In the internet age, everyone has 15 minutes to become famous, and apparently Pang Mai Lang has more than 15 minutes.
Joseph Pang Mai Lang, whose real name is Pang Mingtao, was born in 1984 in Ningqiang County, Hanzhong City, Shaanxi Province, although this information is no longer recognized by him personally. In 2014, he became famous with the song "My Skate Shoes" under the team's packaging, and today, 7 years later, he is diagnosed with schizophrenia: suicide, beating, attempting murder, and finally because he can't control his behavior, Pang Meilang is forcibly taken to a mental hospital.
In a recent monologue video, Pang Meilang's agent Bai Xiao announced that he was deeply trapped in a mental hospital, which caused public discussion.
"I'm going to be president of the United States" "I'm not crazy! You're crazy! Pang Mai Lang kept repeating these words before entering the mental hospital, is it like kanye west, a hip-hop superstar with a similar encounter on the other side of the ocean?
Kanye West announces his candidacy for president of the United States.
Pang Mailang's agent Bai Xiao said that he is an artist who has suffered from schizophrenia and is still insisting on creating and insisting on his passion, and he sees the shadows of Van Gogh and Don Quixote in him, and it is online violence that traps him.
Because Van Gogh was plagued by mental problems, he cut off his left ear, so Bai Xiao compared Pang Mai Lang to Van Gogh.
Some people scoffed at Bai Xiao's claims, believing that he was whitewashing Pang Mailang's various behaviors. The controversy over Pang Mailang's talent and value has not been broken since 7 years ago, Dou Wentao said that he saw Xiao Wu under Jia Zhangke's lens in Pang Mailang, and Jia Zhangke directly "listened to crying", but when it came to the actual scene of his performance, the audience did not exceed ten people.
One of the most embarrassing performances in the world was one of Pang Mailang's lonely performances, which was said to have only 7 spectators at the time, less than the 14 security guards on the spot.
Grassroots rise is something that the public loves, so what about grassroots falls? Pang Meilang gradually became a story in the eyes of the public, rather than a person.
When he was a child, Pang Mailang had a lonely personality, had no friends, and only liked to read books and watch TV at home, and "good composition" was his father's evaluation of him at that time. As an adult, he worked from the countryside to the "charm city" of Hanzhong, and he changed countless jobs, the favorite of which was the KTV waiter. It was also at that time that he saw Michael Jackson, the idol who influenced his life, on the screen, and was shocked and determined to become the most international singer in China. One of the inspirations for My Skate Shoes was MJ's space step.
Promotional photos of Pang Mai Lang's performance.
Sandwiched between thick lyrics, Pang Mailang left his unfamiliar hometown and came to Beijing to seek his dreams. One after another, the draft, and finally Huashu Records took a fancy, investing more than one million yuan to package Pang Mailang. At that time, there were lessons from the fame of Internet celebrities such as Feng Jie and Furong Sister, and through a series of promotional hype techniques, "My Skate Shoes" became popular as desired.
Pang Mai Lang famous Divine Comedy
Cover of My Skate Shoes.
Curious netizens have been staring at him ever since. Like Kuaishou's earthy videos and the lost Killing Matt family, the cruelty and longing of the bottom layer have been put into the public eye, not to mention that Pang Mailang is deliberately packaged by the company and became popular. In the current scene of China's Internet culture being torn apart, laughter and anger go hand in hand, but this also contains the most precious understanding.
Pang Mailang's song in the ghost animal video of station B does have a place.
We can say that his works have also broken down the barriers of Internet understanding to some extent, and are a wake-up call to cross the surface of the Internet world that is safe and sound, but is actually fragmented. But on the contrary, the closed information cocoon room has made the small-town young Pang Mai Lang have a distorted perception of fame and entertainment from the beginning. His uniqueness comes from cultural rifts, and so does his Waterloo. From denying that he was from the countryside after becoming famous, touching Porcelain Brilliance yu to claim that he infringed copyrights, to refusing to attend the company to arrange a tour, etc. - his blindness is the biggest example. Pang Meilang, who arrived in the big city, found that his imaginary skate shoes did not exist, resulting in a huge gap.
Brilliance Chenyu adapted "My Skate Shoes" to make the song appear to the audience in an almost completely new way.
Pang Mai Lang fell ill, was frustrated, still insisted on love, and eventually nearly self-destructed, and this experience can indeed be said to be somewhat similar to Van Gogh, who also burned up his life for self-pursuit. But the difference is that Van Gogh misunderstood him from the outside world, and Pang Mai Lang was always confused about the outside world.
In an interview with the media, rather than the need to be noticed, Pang Mailang's eyes are more dodgy and unconfident.
Jia Zhangke.
Zuo Xiao Curse, a good friend of Jia Kechang and a singer-songwriter who has been repeatedly compared because of the similarity of the "out-of-tune" singing voice to Pang Mailang, has also commented on Pang Mailang many times: "People's lyrics are very well written, very real, and the out-of-tune also needs technical content." ”
Zuo Xiaozu cursed.
There are also Dou Wentao, Wang Lihong, etc., which are people with high taste in the eyes of the public, and they have expressed their love for this song and Pang Mailang.
Dou Wentao.
The biggest reason why "My Skate Shoes" initially touched people was because of his sincerity, you seem to be able to hear the picture of him writing this song full of longing in the noisy dormitory after work, which reminds you of your past or current life situation. Dou Wentao mentioned in his evaluation of Pang Mailang, "There is an aesthetic called the aesthetics of acceptance, the impact of a work on the listener is determined by the listener, whether Pang Mailang is a good singer or not is not important, what matters is what I hear from his voice." ”
When the cognitive gap between people in different divisions is getting bigger and bigger, the real emotions intervene, regardless of whether Pang Mailang's work is suspected of copying "My Skate Shoes", but at least this first single is a real sense of truth. As long as it is sincere, it is not shameful and ridiculous. He created an inner world without ridicule and discrimination to fight against the outside world, and the courage of this person to fight against the world alone is very admirable.
In Pang Mai Lang's world, "We will dance when there is moonlight", this is the biggest creed he got from his idol MJ, simple and romantic.
In order to confirm whether Pang's talent was overshadowed by public prejudice, we listened to Pang's "My Skate Shoes" and Zuo Xiao Curse's "The Love Gun" to professors at the Berklee College of Music, and here are his answers to us:
Berkeley Conservatory lecturer Cristobal
I hope not to offend anyone, but the first time I heard song 1 (Pang Mai Lang's "My Skate Shoes"), I thought it was a comical and clumsy musical imitation. It sounds like club music, but the collage effect produced by pasting so many different sounds sounds sound comical, although I don't understand the lyrics.
Cover of "The Gun of Love"
The second song: Zuo Xiao Curses "The Gun of Love") sounds good, but when I listened, I didn't find anything new either. It's like copying and pasting the harmonies, rhythms, and melodies from popular songs I've already heard. The only part that is different for me is the timbre of the singer in the middle part of the song. I'd love to understand the lyrics because it sounds like they're telling a story, and the second singer sounds like the father of the first singer.
Pang Mai Lang sat by the creek, which was where he played as a child.
Whether it is Pang MaiLang or Zuo Xiao Curse, the resonance is that they together bring us the greatest value. Our biggest difference of opinion can actually be understood as the difference between realism and idealism, although Pang Mailang is not Van Gogh, his ideal is as pure and noble as Van Gogh, in this world of big data algorithms that lacks real resonance, blindness and numbness, cherish every understanding.
Edit: Brett
Written by: pOp
Design: Yuun