Over the weekend, I was reading about the comeback of the Hong Kong duo called Tat Ming Pair. It was during the Eighties that they made their debut and made a name for themselves as the city’s only really progressive synth-based acts with a tablespoon full of camp and tongue-in-cheek humour. Comprising singer Anthony Wong Yiu-ming and songwriter Tats Lau, it was as close to Pet Shop Boys that Chinese popular music ever got. Having only “got” Pet Shop Boys much later on in life, I didn’t know what to make of Tat Ming Pair. All I knew was that the duo was mercifully different to the ponderous ballads churned out by “Canto-Pop Heavenly Kings” and which were being heavily promoted on what was and still is a ad state of affairs when it comes to Radio airplay in Hong Kong. Tat Ming Pair became the darlings of Hong Kong’s “Indie” music scene as they, at least, dared to be a tad more adventurous and showed Chinese audiences that there actually were other types of music.
While reading about Tat Ming Pair’s new record and upcoming concerts, it somehow dove-tailed into another comeback: The Cranberries. As anyone who knows anything about Chinese music and Chinese artists will tell you, Chinese diva Faye Wong modeled herself, her songs and her vocals on Dolores O’Riordan and has, somehow, now made it her “own” and, at the same time, taken her music and image further. It sounds almost absurd to say but it’s true: Faye Wong commands far more attention- and money for a concert- than The Cranberries- and who still have a very strong and loyal following in the region. As for Faye Wong, 40, let’s just say that I adore the woman for everything she has been able to accomplish and for simply being Faye- absolutely gorgeous Faye Wong.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=IZiyMI8z440
The music of the Cranberries, meanwhile, somehow, had the right chords and song “structures” to appeal to Asian- or to be more precise- Chinese ears.I’m sure, Faye heard this just as she did with the music of Cocteau Twins and the more melodic works of Bjork and “borrowed” from them as she fine-tuned her image from plain and homely “Shirley Wong” before metamorphosing to become Faye Wong.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=HJuLg3AD8Rg
All this leads me to today and creating and making music and how so many are looking at “the China market.” This “China market” is or can be important as a touring market to many International acts- but few understand what is needed and how to pull it off. For example, in a classic and ironic example of the tail wagging the dog, The Cranberries need Faye Wong to break into the China market more than she needs them. Funny- in another ironic way- to think that Faye once opened for The Cranberries. And even if the band has no interest in the China market- forget about making money selling music- it’s all about concerts- the idea of the band and China’s only bona fide diva coming together makes for an interesting concept. Faye meets Dolores in China.
Same when it comes to Tat Ming Pair: Imagine, Pet Shop Boys, or Depeche Mode, or the brilliant Bon Iver- well, you get the gist- having a series of concerts in cities in China- but opening for Tat Ming Pair- and with East and West coming together to bring the concerts to an end. This, at least, to me, is what the music industry needs. Though East/West collaborations have happened before, these took place in a very half-arsed manner, no one at “head office” of a music company gave a fuck about them and the end product- and some were extremely good- died a death. Others were, of course, a waste of time and done just to keep “Asia” or the Chairman in charge of the Asian market happy as he needed to keep one of his major local artist’s happy. Taiwan’s Jolin Tse bitching about wanting to record a duet with Kylie song and me having to pull this off was one bad example of these “East/West” collaborations and where the Taiwanese hobbit decided to sing in English and turn it all into cheap karaoke. Silly twat!
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=TqE10_A-oa4
Again, I come back to the tail wagging the now old dog, how this “China music market” which many have talked about for decades but have never ever “got it” can finally take a giant baby step to be what many promised but failed to deliver and, at the same time, create something unique.
This, at least to me, is the type of project or idea which would, I think, interest a Producer like Bob Ezrin, musicians like Brian Eno, Bowie, Peter Gabriel, Dave Stewart, Damon Albarn, Bjork, Todd Rundgren and so many other real innovators and who are willing to take a punt and change the rules and move or remove the goalposts and the barriers.
The music industry has come to point where it needs to take as many chances as possible and have people from around the world creating some type of rainbow coalition of music. Yes, Dave Stewart tried that recently with himself, Mick Jagger, Damon Marley, Joss Stone and India’s AR Rahman- but this “super group” didn’t get very far, did it? Videos and a few tracks doesn’t get anyone far today. One needs a far bigger stage to pull off today’s answer to “World Music” and there is no bigger stage for ‘live’ music than China. And let’s not lose sight of the fact that there are “concerts” and there are concerts an the entire concept of a concert MUST change and become far more inter-active.
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