Born in 1951, Yellowstone is rebellious, stubborn, and gritty, and part of his personality comes from a special environment of growth. His parents were both veterans of Wen Wei Po, and his father, Huang Liwen, participated in the reopening of Wen Wei Po in Hong Kong in 1947. In 1968, at the age of 17, Huangshi entered the bus company and worked as a preparatory dispatcher at the terminal station of the four fields. The writer Chen Cun described the rhythm of Huangshi's life in the article "We Are About Twenty Years Old": "He got up at 2:30 a.m., went to the company at 3:30 a.m. to prepare, and which line was missing the schedule, he was sent." If there is no shortage of people, you can go home in the morning. ”
Later, Yellowstone went to 71 Road as a conductor. At this time, his parents were assigned to the 9424 factory, an enclave of Shanghai in Meishan, Nanjing. His brother went to Heilongjiang, his grandmother died, and Huang Shi alone guarded the ground floor of a bungalow on Jiangsu Road, which was his home, and he did not feel lonely, because he had a salon, painting with many playmates, writing poetry, and secretly listening to classical music. Members of the salon include Komatsu Kojin (director Jiang Junchao, a pair of children of movie star Bai Yang), Xiao Hua (Hong Huang's cousin), Xiao Pu and Xiao Yang. Xiao Yang's name is Yang Yihua, and everyone is more familiar with his pen name Chen Cun. Xiao Yang called Huangshi "Brother Shi", and Huangshi called him "Little Brother".
Yellowstone was in his study
Later, Huangshi was transferred to the general union of the bus company. In Shanghai in the 1980s, when large state-owned enterprises were running newspapers and bus companies had one, Huangshi had served the journal for two years and was not happy because he often contradicted the leaders, such as the bus company's argument about whether female conductors could wear skirts was negative and conservative, but he wrote articles to top the bull.
Leaving the bus company, Huangshi took his backbone to the Shanghai Culture and Art News, which had a circulation of only tens of thousands of copies. The leaders of the newspaper admired him and smeared some "fandom" colors for the Shanghai Culture and Art News. Huang Shi remembers that the editorial board often started with a few people patting their heads and starting to act. For example, they all liked the Japanese movie star Kurihara Komaru, so they tried to give her a page in the newspaper. Kurihara small roll came to Shanghai, the daily newspaper will definitely seize the opportunity, the industry at that time called this short-frequency fast report called "deflation". How the weekly newspaper competes with the "deflated" addictive daily newspaper, Huangshi has two principles, the topic that has been "deflated" should be deep, and the topic that others dare not touch should have the courage to try. Rock 'n' roll was in the second category.
Huang shi has been a fan of classical music since childhood and is not very interested in popular music. rock? There was a lack of concept at the time. Huangshi's rock 'n' roll enlightenment should have come from the performances of overseas artists in Shanghai, such as Jean Michel Yar's electronic concert (1981) and Masashi Sada's concert (1981, 1985), and there are some very rock and roll moments. Feng Bingyou's "Friends of Stereo" was the first program to introduce rock and roll on Shanghai radio. The occasional michael jackson and John Lennon coming from the airwaves are less aggressive than the two books. After reading William Manchester's Glory and Dreams (The Commercial Press, 1978) and Maurice Dickstein's The Gate of the Garden of Eden (Shanghai Foreign Language Education Press, 1985), Yellowstone became fascinated by rock and roll. These two books were the rock 'n' roll initiation of many young people in the 1980s.
On November 2, 1986, Cui Jian participated in the closing performance of the Music Radio Grand Prix at the Shanghai Gymnasium. This is Cui Jian's debut in Shanghai, and the same stage includes Wang Hong, Chang Kuan, Sun Guoqing, Wang Di and other singers. The organizer, Shanghai People's Radio, with good intentions, invited a large number of foreign aid from Beijing, Nanjing and Shenzhen to try to reproduce the grand situation of the "100 Singers Concert" half a year ago. Cui Jian ranked seventh on the night's program list and at the end of the cast list, and the finale of the program was a hundred singers singing "Let the World Be Full of Love". This kind of star platter, it is reasonable to say that there should be many people chasing heads than Cui Jian, but Huang Shi insisted on interviewing him. Huang Shi wrote an article of more than 1,000 words for Cui Jian, which was subsequently published on the front page of Shanghai Culture and Art News (November 7, 1986, no. 84 in total), which should be the first interview for Cui Jian done by the Shanghai media. I went through all the mainstream Shanghai newspapers of that cycle in the Shanghai library, and they didn't miss the news of this performance, but there were very few mentions of Cui Jian's name, and it was the only one who wrote a special article for him.
In an article titled "He Sings Rock 'n' Roll Chinese Country Songs – Remembering Beijing Singer Cui Jian," Huang Shi teased with a wise brushstroke: "The audience of the general pop song concert is prone to extremes, they are easily attracted by the steaming or sweet style, they are easy to catch fire after receiving the infection, and then they sell up the ruby orange juice from the commissary." Slow response to Cui Jian's two self-written and self-acting songs: "Nothing" and "Not That I Don't Understand" is expected, and understanding Cui Jian's songs requires patience and time. ”
"Slow response" is a very polite evaluation. Two years later, also talking about Cui Jian in the "Shanghai Culture and Art News", Shi Xisheng recalled the scene at that time without mercy: "More than 10,000 spectators sitting at the Stadium casually cui Jian's "Not that I don't understand", and then the whole hall was booed..." ("Rock singer Cui Jian", July 1, 1988, 4th edition)
Born in 1964, Shi Xisheng, whose real name is Zhang Jun, graduated from the Fudan Journalism Department in 1986 and was assigned to the Information Department of Shanghai Television. Zhang Jun worked in this position for two years, and gradually realized that his personality was not suitable for journalism. He aspires to a free, open, creative platform. In 1988, he introduced himself to the head of the Ministry of Literature and Art, Wang Chunqi, and in July, he was transferred to the "Big World" program group that produced music and dance content, thus making many singers, but in terms of interest, rock music was more attractive to him. This kind of attraction, if you insist on finding a starting point, can go back to the graduation internship in Fuzhou Evening News in 1985, including the pen name of Shi Xisheng, which also came from this way.
In December 1984, Fuzhou Evening News took the lead in initiating the selection of the "Top Ten Golden Songs" in the mainland, and held the "Top Ten Golden Songs" concert in April of the following year. Zhang Jun and three classmates happened to be interning in the Fuzhou Evening News at that time, and when writing the manuscript, they were uniformly signed by Shi Xisheng (the consonant of interns). On the night of the performance, Qin Qi and Zhou Xiaohu (members of one of China's earliest rock bands, tumblers), two rock pioneers from Beijing, gave Zhang Jun a vague and vivid rock lesson. The guitar effect that is commonplace today was a magical pedal in Zhang Jun's eyes at that time. What exactly is rock 'n' roll? The Beijing teacher couldn't speak clearly.
Shi Xisheng was born in his studio
After completing his internship in Fuzhou, Shi Xi generated Zhang Jun's exclusive pen name. He, like Yellowstone, met the newly published Gate of Eden. Maurice Dixstein could never have imagined that his social science monographs would become the Nine Yin True Scriptures that a group of elites used to push open the door to rock and roll in China. Although rock and roll content occupies only one chapter, in the Chinese mainland of the 1980s, publications such as "The Gates of Eden" that deeply discussed rock and roll seemed to be a lonely product. Some sentences still ring deafening today, such as this passage, which once burned like a fire in front of Shi Xisheng: "Rock 'n' roll was the group religion of the sixties—not only music and language, but also the hub of dance, sex and drugs, all of which came together into a separate ritual of self-expression and spiritual travel." Sun Mengjin, a rock critic who aspired to become a poet, read "The Gate of Eden" and asked relatives in the United States to buy a tape of Bob Dylan. Shi Xisheng is a brother to send some classic albums from the United States.
At that time, Huangshi, because of his work relationship, often went in and out of the Shanghai Conservatory of Music and the Shanghai Opera House (and the Shanghai Culture and Art News worked in Lane 100, Changshu Road). Seeing more academic postures, he is increasingly dissatisfied with the stale concepts and originality of the Shanghai music scene. He realized that rock 'n' roll was clearly a rebellion against the existing musical order. At the same time, another fulcrum of rebellion exists in the art world, and abstract art and performance art represented by the "85 New Wave of Fine Arts" are impacting the Chinese mainland. In other words, the aesthetic movement that was growing more and more intense in the art world at that time was not a kind of rock 'n' roll. Therefore, he likes rock and roll and promotes rock and roll, and his alliance with Shi Xisheng on this promotion road has to start from a 10,000-word "big close-up" published by Shi Xisheng in the "Labor Daily".
At the end of 1987, Shi Xisheng went to Beijing at his own expense, and he later revealed the purpose of the trip in an article entitled "Chinese Rock" published in the Labor Daily on February 28, 1988: to find the early trajectory of Chinese rock. Shi Xisheng had the habit of writing a diary and collecting letters. His diary has a daily column, and on November 26, the column recorded this paragraph: "Arriving in Beijing (14 times), Huang Ping brother came to the train station to pick up, took the subway to Xinhua News Agency, turned around Xidan in the afternoon, and felt that the weather in Beijing was cold." Huang Ping was Shi Xisheng's college classmate and then a Xinhua reporter. On the 27th, Shi Xisheng found Zhou Xiaohu, who had dealt with Fuzhou two years ago, and through him finalized the interviews of Cui Jian, Hou Dejian, Su Yue, Huang Xiaomao and others.
Cui Jian was living in a tube building near the Lama Temple, an old-fashioned two-bedroom apartment with no living room. The interview was done in Cui Jian's bedroom, and in addition to the musical instruments, the most eye-catching thing in the room was the European and American rock posters on the wall. Cui Jian was very confused, how could there be interviews in the name of private people, or did they come from Shanghai in a big way. Mr. Shi claimed not to represent any media, and the business card he sent to Mr. Cui was printed with this pen name, with the words "Freelance Writer" on his head. Shi Xisheng obviously felt that Cui Jian's mood was not good, but the two chatted happily for nearly an hour, and part of the recording of this interview was later included in the article "Rock Singer Cui Jian" (Shanghai Culture and Art News, July 1, 1988, 4th edition). Shi Xisheng read excerpts from "The Gate of Eden" for Cui Jian. Cui Jian handed Shi Xisheng a self-transcribed lyric book. Shi Xisheng, with Cui Jian's consent, copied a complete song that Cui Jian had completed at the time and had not published in the future, "We Shouldn't Have Said So Much.". By "unpublished", I mean that we don't hear this song in Cui Jian's complete works.
Back in Shanghai, Shi Xisheng began to write "Chinese Rock", he was like an investigative journalist, using rock and roll to examine the changing Chinese society, which also led him to talk about rock and roll as the only China. After the article appeared in the newspaper, it triggered discussion in the circle. How could such an in-depth report be published in the "Labor Daily"? Who is Shi Xisheng? Huang Shi was very puzzled at that time, and was eager to get to know the author, so he asked someone to inquire. The two met and saw each other as usual. Shi Xisheng was deeply impressed by Huang Shi's "Shanghai Singers and Stars" (Shanghai Culture and Art News, December 12, 1986, 4th edition), and later made a music program on tv based on this special article. Speaking of "Chinese Rock", there is another tidbit that proves the deterrent power of this article at that time. It was a few years later, When Shi Xisheng's classmate married the little girl who arranged the lead for the "Labor Daily", the bride saw the author of "Chinese Rock" himself and remembered an interesting thing when she boarded: "Oh yo, your article is not good, which makes the word 'rock' missing in our typography room." "In order to figure out the pain of the typestreaker when he was making a version of 'Chinese Rock', I tried to use primitive means to calculate the frequency of the word "rock" in the article. By the time I counted sixty, there were two-thirds of the entire article left.
There is another problem with Shi Xisheng's article, it is too long. At that time, only "Shanghai Culture and Art News", "Labor Daily" and "Shanghai Television" had that belly. And these three newspapers and periodicals, according to today's way of speaking, actually have no traffic. Where there is traffic, he also wrote, in the "Xinmin Evening News" for Shen Cinong's page, in the "Liberation Daily" for Wu Weizhong's page, makeup himself into entertainment, write some dried tofu articles. The attitude of rock 'n' roll in those places with traffic is not as good as not seeing, and it is not so large a layout. In Shanghai in the 1980s, not only were audiences unprepared to embrace rock 'n' roll, but so was the media.
Shi Xisheng once tried to write a monograph on rock and roll, "In the Name of Rock", but the manuscript was abandoned halfway and was not finished
Huangshi and Shi Xisheng befriended, which was equivalent to opening up the two rock strongholds in Shanghai at that time. Shi Xisheng lived in the water circuit of Hongkou District at that time, and was closely related to the brothers Li Suyou and Tao Xin Tao Jun. Li Suyou, the son of an officer of the "Second Army", with a quarter of Polish ancestry, was the director of the audio-visual data room of the Shanghai Conservatory of Music at the time, and fell in love with rock music because of Cui Jian. Tao Xin works at the Shanghai Conservatory of Music, studying pop music; Tao Jun is Shi Xisheng's TV colleague who lives on Liangcheng Road near the water circuit. Huangshi became a new friend of the Hongkou Salon, and once heard them talk about starting a music magazine. The project was led by Li Suyou and negotiated with a publishing house in Shanghai, called Pop Music. They jointly contributed, and later made the inaugural issue well, and it was not expected that the model of replacing the journal with a book was suddenly rejected. Li Suyou hopes that Huangshi can help link the magazine to the Shanghai Culture and Art News. Huangshi intended to succeed, but the newspaper's leaders refused to make a decision.
Located at No. 10, Lane 100, Changshu Road, the third floor is home to the editorial office of Shanghai Culture and Art News, and there is an office that is huangshi's rock stronghold. Shi Xisheng often went to Huangshi with newly written articles, and Ye Fufu and Zhou Zifeng (lead guitarist) of "Sun Companion" would also play. At that time, the newspaper subscribed to some music magazines in Hong Kong and Taiwan, and some magazines were accompanied by posters, and Huangshi posted rock stars on the wall of the newsroom, and some people joked that this was the most rock wall in the Shanghai media circle. Huang Shi said that only ideas are exported here, not specific practices, but in fact, he has been the band's military master since the beginning of the "Sun Companion" reorganization.
Promoting rock music is certainly not enough, and the effect of doing the show is better, and Yellowstone knows this very well. But performing in Shanghai, where is the band?
Shanghai in 1986 did not yet have a veritable rock band. There are many people who play guitar, mainly acoustic guitars. There are many people who hold guitars and sing, mainly cover songs. In the autumn of that year, Huang Shi listened to his colleague Yang Jianguo talk about someone participating in the radio 'Weekly Radio Concert' and singing "Three Disciplines and Eight Notes" on a guitar. Huang Shi heard that this person was working in the Tianlin Housing Management Office, so he sent a letter, the recipient wrote Ye Fufu, and later when they met, they learned that Ye Fufu's real name was Dai Lixin, but the letter was actually sent.
The pen name Ye Fufu was given by Zhang Guangtian. Zhang Guangtian had not yet developed north to become famous in the world, was an underground poet in Shanghai, and formed a band called "Sun Companions" with Ye Fufu. Zhang Guangtian's pen name is Yin Xiaomei. Taking a pen name can be a hedge, but a pen name is far less secure than anonymity. When Huang Shi met Ye Fufu, Zhang Guangtian was in prison at Dafeng Farm. The "Companion sun" had two members, which were disbanded in disguise.
"Regarding the formation of the band," Zhang Guangtian explicitly wrote in his autobiography My Proletarian Life, "I was inspired by Alan Ginsburg. It was November 1984, when Ginsburg was a guest at Fudan University, and Zhang Guangtian followed his German girlfriend to a lecture by the Beat poet. Zhang Guangtian was inspired by the live recitation of poetry and the singing of the accordion. "I formed a creative group with Ye Fufu, a student studying architecture, named 'Goodbye', and later renamed 'Sun Companion Modern Urban Folk Singing Group'. But it was chaotic, suddenly singing, rocking, and folk. ”
If Zhang Guangtian is to be taken as the case, then 1985 is the starting point of Shanghai rock music, because "Sun Companion" was formed in that year. The question of whether Sun Companion was the first rock band in Shanghai was set aside.
After Huang Shi and Ye Fufu became acquainted, the two often corresponded. Ye Weifu remembers that in April 1987, he received a letter from Huang Shi, which mentioned that Wang Guoping, the director of Shanghai Television Station, was preparing to shoot the "May Fourth" feature film "Ode to Youth", which lacked original songs. Huang Shi asked Ye Fufu if he wanted to try it. Two weeks later, Ye fu handed over six songs. Wang Guoping found some middle school singers from the art school to sing, and Ye Fufu invited his friend Zhou Zifeng to play the electric guitar. In the office of the TV station, this team forms the second generation of the "Sun Companion". It can be said that it was Huangshi's letter that catalyzed the reorganization of the "Sun Companion". Huang Shi also introduced his colleague Cao Xiaolei in the Shanghai Culture and Art News to Ye Fufu. "Sun Companion" later had a famous song "Brahms" that cao Xiaolei filled in the lyrics.
Shi Xisheng recently found an old letter from Huangshi while flipping through his diary for me, which read: "Send two tickets for the performance of "Sun Companion" and look forward to coming." Please note the date. The date on the letter was June 2, the date of the postmark was June 8, 1988, and the letter also contained two ticket stubs, which were obviously deliberately collected by Shi Xisheng and his friends after watching the performance. According to the information printed on the front and back of the ticket stub, "Sun Companion" performed a special performance at 19:30 on June 9, 1988 at East China Normal University, and the ticket price was octagonal.
Considering that none of The first generation of rock bands in Shanghai had official recordings, and there was no evidence for their claims, the letter with the ticket stub was an important piece of physical evidence, from which to peek into the role of Huang Shi's agent.
In Zhou Zifeng's memory, the "Sun Companion" from April 1987 reorganization, to July 1988 suspension of activities, in the middle of several rounds of campus tour, the external work is almost all Huang shi in Zhang Luo, because it is voluntary labor, not counting agents, but the actual role is only a lot more. He remembers that the first performance was at Jiaotong University, and the two single-piece effects he used were borrowed by Huangshi from the Shanghai Dance Theatre. Huangshi's colleague Cao Xiaolei, because of his experience in doing dramas, will come to the scene to help design the lighting. Yellowstone sometimes tuned the tune and printed lyrics for distribution on the spot. He even helped the band customize a number of advertising shirts to expand their impact, which currently has a surviving one with three lines printed on the front: "Sun Companion"/Sun Fellow/Modern City Folk Singing Group.
Is "Companion sun" a folk song or rock' roll? Cao Xiaolei left evidence in the October 16, 1987 Shanghai Culture and Art News, and the post-mortem report he wrote for "Sun Companion" included this passage: "It suddenly became a song, passing through the strong sound of electric guitars and jazz drums... The song was conceived in the office to perform at the Shanghai Jiaotong University Auditorium in just a few days, and it heralded the immense energy of a young rock and roll singing group. ”
What about those songs? Huang Shi often invited media friends to listen to the scene, and he called this behavior booing. After a series of ups and downs, "Sun Companion" went to the Massif Hall to perform a platter and went on the radio once, which was a highlight moment. The band's insistence on the original fresh wind has touched college students, but it can't make Shanghai's record companies and mainstream media raise their eyelids. In July 1988, Ye Fufu was hospitalized for tuberculosis, and the "sun companion" without the main brain could not be pushed.
But Yellowstone still craved to burn a fire with rock 'n' roll. A big project he had previously planned finally reached some sort of consensus in mid-July 1988. I saw two pages of minutes in Shi Xisheng's diary, with "7.14" written in the upper left corner, which should refer to July 14, and "Chinese Rock Festival" on the right. At that time, they wanted to hold a rock music festival in Shanghai, which included the "Big World" program group of Shanghai Television Station, Wen Wei Po, Jiefang Daily, Xinmin Evening News, Shanghai Culture and Art News and "Labor Daily And Star Journal", and proposed to invite nearly 20 groups of artists, including Cui Jian and ADO Band, Hou Dejian and Cheng Lin, New Air Singing Group, Liu Huan, Daniel Zhang, Wang Di, Sun Guoqing, Tian Zhen, Qin Yong, Zhang Ling and "Mayday" (this Mayday is not the Taiwanese band Mayday after this Mayday), and the lineup is extremely strong. Another detail that better supports the professional vision of the planners, the tuner they intend to hire is Jin Shaogang, a gold medal sound engineer who later became famous by The Voice of China.
Huang shi remembers that he opened an invitation letter before going north, and the organizers stamped it. At that time, Shi Xisheng also wanted to go to Beijing for the second Shanghai TV Festival, so the two flew to the capital. Flipping through Shi Xisheng's diary, flying to Beijing and visiting Daniel Zhang all occurred on August 12. Daniel Zhang was Mao Amin's agent at the time, and Mao Amin was an invited guest at the TV festival. Shi Xisheng finished talking about business and did an interview with his hand. He and Huang Shi stayed in the Beijing office of Wen Wei Po on a business trip, visited rock celebrities for eight days, and later published three interviews for Shanghai Culture and Art News. Shi Xisheng wrote Daniel Zhang, and Huang Shi wrote Hou Dejian and Cui Jian.
The matter of visiting Cui Jian was full of twists and turns, and when he was in Shanghai earlier, the conductor Cao Ding had already helped to say hello. But when I arrived in Beijing, I never saw Cui Jian. He was busy recording the album No More Cover-up (later renamed Rock on the New Long March Road). Huang Shi called and answered either Cui Jian's mother or his brother, and it wasn't until August 15 that they made an appointment to meet the next day. The content of the talks can be found in Huang Shi's article "Cui Jian is no longer 'nothing' (September 30, 1988, 2nd edition)," which reveals the outcome of the trip: "He said that he was not satisfied with some of the things he was recording, and he had to tear it down and start over, so he had no intention of accepting any invitation to perform until the tape was completed, 'no desire and physical strength'. ”
Zhou Xiaohu's letter to Shi Xisheng contained two negatives of Cui Jian's performance
According to Huang Shi, Cui Jian had promised to perform in Shanghai after recording the album, including details such as appearance fees and on-site equipment. Cui Jian also gave Huangshi a piece of advice: if the sound equipment on the scene is not too hard, you can hang some cloth strips on the stage to start the effect of sound absorption. These details, Shi Xisheng is now completely unable to remember, if it were not for the diary, he would not even forget about the performance. To be sure, Yellowstone's plan to use the rock festival to set a fire on fire ultimately failed. The approval of the performance has been grinding in Shanghai for a long time, and all the efforts will not be followed.
In July 1989, Ye Made a comeback, and the "Sun Companion", which had been silent for a whole year, deliberately restarted. At this time, Zhang Guangtian had been released from prison, but he and Ye Fufu had differences in musical concepts and life values. Zhang Guangtian wrote in his autobiography: "If I leave the band and it is good for others, then I am finished." With reservations, I went down a different path, and I have not said a word about the reasons. In the winter of 1989, Ye Yifu took the new lineup of "Sun Companions" to perform a special performance at Shanghai University of Finance and Economics. Zhang Guangtian gave a concert at Shanghai Jiao Tong University, then went north to start a life of singing as a bard. The winter of that year was particularly cold, and some of the depressed people chose to go abroad, and some of them waited for it to change.
Watching people around him continue to run away, Huangshi did not agree at first. He could still stay in Shanghai, and he chose to remain silent.
In early 1990, Shi Xisheng took the lead in ending hibernation and published his first article in the Shanghai Culture and Art News in nearly half a year. He talked about the impact of the "New Air" band from Guangzhou at the beginning of the month on the Shanghai music scene. The night before the performance, there were many Shanghai singers sitting in the Huangpu Gymnasium, and a few students from the Conservatory of Music also came to touch the electronic synthesizer. All the 'playing rock' buddies present were envious of these Guangzi who made the sound effects earth-shattering..."
Anxiety spreads in the circle: "When the north is blowing the 'northwest wind' and the south is blowing 'new air', what is Shanghai doing?" To make matters worse, Beijing held another "90 Modern Concert" in February. Shanghai, the birthplace of Chinese pop music, suddenly realized that it was like Cui Jian curled up his pants and sang, "Nothing.".
Huang Shi endured for several months, and finally became a nanny for Shanghai Rock in his own position. In a newspaper article of April 20, 1990, he wrote: "Although the Shanghai music scene always wants to follow Beijing, it is best to learn from it, but the friends in Beijing who are engaged in rock and roll have caused fever and sweat, and Shanghai can't even sneeze." ”
After self-deprecation, he introduced the recent situation of the three Shanghai bands "Black Bat", "Blue Forest" and "Sun Companion", mentioned the "Bachelor" band, and then began to think about how Shanghai's rock music would eventually be accepted by the Shanghai music scene. His answer was "the need to break through further in its own situation." This is actually similar to whether it was said or not, but it was difficult to read in the Media in Shanghai at that time that someone was worried about these things, and even "Audiovisual World" was avoiding it. However, "Audiovisual World" will hold regular salon activities to invite media friends from all sides to talk freely, and once, the salon saw the limping Shanghai music scene. Many people suddenly feel a sense of mission. At this time, Li Suyou was already laying out a key project for the Shanghai music scene, a gymnasium-level rock performance. He later set up an organizing committee, referring to the ordering that was later printed on the performance program list, Shi Xisheng was the third person in the organizing committee, and Huang Shi was the fourth person. Huang Shi first informed Ye Fufu about the performance, this time, there were many things that needed him to open up and connect, this time, the rock bands all over Shanghai huddled together to warm up, eager to break through an event.
In the May 11 issue of the Shanghai Culture and Art Newspaper, Shi Xisheng wrote: "When it comes to Shanghai, all that can be talked about for a while is that seven free group singing groups have begun to engage in activities to promote exchanges. "It can be seen that the preparatory action has begun in early May.
Li Suyou remembers that the name "new development" actually came from Pudong, which was often used by the media when reporting on Pudong development. Huang Shi also pinned another meaning on it: "I hope to develop the new feeling of the newcomer New Song and New Band born and raised in Shanghai." ”
On the afternoon of June 2, "New Development" held a rehearsal at the Dahua Song and Dance Hall on the eighth floor of Yunfeng Sleepless City, with nine bands participating. The rehearsal left a batch of photos, from which we can see a red cloth strip hanging above the stage with two lines, the first line is "'New Development' Shanghai Modern Singing Group First Exhibition" and the second line is "Audiovisual World Salon". It turned out that this was just a trial match.
Li Suyou consulted with Huang Shi and Shi Xisheng and selected six bands: "Special Mix", "Key Project" (formerly "Sun Companion"), "2/4", "Electric Iron", "Women", and "Bachelor". "Tai Chi Guang" did not participate in the selection, but entered the final cast list. "Tai Chi Light" and "Special Mix" were formed for this performance. "Bachelor" finally survived an original work for this performance. "Sun Companion" even changed its name for this show. The equipment for the official performance, Li Suyou plans to borrow it through Jin Wulin to ask his friends in Shenyang, then transport it to Shanghai by green-skinned train, and then transfer the truck to the railway station to pick it up.
From these patchwork details, from the scene effect, Yellowstone smelled the smell of temporary pulling hills. However, he and Shi Xisheng still advocated on the battlefield: "These singing groups have reached a certain level and have become a force to be reckoned with in the music world." Intriguingly, this live report moved some hands and feet on the author's signature, Huang Shi used the pen name "Yu Qian", and Shi Xisheng signed the real name "Zhang Jun". Another detail worth noting is that the word "rock" does not appear in this hundreds of words article, not a single rock.
Rock music always has a dew filling, Li Suyou remembered, when the big curtain of the performance was opened, the roar was loud, and the security comrades of the venue could not stand up, and rushed to his side and muttered: "Hey, Teacher Li, Nong is engaged in rock and roll." Li Suyou wanted to laugh, a little nervous. Fortunately, the three performances of "New Development - '90 Shanghai Modern Singing Group Premiere" at the Huangpu Gymnasium (July 29, 14:30, 19:30, July 30, 19:30) were approved, and the security was gone.
Looking at the list of "newly developed" programs, the host of the performance is Liu Qing, a professor at East China Normal University who served as a mentor in "Strange Story" this year, and the lighting execution is Xiao Lihe (pseudonym Xiao Duck, Cao Xiaolei), who later designed the lighting for the opening ceremony of the Beijing Olympic Games. Of course, these highlights have nothing to do with rock and roll, and this sense of dislocation and frustration is also foggy in the participation list: "2/4" Band Li Quan and An Dong are popular on pop music; Ah Yan ("Bachelor" Band) is home to radio; Xu Fengxia ("Women's" Band) is a successful road across folk music and free jazz after traveling in Germany in 1991. It seems that the characters who have participated in the "new development", most of their future successes have occurred outside the field of rock and roll,
The "90 Modern Concert" was an unprecedented success in Beijing, while Shanghai did a similar feat a few months later, and the media circle was quiet. The audience's response was also not enthusiastic enough. Li Suyou pulled Wang Anyi to see, and the poet Sun Xiaogang was also at the scene. More than thirty years later, when he recalled that night, Sun Xiaogang said: "Oh yo, it is completely underground performance, I don't know what these people are singing on the stage, and they can't hear a single lyric." Then he added that Li Quan's cover was OK, because the song "Right Here Waiting" was very popular at the time, and the audience liked it. Sun Mengjin watched the attendance rate of about 60%, and he also mentioned that Li Quan's cover of Richard Marx received a lot of applause. These applause may be a little harsh for those in front of and behind the stage, and perhaps most of the audience in the audience at that time mistakenly watched an immature art film with the mentality of watching entertainment films. Look for some "90 Modern Concert" audio and video materials, reminiscence articles, and see how the Beijing audience reacted, you know that "Shanghai has no soil for rock music" The words "Shanghai did not have rock music" made sense in 1990.
Huangshi said: "'New development' looks like a milestone now, it seems to be remarkable, but at the time, inside and outside the circle did not feel so remarkable - naïve, immature." He was not accustomed to the "special mix" band led by Jin Wulin, and he did not like the formula in which they frantically threw long hair on stage. "Obviously it is a special scene of Shanghai rock, why should we let such a northeast band finale." So he didn't finish the second game and withdrew. Li Suyou chose to support the "special mix". He arranged the Northeast Band finale for two reasons. First, "Special Mix" is the most mature of the seven participating bands, and the rock fan is the most positive; second, the sound equipment for the performance is provided by Jin Wulin and his friends.
How did the Shanghai band perform? Shi Xisheng wrote in his diary on July 29: "The performance was still good in the evening, and unexpectedly, Mr. Ni came to Shanghai to see the performance. Mr. Ni, Li Suyou's Friend from Taiwan, brought a small video camera. Another identity of this Mr. Ni is related to Rolling Stone Records, and mainland music fans later called him "Ni Sang", or directly called him by his name - Ni Chonghua. Ni Chonghua's "Zhenyan Society" signed Lin Qiang, Wu Bai, and Zhang Zhenyue. During the "new development", Ni Chonghua took some backstage images, and after returning to Taiwan, Qi Qin was frightened: "Why do Shanghainese play rock and roll and still read staves?" "I asked Zhou Zifeng for the details of the stave, and he was not impressed.
On August 1, Ni Chonghua appeared again in Shi Xisheng's diary: "Mr. Ni is a guest. "It is impossible to confirm whether Li Quan attended the meeting, but history tells us that Li Quan later signed a contract with Magic Rock Records and was introduced by Mr. Ni. Perhaps inheriting this knowledge, Ni Chonghua published a book in 2013, and Li Quan also contributed an article, some of which confirmed Zhou Zifeng's memories.
Zhou Zifeng remembers that before the official performance of "New Development", An Dong and Li Quan had a dispute, and Li Quan was forced to take the stage alone. Another person present recalled that An Dong was a bit stage-frightened at the time, and as a result, Li Quan's cover song and the performance of the "Bachelor" band were tied for the two most rock-free moments in the whole scene. Li Quan explained it in Ni Chonghua's book: "He felt that our electronic music would be drowned in a rock and roll sound, insisted on refusing to go on stage, and sure enough, the day of the performance disappeared, the previously prepared tracks could not be used, I could only go on stage to perform piano solo and solo singing, which was really uncomfortable." ”
In the summer of 1990, Shanghai rock in the 1980s went through a college entrance exam like many students. "Failed." Shi Xisheng did not hesitate to say this, including his own promotion work throughout the 1980s, which became a cry in silent films.
"There are too few people who are really creative and talented in Shanghai." This is how Yellowstone dissects the problem. However, he didn't have the heart to think about it anymore. In the autumn of 1990, he had the idea of going abroad. After the visa was secured, he quit his job at shanghai culture and art newspaper. Before flying to Canada, Huangshi did not specifically ask Shi Xisheng to resign, but only made a phone call to hand over the work, telling him who he could submit if he still wanted to write a manuscript. Shi Xisheng responded, but did not do anything more for rock and roll later. He continued to contribute to many newspapers and magazines, and he regarded himself as an entertainer after that.
Shanghai Culture and Art News was renamed Shanghai Culture News in October 1993, ceased publication in June 2000, and resurrected four months later, giving birth to the well-known Shanghai One Week in the 2000s. That year, Shi Xisheng saw Ni Chonghua again. Mr. Ni gave him a "Musician Questionnaire." Corresponding to Beijing's "China Fire", Rolling Stone Records intends to do a "China Sea" program in Shanghai, and Li Quan is the singer to be signed in the plan.
It was also that year that Huangshi returned to Shanghai very quietly, not returning to the media industry, but instead of advertising and printing, and later working as an art director at a public company that built a mansion. Shi Xisheng also devoted himself to the real estate industry, not only a pioneer in promoting rock and roll, but also finally made a performance worthy of being a pioneer in the investment of old bungalows. He occasionally writes a little article, published on his public account "West of the Bund", hooking the legend of Shanghai's old bungalows.
In June 2018, Shi Xisheng's tweet visited the old building at No. 10, Lane 100, Changshu Road, mentioning that Huang Shi of Shanghai Culture and Art News used to work on the third floor and had to go once or twice a week to submit articles or pick up newspapers. The tweet drew comments from colleagues in Yellowstone. In this way, two old rockers who had not met in twenty-eight years regained contact, and a few days later in a café, that rock'n' roll summer night in 1990 returned.
Huang Shi has always focused on painting, and in recent years has mainly created oil paintings with Shanghai themes. In his studio and study, asking him to reminisce about the rock and roll of the 80s was actually quite contradictory, and rock and roll music left almost no trace in that room. In Shi Xisheng's rather luxurious studio, the feeling of discord is even stronger. When the interview was over, Huang Shi pointed to his recent group of paintings and asked me if I noticed any commonalities? In each of his paintings, there is a great man hidden. I thought about the album cover of the British band Japan, the spoof of the new pants band, what Huangshi said earlier, that in China in the 1980s, rock and roll found another rebellious fulcrum in painting, and I remembered the lyrics of the never-published Cui Jian, "We Shouldn't Have Said So Much":
Break up and we each go out of our way
Come together and talk endlessly
The front heart is said to be on the back
Spit stars turn into rivers
The heart is as broad as the sky
Hands and feet shrink day by day
There is nothing under the tongue that is not understood
But it's a lot of excitement to start with
The eyes burned with a fiery fire like the sun
When we broke up, we cried and cried lonely and lonely
The fire burned with fanaticism
In loneliness, there are no brave actions
We don't say that much
We should have lived authentically
As we spoke, we came to the dinner table
Eating and eating is even more joyful
Life is said to be colorful
Time is said to flow like water
You and I are the only ones in the world who are not stupid
Although you are still you or me
Although you have an undead wife
Although I didn't even dare to touch the girl's hand