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发表于 2006-11-17 09:35:38
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Protest music grows up〈Taipei Times 2006.10.27〉
Protest music grows up
By Ron Brownlow
STAFF REPORTER
Copied from 《Taipei Times》Friday, Oct 27, 2006, Page 14
Advertising Making protest music has never been a lucrative occupation in a small market like Taiwan. So when members of Golden Melody Award-winning band Labor Exchange (交工樂隊) parted ways three years ago, it was no surprise that singer Chen Guan-yu (陳冠宇) said he was through with the genre. "Our music is very different," the Hakka lyricist said when introducing his new project, the Hohak Band (好客樂隊). While Labor Exchange merged music with political messages, his new group would make "happy, easygoing music that shouldn't be taken too seriously."
Fortunately for music fans his former band mate, Lin Sheng-xiang (林生祥), whose second solo album Planting Trees (種樹) was released last week by Trees Music & Art (大大樹音樂圖像), still has plenty of protest left in him. Lin's 2004 release Getting Dark (臨暗), a brooding look at globalization through the eyes of an urban laborer, won him another Golden Melody Award and was considered by some critics to be the best Chinese-language album of that year. It sold 5,000 copies, a modest number, but when combined with frequent performance gigs it was enough to allow Lin to continue working as a full-time musician.
Golden Melody Award-winner Lin Sheng-xiang, center, Ken Ohtake, right, and Takashi Hirayasu get the groove on.
"Sheng-xiang is really quite an exception," said Kuo Li-hsin (郭力昕), a lecturer on popular culture at National Chengchi University's School of Communications. "He is probably the only musician in Taiwan who can make a living singing exclusively about so-called social issues."
Taiwan has seen its share of protests recently, but the days when a musician could command a large following as a protest singer are long gone. The repression under the KMT dictatorship, which in the late 1980s gave musicians like Chu Yue-hsin (朱約信), better known as Joy Topper (豬頭皮), a clear theme to target in their songs, has given way to a general sense of discontent under Taiwan's democratically elected government. Musicians still sing about social issues, but they lack a clear target to protest against. Even critically acclaimed groups like the Betel Nuts Brothers must supplement their income with day jobs.
"For many of those artists, their emotional attachment was always towards the Democratic Progressive Party. Most people who longed for political justice had that kind of tendency, including myself." Kuo said. "When the DPP was still the opposition party the songs they wrote mostly (criticized) the KMT regime or some absurd social or political phenomenon. But then I guess after Chen Shui-bian () got elected they couldn't find much to protest about. Their voices diminished then."
Lin leaned toward the DPP early in his career, as did his longstanding collaborator, poet Zhong Yong-feng (鍾永豐). Zhong, a classically trained musician who has been writing Lin's Hakka lyrics since the latter's days as the front man for Labor Exchange, now works for the DPP-led government of Chiayi County as its director of cultural affairs.
Both, however, seem to be of the view that no one in government can be trusted to protect members of the public. In track seven of Planting Trees, officials are likened to "shiny river eels, slippery and wriggling away." "When globalization comes," the song continues, "There's nothing much they can do."
"To do your best as an artist, you have to stay true to your base," Lin, 35, said in an interview last week. "I come from a farming and working-class background, so I have a better grip on this kind of music, not only the music but also its content. Farmers and laborers lead hard lives. I understand this because my parents are farmers. The power in my music comes from this tension."
But while Lin has remained true to his roots, his music has evolved. After releasing Getting Dark, he toured in Europe and the US and began working on his new album with acoustic guitarist Ken Ohtake, 31, of Tokyo and Okinawan musician Takashi Hirayasu, 54, whom he met in 2003 at the Migration Music Festival.
Planting Trees, which comes with extensive liner notes in Chinese, Japanese and English, is a tender reflection on the hardships faced by Taiwan's farmers and a tribute to their declining way of life in the face of reduced subsidies and trade liberalization.
From a musical point of view the album is far and away the best realized of Lin's work and marks a new stage in his evolution from protest singer to sophisticated musician. The sound is a unique blend of Lin's Hakka singing and folk-tinged acoustics with the minimalist sound of Hirayasu's sanhsin, a banjo-like instrument from Okinawa, and Hirayasu's breezy acoustic guitar.
Ohtake said recording was a draining process, especially with the album's ninth track Thanks to You, Young Man (後生打幫), in which Lin expresses his gratitude to Yang Ju-men (楊儒門), the so-called "rice bomber" who carried out a bombing campaign to protest Taiwan's accession to the World Trade Organization.
The song was written after Lin's mother saw a TV news story on the bomber and remarked that the man was helping people like her and his father. Lin gave the melody guitar a feminine sound, like his mother. "Ken understood the story," Lin said.
"He gave the guitar a lot of energy." Ohtake said of his approach: "Only angry is easy. Only sadness is easy," he said in English. "I wanted to try to express not only sadness, not only sentimental… . I wanted to express what I can not explain."
More important than helping Lin make what will most likely be seen as one of this year's most memorable albums, the two dedicated musicians helped Lin take his craft to the next level. Gone is the rough protest singer, and in his place is a sophisticated artist who exudes confidence on stage.
"Sheng-xiang learned a lot from those two about the attitude of being a professional musician as well as techniques," Kuo said. "(He) has never lacked commitment, but as a professional musician you need something else … that deep love of music and the desire to make it better, to sharpen your technique and always feel dissatisfied with your own music." |
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发表于 2006-10-8 23:02:59
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抢沙发
发表于 2006-10-15 19:36:38
