Cultivating youth
“From now on, you young people who are taking on responsibility for the land / From now on, as you seize opportunities for progress / Finding and cultivating an ideal life / I’ll be by your side to find sincere steadfastness / The times are changing but we are not afraid / Let us join hands to support each other / Connecting with the earth and living with courage / Cultivating youth with a firm and calm heart” —from the song “Cultivate Youth.”
In 2019, the tenth year since the founding of Youth Banana, the band released the album Cultivate Youth, recording their feelings about staying on in their small hometown.
Zack Guo describes the features of the three albums Youth Banana has released. “Bananas Won’t Make You Fat,” their first single and the title track of their first album, was an effort by young people to use music to help farmers promote sales of bananas. The second album, Community, focused on public issues, such as the realities of politics and societal conditions, with songs like “Public Hearing” and “A Crazy Place.” Their musical style at that time was angry with a punk edge, rocking harder than they did before. In their tenth year, with Cultivate Youth, their style has become gentler and more romantic, moving toward a country music sound.
As young people who have remained in their hometown, Youth Banana’s experiment is not yet completed. They have chosen to “cultivate youth” in their hometown because “no matter where you go there is no Utopia; the best place is the place where you live now,” says Lao Wang.
From meeting with us for a photo shoot early in the morning, then going into the studio for a seven-and-a-half-hour band practice session, and finally joining us again for an interview, all without a break, these young people show no sign of tiredness, in sharp contrast to the label of “frustrated by life” that society places on young people born after 1990. Each member of Youth Banana is optimistic. “Youth Banana cares very much about the existence of every individual. And the reason why we are so optimistic is because we all believe that people will grow and change for the better,” says Huang Tang Hsuan.
Are you worried about tomorrow? Zack Guo, who is already like a professional banana farmer, replies: “Tomorrow? Tomorrow I have to get up early, there’s work to do in the banana plantation!” Jiang Wang says: “Tomorrow? Probably the only thing we worry about is that our work for tomorrow isn’t finished yet!” (There is a great deal of preparatory work still to do for the Cishan Rock festival.) Their positive energy is off the charts. With rock as their spirit and bananas as their faith, the members of Youth Banana are working hard to remain in their hometown because this is “home,” this is “a good place.”
Youth Banana's album: Bananas Won’t Make You Fat. (courtesy of Youth Banana)
Youth Banana's album: Cultivating Youth. (courtesy of Youth Banana)
Youth Banana collected the results of five years of field research into a book introducing 27 specialist businesses found in Qishan.
The book that Youth Banana published on specialist businesses in Qishan includes a report on the Qianyuan Chinese herbal pharmacy. By making a record of small shops like this, the book helps preserve the steadily disappearing feeling of small-town life. (courtesy of the Zun-Huai Foundation)
This map of Qishan includes historically and culturally important locations, as well old shops and businesses. Youth Banana often organizes mini-tours of local communities, helping visitors get to know their little town. (art by Cai Zhengyu, courtesy of Youth Banana)
The 2020 Cishan Rock festival was accompanied by an exhibition on specialist businesses in Qishan. In the photo, Jiang Wang is helpfully serving as guide to an elderly gentleman.
The Qishan train station, completed in 1915, has been preserved thanks to community activism. Since its restoration it has been a landmark in the old quarter of Qishan.