In the past two days, Four Words released a new album.
The name of this album is "Liu Yanfen", and it contains a lot of elements. In the past, Tao always focused on four-character film and television works, but this time to clarify the secrets contained in this album, our research and discussion must begin with film and television, but not limited to film and television. Then little by little, he approached the "strange" soul of the four characters, which was independent of the billowing red dust.
Before the release of the album, the four characters typed two sentences on Weibo:
Night rises, start with songs.
The ship of dreams, docked on the shore in the song.
These two sentences seem to foreshadow this album, and the companion ship is generally docked in the harbor of dreams.
And on April 18, the new album cover was announced. On April 19, the new album trailer was released. From the cover and teaser, a retro atmosphere of the 90s greets you.
This image is the album cover
The cover of the new album is from the 2001 Gong Li co-photographer Xia Yongkang, director Wong Kar-wai's "Street Car Desire" series of photographs, shot from Macau.
Gong Li in the picture represents that women can have different images, which also hides the connotation of this new album
In the trailer, Sizi with a wolf-tailed hairstyle entered the dance hall from a shabby alley, fixed his eyes on the people in the dance hall, turned and walked into the backstage of the dance hall, and seemed to be ready to start performing with the band members.
The 47-second trailer seems to lead the audience into the 90s Disco dance hall scene.
In addition to the strong retro atmosphere, this new album can also be said to be a very bold attempt of four characters, the nine songs in the new album integrate music, cinematic sense, artistry, nine songs and six sound plots composed of the album, presenting the audience with a strong sense of story.
The four characters and the dark railing seem to be a string of notes on a sheet music (Source: "Jiaren" interview)
The album "Liu Yanfen" is not only a record containing music, it is also like a "universal container" that contains a lot of information.
From their own perspective, Si Zi and Fan Yitang, Chen Jingfei, Wang Zi, Yin Yao and Tang Tian, five lyricists, sound designer Tan Ailong, visual designer Cinnabar, and producer Mars Radio, Jude and many other creators jointly completed this record.
Why is this album a universal containment machine? Because the elements in the record are, on the one hand, the fusion of cinematic, musicality, and artistic style; On the other hand, it is also Shizi who includes his own life observations as an experimental sample from unique music to three-dimensional wide-angle.
This new album has a film texture and independent style, and Momo feels like a dream journey after listening to it.
There is also an important detail in the album, which is the title "Liu Yanfen". In fact, there is a story behind this title that is not known to the general public.
"Liu Yanfen", this name, or where did this image come from?
In fact, this name has a long history, in the second season of a variety show "Let Go of My North Nose" in 2017, in order to complete the tasks arranged by the variety show, Sizi dressed up as a female choreographer and director tricked all the staff to go out to purchase, and when other guests asked what "her" was called, he casually said the name "Liu Yanfen".
Judging from his Weibo, this blurted out "Liu Yanfen" also has the meaning of a virtual observer codename.
So, from "Liu Yanfen", what did he observe?
We might as well get to know Yi Yangqianxi again from multiple dimensions.
When it comes to the four characters, many people will subconsciously think that he is a clear stream in current popular culture.
And the embodiment of clear stream, on the one hand, is about choice. In February 2018, the four characters shined in the program "This is Street Dance". According to common sense, he should seize the opportunity and take advantage of the situation to deepen his cultivation in this track.
But the four characters seem to have more unique considerations. In July of the same year, he was admitted to the Central Academy of Drama and then entered the actor industry.
On the other hand, in the acting career, the four characters chose a rather difficult path, that is, to speak with works. If summarized and summarized, his classic screen image mostly focuses on small people at different points in history.
For example, from "Young You", we can see that his interpretation of the bottom teenagers is meticulous and has an explosive emotional expression.
Xiaobei in the movie "Young You"
And in "Changjin Lake", the teenager played by the four characters, from a child who didn't know anything at the beginning, slowly grew into a teenager full of family and country feelings.
Wu Wanli in the movie "Changjin Lake"
In the presentation of "Miracle, Stupid Child", he interprets the image of an older brother who is at the bottom and runs around to treat his sister in detail.
Jing Hao in the movie "Miracle Stupid Child"
In the recent "Manjiang Hong", Sun Jun, the deputy commander played by the four characters, has greatly changed his screen image in the inflection point of the era presented by the movie, and the role he plays reveals a kind of decisive maturity and full of enthusiasm for righteousness.
Sun Jun in the movie "Manjiang Hong"
In general, the characteristics of the four characters are unique among young actors. The screen images he creates are often small people, but these small characters are polished to the smallest detail.
And such a work shaping, on the one hand, is attributed to his almost "obsessive" spirit as an actor. He said to himself that hard work is rewarded, and this circle can be summed up by using works to speak.
From CCTV's "Face to Face" program
On the other hand, this is also thanks to Sizi's observation of the real world and a lot of speculation about small people.
As we all know, the screen shaping of small people requires more effort.
Because small people are different from "big people" who are highly summarized and summarized, performers can easily find "samples" to imitate. Conversely, small people, while the forces that build society, are often overlooked. If you want to play small people well, you need to observe them more closely.
To take a simple example, Chen Peisi and Zhu Shimao went to observe vendors near the Beijing Zoo in order to perform the sketch "Lamb Kebab", and even sought advice from law enforcement officers. It is precisely because of the accumulation of a lot of material through observation that they act vividly
For Si Zi, rather than being the center of attention, he prefers to hide himself in the crowd and observe everything that happens around him.
And observation is also one of the activities that he enjoys and is used to outside of work.
This habit can also help him more easily figure out the psychology of the characters in the script, so as to better interpret the characters that can move the audience.
After being admitted to the Central Academy of Drama, the four characters of the first two years seemed to fade out of the public's sight. Behind the spotlight is to precipitate yourself, refine your acting skills, shrink "yourself" in front of the public, and then enlarge the "role".
He loves to ride the subway bus, wear a hat and mask, observe the world and observe the crowd.
In an interview with Vogue magazine, he mentioned that people need to be constantly absorbed and accepted, and the actor industry needs to continue to accumulate.
The accumulation of this is not only the speculation of different roles, but also the voluntary experience of various lives without limiting oneself.
And when it comes to not limiting ourselves, we can also see the other side of the four-figure slash youth.
In addition to the identity of the actor, the four characters under the stage are sometimes jokingly called "old artists with both virtue and art".
And his calm personality has allowed him to find a perfect fit between art and life.
Anyone familiar with the four characters knows that he is obsessed with sculpture.
In the interview, he mentioned that he saw an old clay artist in a video, and he thought about the life of the old artist from the old artist's work. He was so touched that he fell in love with clay sculptures.
Yi Yangqianxi's clay sculptures
Explore the art of still life in clay sculptures
Four characters are willing to sink down to explore their hearts, and at the same time, this big boy who looks calm also contains an inner impulse.
At the age of 16, he carried a bag and traveled south for 44 hours by train to Yunnan to climb the Jade Dragon Snow Mountain.
He also once mentioned that he would like to travel on his own all the time if he could
In daily life, Si Zi is also happy to share his works with everyone, or let "observation", "sharing" and "feedback and re-observation" form a cycle.
On Weibo, he shared a lot of his own shooting works, including shooting landscapes and recording the life of his crew.
In 2021, after staying in the crew of "Changjin Lake" for more than half a year, he posted a casual vlog video on Weibo, which became popular out of the circle.
This vlog was also pinned on the personal homepage of Weibo.
Many people are surprised by his artistic creativity and ability to observe life.
Love to record the four characters of life, but also specially designed a secret base, warmly called "small website" by everyone.
Fans can send him any words from their hearts and share with him what they think in their lives, like a tree hole between them and the four characters. Sometimes, in his spare time after his busy work, he will also find time to log on to the "small website" to read information.
Fans were pleasantly surprised to find that their comments even became inspiration for some parts of his new album.
He said in the interview: After seeing all kinds of information, I can see each person concretely, and each person gradually becomes concrete, which makes me feel that I have narrowed the distance between them a little, and that distance is quite warm. But this distance is not so open, and there are still reservations.
And in 2020, Four Characters released an album "Backseat Theater". The album is often mistaken for a pure cover album.
But strictly speaking, the album is strongly experimental, more like a documentary slice from his childhood.
The album's proposition is about the "past". 10 years ago, nearly 40 kilometers from the North Second Ring Road to Changping, the four characters used to build their own tiny and wonderful world in the last row of the last bus. 10 years later, he chose 6 classic works with the highest "self-resonance frequency" to build a "backseat theater" with sound.
In the cover song, it seems to take you back to that old time
Lovebirds, people in the subway who discuss what to wear when they bungee wear.
Late at night, on the way home from make-up class, the conversation between parents on the phone.
Similar to the "private novels" that were popular in the Japanese literary scene in the 20th century, the four-character album is full of personal expressions. Piecing together the past through sound, and gazing again at the future self through the window of the time.
As if everything was again attributed to the ultimate problem of philosophy - me.
In an interview, Si Zi once said, "Thirteen or fourteen years old was arranged to take a good road, seventeen or eight want to find what he wants."
So, what did he find?
We might as well briefly analyze one or two from the meaning of the four-character work.
Some people think that the four characters are very partial to the 90s.
Whether it's the background sound of "Play is a Heartbeat" in his Vlog, or the retrospective of nostalgic golden songs in "Backseat Theater". Many saw in him the nostalgia of the 90s.
In the eyes of collaborators, there seems to be a switch in his body, connecting the old and the new. Asked if he felt that he was a more nostalgic person, he nodded: "I am, I like that old stuff." ”
But on the other hand, if we try to abandon stylized representations and go deeper into cultural perspective, we will find that the 90s may be the spiritual homeland of the four characters as creators.
From the perspective of cultural history, the 90s are a special node for creators. At that time, people had just experienced the thaw of ideas in the 80s, and caught up with the boom of the commodity economy in the 90s. Artistic creation and exploration have also reached a peak of enthusiasm.
In the 80s, talking about Nietzsche and Freud was a trend
On the one hand, creators are willing to take care of new forms of expression and use them for themselves. On the other hand, in the wave of modernization, they are also willing to use works and self-expression to make up for the rift of the times.
"Xiaowu", shot in the 90s, is more like a spontaneous exploration of the era perspective
Therefore, compared with the time node of the 90s, the exploration and enthusiasm of the 90s may be more in line with the creative spirit of the four characters. His focus may not only be on the culture of the 90s, but more on cultural exploration.
Therefore, the so-called "cultural root-finding" is not to mechanically appreciate the past and the present, but to create their own works and styles in combination with the present. This is the kind of spiritual precipitation that we can perceive from him.
Regarding the old and new, Yin Yao, the lyricist of the new album, mentioned the three epochs in the four characters in an interview with "Jiaren": past, present and future.
The hard work of a teenager growing up so far, the calm and steadfastness of the present and the immeasurable future.
Returning to the present day from the 90s, one of the dilemmas of artistic exploration in the 21st 20s is that people are often trapped under the cocoon of huge amounts of information.
In economic activity, pop culture will be streamlined into perfect products according to the audience's preferences, and then continuously meet the needs of the audience. However, the feedback from the audience will make the cocoon deepen.
As a result, many creators unconsciously become overly involuted "content cows", but ignore one of the true meanings of creation, which is diversity and exploration.
Start from your true self and find your own language and express it through various art forms.
Many of the current creators are much like the "ムーピー" in Osamu Tezuka's manga "Fire Bird", this alien creature can become what people expect
And the four characters in the current popular culture, did not follow the trend. He is willing to follow his dreams, find himself, try boldly, have the courage to explore, observe, try different things, form his own artistic style, rather than become a vassal of pop culture.
Then, he presented his observations and feelings of everything in life to the audience in the way that he polished his works in a muffled voice.
Four characters use the soul of the actor from the movie to write the music of the singer Four Characters.
So far, we have only seen a third of the album content for the time being, and we are even more looking forward to seeing the follow-up content.
I look forward to seeing that as a post-00 generation of the four characters is the author consciousness of "self", through his meticulous observation, the feeling of the interaction between life and art, and the patient polishing of the work, it brings us a unique "Yi Yang Qianxi style" work; I look forward to what such a young man who cherishes the spirit of the 90s, likes to "polish works with muffled sounds", and has great potential energy at the moment, will leave something to this era.
Design/Vision: Strong