Sad like a sexual encounter Zhong Lifeng - as sad as a sexual encounter
In the second issue of the musician interview column, we were fortunate to interview Zhong Lifeng. He once shared that when the end of the world finally came, the great conquerors, lawyers, and politicians came to receive the rewards—crowns, laurels, and names carved into marble.
And when Almighty God saw the reader with the book in his armpit walking in, he could only turn around and say to Peter with envy: Look, these people don't need a reward, we don't have anything for them here, they love to read all their lives.
About the singer Zhong Lifeng: The first time I heard Zhong Lifeng's song was in a qingba in the ancient town of Shuanglang in Dali. At 8 p.m., the old town had just taken on the neon industrial atmosphere, and I was the first guest in this bar tonight. Quietly listened to the resident singer's cover of "On the Side of the Road", "Light a cigarette, in the night of the snowflakes." "I met this song, wonderfully like a sexual encounter.
For me, Zhong Lifeng's song has a magic power, which is to leave life and feel my own booster.
But today let's walk into "Author Zhong Lifeng", of course, if you want to see more interviews with musicians, you can leave a message at the end of the article.
Interview: Liu Xiaodai
Editor: Chen Yang
Curated: Leave the bookroom behind
Reproduction without permission is prohibited
Xiao Dai: Knowing Mr. Zhong Lifeng is first of all a singer, a folk singer, fans call you a "folk poet", Mr. Yao Qian described it as "singing the beauty of this era with the tone of the old era", how do you think of such a statement? Do you think the biggest source of inspiration in your creations is your usual reading or walking in the world?
Zhong Lifeng: The evaluation of Me by Mr. Yao Qian that you pointed out reminds me of rock singer Zhang Chu, who said that there is a kind of "beauty of Peking Opera that is divorced from the times!" "When the famous music critic Li Wan talks about my works and expressions, he often uses words such as "solemn" and "decent", which seems to have a sense of ceremony...
I wondered, why do they feel this way about me? Probably because they can't see in "me" that the mainstream public is "chasing" or "hotly discussing" things, so they give people a feeling of "marginalization" or even "out of the times".
I think that in fact, they are also such people, because a marginal person is not indifferent to the "current life", on the contrary, he is enthusiastic in his bones and is willing to "embrace" the life in front of him, and his "sideways" is to "look at the overall situation", to leave himself a room for imagination and thinking...
The philosopher Forrest Gumpen spoke of "what a contemporary" – he borrowed a phrase from Roland Barthes – as "an anachronistic man". Why? Because only by attaching to this world and at the same time maintaining a certain distance from it (so that you can see everything soberly) is it really "working" with the world and with this world.
These can also be compared with today's idol stars, there is no doubt (seemingly) they are all popular people of the times, leading fashion trends, media discourse, but before long, these things that seem to be completely consistent with the times - killing Matt style, Internet language, etc. - immediately became obsolete goods, abandoned by the times.
So, when Agamben talks about an elegant lady in the 19th century, he says: She is a contemporary of everyone. It's like when we look at the characters in European films of the 1950s and 1960s, whose images, whose expressions, now seem to be often new and never obsolete. I also think of the American independent director John Cassawitz, because of his uniqueness, marginality, his films (and the whole person) feel younger than those who have been deeply influenced by him, such as Spielberg and Woody Allen!
The philosopher Argamben discussed the concept of "contemporaries" in his book Nude
Regarding "inspiration", to be honest, I never knew what it was? Have I ever owned it? But I know that it is precisely because of the "unintentional accumulation" of daily life—whether reading or walking—that the impulse and desire to compose. Walking, reading, are some kind of secret groping, wandering, arriving... Trance, with some indescribable emotions to find a lost and regained thing, is satisfied and empty.
Xiao Dai: In addition to the singer Zhong Lifeng, we also met the author's Zhong Lifeng, and I feel that your books are not much less than your music albums. How did you determine that a footage appeared that you wanted to keep with a transcript?
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<h1 class="pgc-h-arrow-right" data-track="43" > Zhong Lifeng: At first, I didn't think about how I, as a composer, started writing again. Later, I felt that it was normal, and slowly found that many of my favorite singers, directors, and actors are excellent writers! </h1>
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<h1 class="pgc-h-arrow-right" data-track="45" > Canadian singer Leonard Cohen, French musician George Buhason, etc. have all published literary works before the release of the album, as well as Shuji Terayama, Truffaut, Fellini, pianist Gould, photographer Nguyen Ngit Trung! I was even obsessed with the essays of a strange Bulgarian folk warlock, one of his prose poems, "Anecdotes of the Surfing Bird", which I raised for a while to the same height as Maramé and Kidd! </h1>
When I write, I basically don't think of myself as a musician. But the rhythm and rhythm of the music will subtly enter it. Relatively speaking, composing music is a bright thing, even if it is a gentle, dark, swirling piece, there is its "full disclosure", which is the uniqueness of music - it does not lie, it can enter the listener's heart as quickly and directly as possible; and what about the expression of words?
I remember a famous novelist saying, "A good novelist should first be a 'liar'..." And another director said, "I want my character to have the ability to lie and have to breathe." "For me, groping in words is like walking in the dark, restless and exciting, lost and belonging... It's like a shadow.
(Source: An excerpt from Weibo netizens of Zhong Lifeng's song book of the same name, "Sad like a Sexual Encounter")
Xiao Dai: There is a saying on the Internet that you have said, "Music is my loyal wife." Literature is my greatest sexual encounter, it is my proud lover, and I love both, of course, in different ways. "As a creator, can you compare your music and literature? How are the directions of the two different?
Zhong Lifeng: Then "wife and lover", I also said - "It is music and words that complete my breathing: word inhalation, song exhalation". Some music fans think that among mainland singers, I am more immersed in literature... So I think my songs—especially the lyrics—are more poetic or literary.
Actually this is not the main thing, the most important thing is that literature has changed my melody, the direction of the chords! For example, before going to bed, I idly read a book in which a certain posture of a beautiful person, a love sentence, an avoidance, and so on will induce me to write an unexpected melody; on the way, I open a pocket book, and there is a line of poetry in it, and its jumping and bizarre imagination is no different from the chord that I will play next!
Xiao Dai: In your album we saw "Carving Time", "Crazy Fruit", "The Man Without a Past", in your anthology we saw Bergman, Fellini, Buñuel, "Red Desert", "Roller and Violin", "Long Live Love", "Landscape in the Mist"...
In your new book "The Magician and His Woman Gone", you also listed a lot of your fate with movies, you said that there is no favorite movie but there are favorite actors, can you share with readers and friends, do you like the type of movie you like? What do you think is the meaning of film in your life?
Zhong Lifeng: As time passes, my own growth, preferences and vision will change and adjust, such as Robert Mitchum, who once liked to star in "Hunter's Night" and "Beyond the Whirlpool", and quoted film critic Roger Ebert when mentioning him in the book "The Magician and His Woman Is Gone": "Mitchum symbolizes the incomprehensible mystery of the film. ”；
For a moment I thought the French actor Trentinion was so charming, especially his performance in Bertolucci's "The Same Streamer", which really had a kind of "snake god"," and his appearance and expression reminded me of the Hollywood superstar Humphrey Bogar, who grinned and showed his teeth, consciously or unconsciously bursting out a certain wild and uninhibited sense of humor;
But recently I think the British actor Richard Burton is unparalleled, because I re-watched "Spring Supper" starring him and Elizabeth Taylor, and it can be said that his expression in this film is more wonderful than "the film itself", how did he show all this? This is the charm of the film itself, the eternal humanistic charm associated with literature, poetry, music, etc.!
(Source: Nanjing Pioneer Bookstore Weibo| Zhong Lifeng's new work "The Magician and His Woman Are Gone")
As I like all types of literature, poetry, novels, essays, plays, travel literature... So no matter what film genre, film noir, comedy film, ethical film, documentary film, suspense film, documentary, etc., as long as it is good, for my appetite, I will accept it all!
Watching movies is the same as reading, the more you see, the horizons are broadened, and it is natural to determine at the first time whether this is a good book or not, whether it is a good movie, without spending a long time, and finally found out: Oh my God, wasted time, this, too mediocre.......
Cinema is an all-encompassing art genre, and for me a masterpiece is a treasure and a place of peace of mind for myself, even though it usually expresses human grief, contradiction, despair and insolubleness. I'd love to find a secret about painting, music, or literature in a particular detail of a movie.
A lot of times, these things are just some kind of "self-evident" between the director and "me", because any good work of art, different people enter it and get different things of their own, and the same is true of movies, it allows me to discover the mystery of life, the floating of emotions, in short, at the last moment, it will make people feel at ease, let people feel unspeakable love surge.
Xiao Dai: In your works, we feel your literary vision, especially in poetry, can you share with us this feeling? Your favorite is Borges, isn't it?
Zhong Lifeng: I am very unfamiliar with poetry, (I have heard that there is a sense of "strangeness" in really original things) Is poetry a surprise that suddenly flashes in ordinary life? ...... Fans talk about me, and they mention Borges because in the late 1990s, I formed a "Borges Band" and composed a Borges poem "Boundary Line".
And Borges, like Schopenhauer, Wittgenstein, Pett, and so on, believes that in all art, music is supreme..... Borges once said: "As long as the music continues, we can't say there is no hope!" Regarding the poem, I think of this sentence:
He composed poems
But it didn't look like poetry
He didn't want to write poetry
But he wrote poetry.
The poet Auden's statement about poetry is unforgettable, he means that poets do not have anything to say when they write poetry - or like composers, directors, painters, they do not want to say anything, emphasize anything, or give the world a warning, a reason, a mission, just a natural outpouring, like a game! — Auden said that if a poet has something to say, don't write it!
"Poets are the ones who like to eavesdrop on what can happen next to one word." Auden's sentence removes the burden on the creator and gives the creator a lightness and game-like pleasure!
On May 18, 2007, Zhong Lifeng made his debut after forming the borgos Borges band
But, we also know that the thrill of the game is because every game has its own serious rules of the game! This reminds me that renoir's film "Rules of the Game", which we all like, ends up presenting a terrible and tragic situation, precisely because those "high society" people do not "follow" the secret "rules of the game" within them... Renoir, as a director and artist, is strictly doing his "movie game" - this is the wonder of art!
Xiao Dai: You're a singer, and of course you have to share with us what you think is good music, and I guess you like Leonard Cohen more than Bob Dylan, right?
Zhong Lifeng: I basically don't recommend good music or good literature that I "like or think" to others. The reason is very simple, everyone has different tastes, tones, preferences, aesthetics, (but this does not prevent me from talking about them in writing, this is a kind of self-grooming, the work itself will meet the people who are related.... Recommending works to people is a bit like saying to him, "I love this thing, so you can eat it!" ", but everyone's taste is too different, and the delicious taste on the tip of your tongue may be tasteless to others!
So, it doesn't make much sense to do so. I write a book, an album, and the devotee will naturally be drawn to the breath inside and enter everything related to it. I myself am like this, through a book, an author, into more texts, the magic of art, is automatic reproduction, endless life.
Bob Dylan and Leonard Cohen, although they both have thought of "becoming each other", the media, music fans often compare the two, but their musical temperament, playing style is too different. One Western music critic believes that Bob Dylan's lyrics are deeper than ordinary pop songs, but overall, it is not difficult to accept, and it is a continuation of traditional blues and country folk songs, and the tunes, lyrics, and rhythms are very close to "the people".
And Cohen, in his melodic direction and chord changes, we can feel the inheritance of thousands of years of European culture, can taste the drifting meaning of tango, fado (Portuguese folk song), deep song (Spanish folk song), the lyrics pay attention to law and rhetoric, obscure, precise and restrained.
It is undeniable that they all represent the highest standards of humanistic music. If Dylan's music belongs to the "people", Cohen's undoubtedly belongs to "human nature". You're right, something with human charm moves me even more.
(Pictured: "Book Traveler" Wuxi Talk concert| Zhong Lifeng once talked about Cohen and Dylan's sympathy in the book)
But my favorite singer is an Armenian-French singer whose narratives and singing have a long history of medieval troubadours and gypsy wanderers, Bob Dylan went to France alone to watch his concerts when he was young; Leonard Cohen said when he was young with women, he had all the best of the singer and Dylan...
You must know who he is? He was Charles Aznaf, the star of Truffaut's The Gunsling Pianist. When I read a biography of Bob Dylan, the author mentioned that he was also attracted to the film, which is one of Dylan's favorite films. Although Charles Aznaf is a French national treasure singer, his music is more understated and more "threshold" than the two we discussed, so he is not noticed by the mainstream.
Xiao Dai: Your music, your text is beautiful and elegant, and the audience you like has a certain aesthetic taste, etc., but this may affect its spread in the audience that is not theirs, and it may be as some people say "ungrounded", what do you think?
Zhong Lifeng: Well, I really don't know "how to look at it"... The so-called "ungrounded" must be inconsistent with what is respected by the mainstream of the masses, which I have already talked about above, and I am a "marginalized" existence; I think of a writer of hesse's contemporaries, who are literary friends and competitors, and Hesse's works, when he was alive, were recognized and liked by readers, and later read by generations of readers around the world.
And his friend Robert Walser, who influenced Kafka, Thomas Mann and other literary circles, because of his elegant style, strange imagination, gentleness and shyness... - like lao Tzu's inner writer who wrote that "the good is like water, the evil of all" is always in a "marginal state" that no one understands, but you see, how Hesse evaluates:
"If writers and poets like Walser could become spiritual leaders, there would be no more wars in the world. If he could have thousands of readers, the world would be a little better. Whatever it is now and what it will be in the future, with people like Walser and something as beautiful as The Poet's Life (Walser's work), the world has a raison d'être. ”
The youth of the Swiss writer Robert Walser
However, Hesse knows, and we know, that his statement is only a statement, and where there is a "leader" who is "implicit but not revealed"..... And in any era, the mainstream aesthetic of the public is big, coarse, and will not be elegant, detailed or profound, so as a creator, write according to the guidance of the heart.
Or like Stendhal (joke?) Deprecating? "I believe that in fifty years, someone will read my work." "In addition, the creation is a bit similar to a woman conceiving in October, many ladies, in addition to expecting the child born to be normal, healthy, and natural, will not have nothing too much to demand..... Whoever he can become in the future depends on the world or his own creation.
Xiao Dai: As a singer, I rarely see you on tour, how do you usually arrange your time, how much time do you spend on music, writing, and traveling?
Zhong Lifeng: I rarely do any planning and arrangement for myself, and what I do is somewhat similar to the "improvisation" in music, but the improviser is not a "chaotic coming" without rules, but another expression of "confidence". Just like jazz players, their performances and their cooperation with each other are improvised, but particularly flavorful and unexpected!
This is because their skill has reached a state of freedom, and this freedom is a precision that their hearts seek. If I had to say it again, it would be that my purpose was to wander aimlessly—to travel in music; to write while traveling, to get lost in writing—and it was precisely because I got lost that I found another (and perhaps more suitable) path.
"Blue Traveler" mv
Xiao Dai: Your music, reading, travel and many things are in line with the label of "literary and artistic youth" in society. At present, "literary and artistic youth" in a part of the population in society is not a positive word, what do you think?
Zhong Lifeng: I am relatively indifferent to all kinds of titles, and I don't care. If there must be a label, it is my own name. It's understandable: "He established his style with the precision of a clock. And the wind itself is a story and a song, which is the "wind" of the "Wind and Grace" of the Book of Poetry. You often hear, "Let's go pick the wind!" That is, we collect folk songs, legends, and stories of "resurrection from the dead" that have been handed down from ancient times to the present. - The answer is wafting in the wind...
Xiao Dai: You blend between film, music, and literature, which identity do you enjoy more?
Zhong Lifeng: Taken together - "Fan Writer Singer".
(Source: Zhong Lifeng Weibo)
Xiao Dai: Talk about Wuxi in your eyes, you seem to come to Wuxi often, and you have opened a bookstore here, just in Nanxiatang, not far from our former station.
Zhong Lifeng: Wuxi has a few very good friends. A city, the reason why you love, like, miss, is nothing else, it is precisely because there are a few acquaintances in this city, and your "chat" is often because of a piece of music, a few movies, three or five books. As for the bookstore, I don't mention it, because it is called "walking bookstore", and after a year of opening, it automatically walks away, and it is gone...
In the past, every time I went to Wuxi, I would go to the old book stall of Nanchan Temple to find books, although not every time I had a harvest, but it was quite interesting to go shopping. I remember that several volumes of "Detective Hawthorne" written by the Republic of China writer Cheng Xiaoqing were found at the Nanchan Temple, and several film books: "History of Contemporary French Cinema", Krakauer's "Psychological History of German Cinema" and "Hollywood Directors Talk about Art" were also found at the Nanchan Temple.
Wuxi Nanchan Temple Book City
Xiao Dai: Is there anything I would like to say to readers of the new book?
Zhong Lifeng: It seems that there is none. Because what the author writes, feels, thinks—and the most critical "hidden" (there is only one most important thing in art, and that is what you cannot say. Painter George Braque) – all in the book. So, just like the game begins now, the author and the reader all enter it equally – through the "rules of the game" – to delight each other.
On the side of the road Bell LiFeng - folk songs on the road Icheon LIVE
(From left to right: Zhong Lifeng, Liu Xiaodai, Ling Xiao)