The same short video became popular, comparing Zhao Lei and Li Ronghao, and the gap came out

Text | Ling Hu Boguang

At the end of the Spring Festival in 2023, Bo Guangjun wrote an article lamenting. When it was just released at the end of last year, no one expected that the Spring Festival file would be an outbreak, and the TV series included "Go to a Windy Place", "Moses on the Plain", "Crazy", "The Three-Body Problem", "Daming under the Microscope" and so on.

It is enough for the movie to have "The Wandering Earth 2", while the animation has "Deep Sea", "Chinese Strange Tan" and so on.

Chinese games just don't have works released during the Spring Festival, but we know how much Chinese games have changed after Genshin. Anyway, this Spring Festival Chinese pop culture seems to have only Chinese music, as well as variety entertainment and idol entertainment at the level of the most crotch-pulling, the latter two fields will not be mentioned.

The popular Chinese music from the Spring Festival in 2023 to now is not nothing, first Li Ronghao's "Wumeizi Sauce" became popular, and then the well-known music critic Ding Taisheng commented that "too dirty" was on the hot search, triggering discussions among netizens about Li Ronghao's fall and the decline of the Chinese music scene.

At the same time, a "Tuhi" short video divine comedy "Love Like Fire" also became popular. But everyone's comments are: the first time is vulgar, the second time is something, the third time the heart is beating is love like fire -

The popularity of these two short video divine comedy is almost the same as every time similar songs become popular. Everyone first scolded the Chinese music scene according to the convention, but it did not prevent short videos from playing memes together on the Internet, and the second creation and various derivative works flooded until they rushed to the next wave after passing the gas.

Strictly speaking, it is not right that only these two divine comedy have been popular since the Spring Festival, and Bo Guangjun saw that the Penguin song list ranked with Zhou Shen's "People Is" and "Eternal Solitude", as well as Zhao Lei's "I Remember" also became popular.

From the new album "Take You Flying" to "Wumeizi Sauce" and "Love Like Fire", to Zhou Shen's two OSTs and Zhao Lei's "I Remember", the development of the Chinese music scene has indeed come to a fork.

Can't the Chinese music scene work? Whether it works or not, don't look at Jay Chou

I have written many times about the problems in the Chinese music scene, here is a first analysis of the above list of popular songs since 2023, in fact, it can be divided into two categories.

The first is Li Ronghao's "Wumeizi Sauce" and the short video song "Love Like Fire", these two capitals are customized divine comedy of short videos, the difference is that one is speculation by well-known pop musicians, and the other is short videos that make money.

You said that Li Ronghao's "Wumeizi Sauce" is also to make money on short videos. It is true, but "Love Like Fire" is created in the music is not any pursuit, the arrangement and production are not exquisite, simple melody, suitable rhythm, with easy-to-understand lyrics to achieve a brainwashing effect, what is needed is this easy to spread effect.

Li Ronghao's "Wumeizi Sauce" is still different, the biggest problem with this song is that the lyrics are too popular, and the melody and content motivation are too speculative, but the arrangement and production are in the short video song.

The front of "Wumei Zi Sauce" is a relatively routine, and the harmony of the interlude in the back is not something messy that can be written by a messy person, as long as you have seen singing and ear training, you can know it. The arrangement of this song is not complicated, but what happened to the simple arrangement of orchestration?

Li Ronghao is very strong as a guitarist, I think it is a very normal and ordinary song, say his routine, that interlude surprised me, I also specially went to check the harmony to learn his writing, there is no problem with writing. Those who criticize the defense of "Plum Sauce" and the defense of "Confession Balloon" are people all the way, and maybe the piano group does not know a few keys.

So what's wrong with this song? Why do people complain that they think it's very tacky?

Second, this can be explained by Zhou Shen's "People Is", "Eternal Solitude", and then Zhao Lei's "I Remember". "People Is" is the promotional song of "The Wandering Earth 2", "Eternal Solitude" is the promotional song of "The Three-Body Problem", these two are commercial songs at all, why can they be well received?

Zhou Shen's timbre and singing skills are one of the main reasons, and the commercial OST sung by Zhou Shen has gone more, and it is not a capital fire.

The main thing is that the creator shows his singing voice vividly according to the characteristics of Zhou Shen's voice, vocal range and singing skills. And I feel that the creators of these two Chinese science fiction film and television dramas, although they are commercial songs, they are obviously more attentive and have a strong force in them.

For example, "People Is" was written by Qian Lei and Tang Tian, and Zhou Shen collaborated on similar songs such as "Big Fish" (this song is Yin Yao).

The soundtrack of "The Wandering Earth 2" is a Kun who is close to Hans Zimmer's symphony and electronic music, while the soundtrack of "Big Fish and Begonia" is Japanese soundtrack artist Yoshida Jie, and the music style is biased towards the Japanese oriental style. Therefore, "Big Fish" created by Qian Lei is also similar to this Chinese style.

But the music style of "People Is" is more popular in the West classical and electronic, so this piece starts with violin (it should be), you listen to a bit similar to the theme song of "007", the first half of the main song Zhou Shen's voice is also laid with a layer of electric sound effect, and then the song, rhythm and arrangement begin to progress layer by layer.

This lyrics with Tang Tian's incomparable fit to the content of the movie vividly show Zhou Shen's voice, vocal range and singing skills. The most important thing is that it is very good, and the treble and song impact are endless. Even if you haven't watched the movie, you will be shocked, let alone if you like "The Wandering Earth 2".

"Eternal Solitude" is the same reason, forcing the other side of Zhou Shen's voice out, the key is that the song is good.

The same singer-songwriter, compare Zhao Lei and Li Ronghao, the difference will come out

Of course, some people will say that "People Is" or "Eternal Solitude", backed by the content of "The Wandering Earth 2" and "The Three-Body Problem" film and television dramas. At the same time, Qian Lei just composes music and does not sing, and can change the style of the song at will, unlike Li Ronghao's voice is fixed, so the comparison is not scientific.

(I don't agree with this view, or that sentence Zhou Shen's film and television OST is not the first capital will fire).

Let's not compare these two songs of Zhou Shen, let's compare Zhao Lei's "I Remember". Li Ronghao's "Wumeizi Sauce" was first released on November 21 last year, and later included in the new album "Across the Sea" on December 21, and Zhao Lei's "I Remember" is a song from the new album "Jiqian Street Boy" released on August 29 last year.

They were all not popular when they were published at that time, and they became popular after the Spring Festival in 2023, and the reason for the fire was "short video".

Here is still the first to talk about "Plum Sauce" and "I Remember", in fact, it is okay to analyze the songwriting and singing production alone, but ordinary people can't watch it. In the most understandable words: Li Ronghao's song is the machine of "Love Like Fire", while Zhao Lei's "I Remember" is similar to Zhou Shen's "People Is" and "Eternal Solitude".

The former used the arrangement and production that Li Ronghao was good at, and the result was to create a short video brainwashing divine comedy that would catch fire.

Although Zhao Lei's "I Remember" does not have film and television content to support, it is essentially similar to Mao Bu Yi. Zhao Lei was earlier and more grassroots, so he wanted to live like "Painting", confused in pursuit of ideals. Mao was not easy to be later, gently expressing his yearning for money, his confusion about worldly struggles, his longing for integrating into society, and his struggle with Buddhism.

But now they don't have to struggle anymore, but Zhao Lei is still thinking about the meaning of life, Mao is not easy to get angry until the commercial oppression is too serious later, as if there are really no works worth thinking about now.

When "The Boy of Qianqian Street" was first launched, it cost money, and I liked "I Remember" very much when I listened to it, and I think that in terms of songwriting, arrangement, and mixing, it is a very high-quality Chinese folk song, and it is also a very sincere song. It's hard to imagine that Zhao Lei would use the concept of "reincarnation" to write songs.

I can feel from this song that Zhao Lei's music is obviously sublimated compared to the popular "Chengdu" that year, just like Fatty Song wrote "Guo Yuanchao", which is definitely a new starting point (but the artistry is still much inferior).

To mention more, although the album "Jiqian Street Boy" has not made a big breakthrough, it is also a work full of sincerity, as a work that has been sharpened by a sword in six years, Zhao Lei has poured a lot of effort, I hope you can listen to this album more, not just a popular "I Remember".

Why so many netizens scolded Li Ronghao this time, not because he can't write this kind of song, but because the "short video divine comedy" in the Chinese music scene is too widespread, Li Ronghao's song is good or not, depending on which angle to evaluate, the main thing is that Li Ronghao has not only written this kind of song.

Do you remember the lyrics after "Your shallow smile is like plum sauce", is there a logical correspondence between the two lyrics before and after? Is it the TikTok BGM-type song we often say.

After I listened to this song once, this song twice, and this song three times, I think he didn't want to write other songs, just record this sentence on the original voice TikTok The popularity will not be much lower than now, which is unacceptable to the audience who once recognized Li Ronghao's music.

Li Ronghao's songs may not be much breakthrough, but you at least have an emotional expression, "Young and Talented", "Model" and "Wild Animals" are not this tune, right? "Li Bai" said that it was very vulgar, but at least he still did it seriously, or a sincere song.

Ding Taisheng's criticism of Li Ronghao and praise of Zhao Lei There is still a sentence that makes sense: why praise "I Remember", because Zhao Lei is sincere, why scold "Wumeizi sauce", because Li Ronghao is too speculative; Sincerity In the Chinese music scene of this era, it is something as precious as a diamond.

Venture? Corrupt the ethos? The Chinese music scene does not need Li Ronghao, or even Jay Chou

Finally, I have written many times about the main reasons for the regression of the so-called Chinese music scene, first of all, the way the public listens to music has changed, the current digital music and the music dissemination of short video platforms, everyone can more easily hear music and actively spread music (such as the second creation of the video era).

The core of excellent works comes from the audience, but the aesthetics of music need to be led by professional and innovative musicians, and in recent years, capital has often turned music into an industrial product mass production (such as a set of chords, just fill in a word to produce a song).

The aesthetic of the masses is so directed, the vicious circle, we hear the classic music has always been decades ago.

Secondly, the public often listens to music and is accustomed to their familiar chord direction, in the final analysis, aesthetics are just like that. Therefore, whenever you hear some music composition beyond your expectations, you will instinctively feel that music is not good, which is also because Chinese music was too prosperous decades ago, especially the urban ballet, that is, pop POP written by Hong Kong and Taiwan.

It is difficult for the public to try other musical styles and other chord directions, for example, 4536251's chord direction can sing many songs from decades ago, you naturally sound like plagiarism, Li Ronghao's "Wumei Sauce" and Jay Chou's "Romantic Phone" are a truth.

All use the same set of chords and arrangement ideas can be different, as for whether it is plagiarism is a matter of law.

Finally, those who are arguing that the Chinese music scene is dead, it is true that the credibility of the current Chinese list is collapsed, but I suggest that you listen to niche musicians and music, and if you really love music, take the initiative to find and listen to music outside your comfort zone, and don't always look at big data to push.

As a result, you will find that after jumping out of pop and urban ballet, the Chinese music scene is now more than ten times richer than before. Believe me, then you will find that not only Li Ronghao is nothing, but even Jay Chou is like that.