wrote to Junzi, "Youth", and also wrote a song "Orphans of a Beautiful World" for Junzi, who died not long ago.
I don't know if it is because of an emergency, so "Orphans of a Beautiful World" is also very much like "orphans" in terms of musical attributes, just a song with a drum machine as the rhythm, which is obviously not a product of the same system as other works, and from the level of arrangement, it sounds quite thin.
But the song, certainly a good song, a very sadistic rock work, contains a person's smallness and grandeur, helplessness and fearlessness at the same time. It is said that the melody of this song originated from the "Tacit Understanding" written by Wang Feng when he was 18 years old, and later because of the death of Junzi, he completed the finished song.
At the end of the inner page, Wang Feng listed a large list of thanks. The second half is his friends, while the first half is the musicians and writers, poets, and directors who influenced him. Takeshi Kitano, Index Finger, Henry Miller, Bob Dylan and John Lennon, among others.
Of course, it must also include Jim Morrison. I have to say that listening to works such as "Good Morning, Lady" and "Hanabi", you can clearly feel that Wang Feng at that time was influenced by Jim Morrison too much in terms of creative structure and musical text. And the guitar Riff and timbre of works such as "Good Morning, Lady" and "North by Northeast" are even strong The Doors flavor.
This list of thanks also includes Xiao Wei, Yang Qingwei, the early manager of the band "43 Baojia Street".
On the album, I also especially like "Lost Deer", that kind of confused self-questioning and self-answering, mournful and cool. Later, I met a little friend, her ID, also called Milu.
"I Love You, Life" is quite like the song "Nobody Wants Me" from the first self-titled album of the band "Baojia Street", which is also very decadent and sad. It seems that "no house and no car" and "that fat man with money in his hand" are also the pain points and eternal themes of Chinese rock singers in that era.
What makes people feel very strange is that in the same month of the same year that Wang Feng's "Hanabi" album was released, Hong Kong singer Leung Wing-chi released a personal album, also called "Hanabi", the album's title song, which is also her personal creation of "Hanabi". And the distributor of that album is also "Warner Records".
At that time, when talking about "Hanabi", who was first talked about could also be used to judge which field of Chinese pop music a fan "specializes in".
