I still remember that at the beginning of this year, AI singers once washed the major video websites, and the technical nerds put the singers' previous works into the software "alchemy", and then generated an AI version of the voice, and then after a certain amount of tuning, a singer who performed no less than a real person can be generated"AI stand-in".
Compared with real people, AI singers are on call, will not collapse houses, will not roll over cars, will not reverse their voices, can sing whatever song they want, and will not lip-sync while shaking the big pendulum. It can even make some singers who have passed away or retired "win the repechage match" and let their singing return to the world.
Among them, the most popular is the "AI Yanzi Sun" that once washed the music area of Station B: netizens found that the AI version of Yanzi Sun can really sing anything: Nanquan's mother's "Rainy Day", Zhao Lei's "I Remember", and even the "two-dimensional" national anthem "Butterfly", Liu Huan's "Song of a Good Man", the first capital can control.
Some people say that the award for the best Chinese female singer of the year should be awarded to AI Yanzi Sun, and some people say that the AI version of Yanzi Sun has surpassed the ontology at the level, and Yanzi Sun herself may be unemployed.
The popularity of the AI stand-in even blew up the Sun Yanzi herself, who has retired from the music scene for many years, and she said clearly: AI cannot replace the current three-dimensional self at all levels.
Coupled with potential legal disputes and risks, the craze for creating AI doubles for singers cooled down after a few months.
AI Stefanie Sun can only win second place in the Stefanie Sun Imitation Competition
Interestingly, at the same time that the AI Stefanie Sun took over the music district, almost the same thing happened in the lesser-watched Hong Kong music scene. However, the subsequent story took a 180-degree turn, and finally became a major event that affected the whole city.
In June 2023, a YouTube account called VirtualTours uploaded a video of an AI cover of Hong Kong's annual hit "One Man's Realm" in 19. In addition to excellent tuning, because the AI sang this song that was originally a lonely and depressive atmosphere with a festive feeling, it made people feel inexplicably on top.
The playback of this song soared wildly, and the AI version of "One Man's Realm" soon became the first AI Cantonese song on Youtube to exceed one million plays, and even became a short video gold song for a time.
Use AI "One Man's Land" to cut food videos...... Show me I'm hungry
And the main owner of this AI voice belongs to a 74-year-old singer - Yin Guang.
Yin Guang, born in 1944, began to make a name for himself in the music scene in the 70s. His songs often have a strong market atmosphere, which is simple and easy to understand, and even people who have not gone to school can understand what he is singing at once.
"I'm confused
When I saw someone with a beard, I thought it was my father
Looking at a cup of coffee is like milk tea, and rotten wood is used as a cigar
The tip of the pork bone is regarded as precious ivory."
——Yin Guang "Big Old Flower"
In addition to popularity, some songs also add some "happy" rubbing lines, which will make people feel unbearable after careful association, and also give Yin Guang the nickname of "King of Salty and Wet Singers".
Yin Guang also playfully buried some "Cantonese rhyme" in Cantonese - such as "Your Grandma's Big Sale" and "Department of Geography and Agriculture" (homophonic Cantonese "lose your old wood"), which makes people very happy.
With his approachable style, coupled with the "dimensionality reduction" brought about by Xi singing skills brought by Cantonese opera since childhood, Yin Guang soon became the "King of Temple Street" in Hong Kong at that time.
Even the title of the album is very in line with the mental state of modern people, "Thinking of Money and Thinking of Confusion"
In other words, Hong Kong people may not know who Yin Guang is, but they will definitely hear his songs on the streets and alleys during the New Year's holidays. If Yin Guang was born in Yunnan, then his representative song will most likely be "Pinch Your Crotch".
Yin Guang's happy and festive singing accompanied Hong Kong people through the era of rapid economic development, and slowly left the spotlight with the tide of the times. It wasn't until the AI Yin Guang came out this time that everyone realized: it turns out that Yin Guang is still singing!
Under the comment area of AI "The Realm of One Man", there are even viewers who don't know the truth to urge Yin Guang himself: I hope you can launch more such excellent works!
So, Yin Guang responded. did not write a statement, nor did he start a live broadcast, but responded to all this in the way that a singer should use most - with singing.
On September 11, Yin Guang released his new song: "Dear Myself" (Dear Myself).
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The official MV of "Dear Myself", I highly recommend everyone to watch it
In the MV, 74-year-old Yin Guang walked slowly down the steps, and the stairwell was full of posters of his previous works and concerts.
He walked to a stage with a microphone, where he sang:
"What a triumphant achievement,
If you want to hear me, I'd love to look back with you
It was a slight autumn in an instant
Please take your seats for this performance."
Peacefully, like an old man playing chess in the park, he hopes to tell every young person who passes by about his youthful pride. And the huge ballroom under the stage was empty.
"Reminiscence and resonance, no one has regrets
Didn't enter Hollywood, but was addicted
The fourteenth seat of the seater is about to go into seclusion
Sing the last rhyme"
If you really want to recall it carefully, who has never had the same wish as picking stars in their lives, but in the end it can't be realized? The old man waved his hand, saying that he had already enjoyed it and had no regrets. Considering Yin Guang's current age, his "last aftertaste" and "retreat" may not only be the end of his career as a singer, but also the end of his life.
"How grateful to be here to see the stars
This journey comes and goes
Counting the hairs of the head and slipping away
听过几多落泪大笑欢呼拍手”
After singing this paragraph, a similar but not identical voice suddenly appeared, snatching Yin Guang's lyrics, and it was the AI version of Yin Guang who "wanted to rob him of his job".
After it appeared, it sang through the life of the deity in just one sentence:
"I sing no boring chats that never shine too brightly
I'm singing, day and night, I wish I would like to make you laugh."
Yin Guang's life has never been as sought after and named a god by everyone as a superstar. There is no poignant love in the songs he sings, there is no grand narrative, there are just the daily life of every ordinary Hong Kong person in that era, and the reward he wants is only the heartfelt and simple laughter of every Shengdou small people in that era after hearing the song.
As for how to get along with the self created by AI, and how to face the crisis that AI may replace humans, the old man and the AI version of themselves, the chorus gave their own answer:
"By the time I got there, my voice was depreciated
I've passed this mission over to AI."
If my life's mission is to create laughter for all. So even if my limit is approaching, even if I am hoarse, even if I am in a hospital bed, even if my life is gone. My voice, created by artificial intelligence, will continue my mission to continue to create beautiful memories for every listener, and become an uninterrupted continuation of my acting career in the cyber world. This should have been the original intention and mission that should be given to artificial life when it was created.
"It's a lot of people
The seasons are like the thieves of the years
How many tears, cheers, laughter, and clapping have I heard
Count a lifetime of wisdom and absurdity
How to talk about what you have gained and lost
The mood is changed and the people are the same"
After saying goodbye to the AI version of himself, Yin Guang put on the most "fashionable" dress when he was young, sighed the passage of time, lamented that time was numbered, and recalled the years he spent with the audience that were stolen by the seasons, but in the end, he easily and wittily brought all this easily, as long as he wore that dress, he was still the immortal "King of Temple Street Singer":
And at the end of the song, he thanked his other self like "AI Yin Guang" in the mirror, and among countless titles, the old artist chose to affectionately call it "best friend".
Chaochao looked at this old friend in the mirror
Me and I are best friends in the mirror. ”
In any way, "Dear Myself" is a very rare song: an old artist, in a way that almost carves an epitaph for himself, looks back on his acting life, and thanks and waves goodbye to the listeners who have come along the way. This kind of expression of living and dying with the art of singing can be said to be very rare.
What's more delicate is that in the chorus part of this song, each lyric hides the easter eggs of Yin Guang's classic works, and this way of writing the trajectory of life adds a sadness to this song:
And what is even more rare is Yin Guang's sincerity in the song. And sincerity is the best killer feature.
After the birth of "Dear Myself", it quickly became popular in the Hong Kong music scene, and the number of views of the MV quickly exceeded 1.6 million, and it directly landed on the radio gold song chart of the month. The comment area of the song was even more occupied by "listening to crying" and "moving".
Even on mainland video sites where the Cantonese atmosphere is not so strong, "Dear Myself" has touched many people:
And the biggest listener who was broken by this song is the 6-time actor, the actor "Slag Hui", who will enter the 60-year-old mark next year. When he first heard Dear Myself, his reaction was:
Zha Hui also recommended this song to his good friend, the singer Jacky Cheung, and asked him to listen to it too. When he found out that Xueyou didn't cry like him after listening to it, he concluded that "he was cold-blooded"
Of course, what gives this song special meaning is Yin Guang's attitude towards his AI stand-in: professional singers singing with AI are already a precedent in the industry. At a time when most people on Earth were afraid that artificial intelligence would rule the world and would cost him his job and income, he chose to actively embrace this new thing and treat it as a continuation of his life.
"Flesh and blood are not eternal, and the voice will be depreciated after the baptism of time, but technology can make everyone become Yin Guang, find another dimension of self to sing together, and let the "Yin Guang spirit" live forever in the world. ”
74 years old, in Du Fu's words, is already a rare age. At this age, some people are already sick, some have begun to lose their memory, some people choose to live with the world and enjoy peace and tranquility, while others are paranoid and stubborn, still clinging to the glory of the old world for warmth.
Yin Guang, who fled since childhood, probably did not read a paper on the threat theory of artificial intelligence, but he chose to actively embrace the new things in this world, and when young people were confused, puzzled, and confused, he used the experience and intuition given to him by the years to give his own answer.
No matter which reason he was moved by, with this song "Dear Myself", Yin Guang has successfully gained a group of New Year's fans after nearly 20 years of anger, and has turned from having nothing to do at home to retire to becoming one of the busiest artists in Hong Kong in 2023. After many years, he was able to return to the Hung Hom Coliseum, Hong Kong's highest performance stage, to start a solo concert.
His influence has also successfully spread to the Cantonese-speaking area of the mainland, and he also has the opportunity to open a solo concert in the Guangzhou-Foshan area after many years - the most humorous thing is that the theme of his concert is "I am not AI"!
At TVB's largest annual Taiwan celebration event, Yin Guang sang as a special guest. The most ironic thing is that he never had the opportunity to appear on TV in his peak Temple Street days - because the TV station thought that his image was too marketable and "unqualified".
Even the Hong Kong SAR government noticed this former singer in the market and specially invited him to shoot an image promotional video for SAR affairs:
As if going backwards, time has been reversed back to the 80s, and Yin Guang and his singing have re-spread in every district of Hong Kong. Fans on the Internet even refer to themselves as "light shortbread" and Yin Guang affectionately as "light B".
They feel that they must leave some recognized brilliance and proof for Light B in this year. They have only one choice - to win the "Command"!
The full name of "Singing Bad" is "My Favorite Singer in the Music World", and it is the most influential music award in Hong Kong. In the golden age of the Hong Kong music scene of the Four Heavenly Kings and Leslie Cheung, every time the voting stage for the best male singer is a sensational event in Hong Kong, and all TV and newspaper headlines will compete to track the latest situation of the vote.
But after the golden age passed, the male singer also lost his former attention. In 2018, a boy group called MIRROR was born, and with its commercialized packaging strength, Hong Kong Entertainment's unprecedented militarized fan circle management model quickly occupied every hot search and every billboard in Hong Kong.
The whole city is hot, but also brings doubts, because the speed of popularity is too fast, there are not enough excellent works to support fame, MIRROR is also regarded by more ordinary Hong Kong people as a symbol of capital manipulation of the entertainment industry and playing with the flow economy. It was ridiculed by many mainland people, "It's not as popular as Luohu", "Fans eat something good"
Hit the list, account for hot searches, and brush data This set of fan circle models can be said to be strange to the people who eat melons in the mainland, and the voting award of "Male Singer" will naturally not be let go by fans, since it became popular in 2019, "Zha Zha" has completely become an award for infighting and pork sharing between fans of the MIRROR group, and the distance between ordinary people who don't care about the entertainment industry has been further away.
MIRROR团员连续三年包揽“叱咤”
In this way, the 74-year-old Guang B, in the 2023 Prestigious Music Awards, has transformed into a representative of ordinary Hong Kong netizens against capital, traffic, and fan circle mode, and in the top 10 list of the primary selection, Yin Guang appeared among several MIRROR members and a group of young male singers.
And in the final stage, the "unorganized and undisciplined" light shortbread successfully squeezed out nearly countless fans who formed a group to play the list, and the MIRROR members with the support of brokerage capital made Yin Guang enter the top five for the first time!
is just a folk singer who has unexpectedly become popular, does it really deserve to be praised as a symbol of resistance to the power of capital?
People in Hong Kong think he's worthy, because he's been doing it 40 years ago.
Although Yin Guang's lyrics back then were simple and down-to-earth, there was also some vulgarity. But the theme of his lyrics that can never be avoided is that it is the poor citizens who have been neglected in that era. is like "Fourteen Seats", singing about the bus drivers who were bullied by bus companies and gangsters day and night at that time:
"It's really unlucky, I drive a fourteen-seater
I turned around and it wasn't full
Two or three o'clock, sleepy, hungry."
And the song "Your Auntie's Big Sale", which is scolding from the title, actually tells the story of the current situation of gritting his teeth to support his family when he was suffering from domestic violence and being oppressed by traditional conservative thoughts, no matter how good his husband was to gamble or how irresponsible:
"Your grandma has a big sale for your father
It is indeed not easy to support a family day and night
There is no living expenses, and you have to cook three meals
There is such a good wife to be praised!"
After entering the 21st century, Yin Guang directly stopped pretending - wearing a gorgeous suit, using the most popular hip-hop rap, straightforward and extremely aggressive lyrics, singing the difficulties and hearts of contemporary youth that are difficult to turn over:
"The more you sell the house, the more expensive it gets, but the more you live in it, the narrower it gets
After graduating from college, it is not the same as 996
You say how dare young people get married and have children?"
——《你老板》尹光 (ft. KZ)
In the era of drunken money and rapid economic development, Yin Guang has never forgotten every ordinary person who has been neglected and oppressed by capital, so that their voices can be heard.
Today, when Hong Kong's economy is stagnant and ridiculed as the "ruins of an international financial center", it is even more difficult for young people to see hope, Yin Guang has stood up again and told young people how to reconcile with the glorious past and how to deal with future crises. What he represents in this era is the last afterglow and retrospective of the golden Hong Kong era.
One comment said that if Wan Guang won the award, the significance would not be that his humorous songs had successfully entered the mainstream, but that Hong Kong people still want to tell a good story of sanity. Let yourself continue to believe that in this city, powerful people still have happy endings, this is the deepest meaning of these.
In the face of the sudden attention in his later years, Guang B is still as open-minded and humble as ever, he said that he has everything for the award, and he has voted for his vote for the powerful singer Zhang Jingxuan, who also entered the top five.
But judging from the data analysis of social networks, the chances of light B completing the top stream and singing for the first time in 50 years are actually not small.
Maybe whether Yin Guang can win the final prize or not is no longer important. Because the slogan of this year's "Mighty Awards Ceremony" is the original intention of his insistence on singing so far:
The final results of the 2023 Hong Kong Pop Chart "My Favorite Male Singer" will be announced on the evening of January 1, 2024.
I don't know if it's Yin Guang's dream, or the memories of the past, or the prophecy of the upcoming future. At the end of the MV for "Dear Myself", Yoon Kwang re-entered the stage.
The curtain opened, the lights under the stage were bright, the seats were full, and the applause was thunderous.