Yet, even during the northwest wave, Taiwan pop music was never completely pushed off the stage. And it was helped along by political developments: In 1987 the ROC government began to allow people from Taiwan to visit mainland China, and mainland authorities formally approved the import of recorded music from abroad. Thereafter, artists like Julie Su and Chyi Chin had a considerable impact.
Su's voice had been known in mainland China since the film Getting on the Wrong Bus was shown there in 1984. Her style first caught on with young students of relatively progressive thinking, and gradually became more widely accepted, growing in popularity over the years. Most importantly, her robust, from-the-gut singing toppled the genteel and fragile Teresa Teng mode that had ruled the roost for so long. Says Jin Zaojun, "Many women singers with potential, such as Na Ying, Hang Tianqi, and Fan Linlin, took Su as their model."
As for Chyi Chin, after his 1988 "Wolf" trilogy entered mainland China, in the space of only a few months he was a phenom worthy of the aphorism "a single spark can start a prairie fire," becoming just as big as Teresa Teng had been. Ding Ning, chief writer for China Broadway, says: "Influential singers from Taiwan can be divided into three generations. First came Teresa Teng, along with Liu Wen-cheng, then Luo Ta-you, then Chyi Chin." She says that the generation of people now between 23 and 28 was most effected by Chyi Chin. "The impact he had on us was not merely the pleasure of listening to music, but a whole worldview." Lyrics like "I wander alone in the wind," expressing at once alienation and self-confidence, appealed to people like the young Ding, who deliberately tried to be just like Chyi Chin.
Wang Xiaofeng says that Chyi Chin's rebelliousness was different from the rebelliousness of Luo Ta-you, which was built on history. Chyi Chin had a very individual style, and gave young people the courage to be themselves and therefore got a great response. Ding Ning clearly remembers the first time Chyi Chin had a concert in Beijing: "That winter it was fashionable to wear long white scarves. When the concert ended, and Chyi Chin left the venue, a whole group of kids had dangled their scarves down just hoping that Chyi Chin would touch them."
Idols and niche markets
By 1989, the pop music market seemed to be entering a new phase. One factor was that karaoke was growing rapidly in the mainland. By the end of that year there were more than 70 karaoke bars in Beijing alone. Cities like Beijing, Shanghai, and Guangzhou had reached a certain level of development, and there was tremendous demand for this recreational activity that let people show off their individual personalities and fashion-consciousness.
Another factor was the Tiananmen Incident. After June 4, 1989, disillusioned musicians in the PRC felt that they were powerless to change anything, and local creative output dried up. Hong Kong and Taiwan pop music moved into the vacuum, a vacuum made all the larger by the demand for karaoke music.
"Another critical link was reform in the media," notes Jin. Beginning in 1989, TV stations, newspapers, and magazines around the country began responding to the market by producing things like all-music stations. New entertainment and lifestyle features in the media created a huge appetite for pop music and related news. In this way the development of the mass media added fuel to the spreading flames of Taiwan pop.
"At that time, whatever was hot in Taiwan or Hong Kong would automatically become hot in the PRC." While Chyi Chin remained popular, other types of singers got into the mainland market after the official liberalization of recorded music imports. Albums were selling in the hundreds of thousands or even surpassing one million, and concerts in big cities couldn't drum up any interest unless they featured performers from Taiwan or Hong Kong.
Wang Xiaofeng opines: "The era of chasing stars has arrived." From here on, it is less and less likely that any one singer could have the profound impact of a Luo Ta-you, a Julie Su, or a Chyi Chin.
In fact, these changing tastes of the audience reflect changes in the larger environment. "That was an era of dramatic economic reform. If we can say that in the first five years of the 1980s idealism was the main trend, then in the first five years of the 1990s it was pragmatism," says Jin Zhaojun. Following Deng Xiaoping's 1992 "Southern Tour" and his comments on the direction of the economy, reform was accelerated in mainland China. In recent years, there has been dramatic social change: Personal computers and private cars have become relatively common, real-estate prices have skyrocketed, the medical system is switching over to an insurance system... and these changes are affecting people's value systems.
Xie Xizhang avers, "In the 1990s, the standard for what is good entertainment is that it is not too serious and that it is about pretty-much everyday stuff."
In this kind of era, "Taiwan's songs, which are more carefully written in comparison to the vacuous lyrics of mainland songs, naturally have appeal," says Jin Zhaojun. He points for example to the song "In Love with a Person Who Doesn't Come Home," which has struck a chord with Beijing policemen and their wives. Jonathan Lee's "In Fact 17-Year-Old Girls Are Really Very... You Know" has found its place in the fashionable self-involved culture of Beijing teens.
A couple of years ago, Taiwan performer Jen Hsien-chi found widespread popularity in mainland China with the song "Too Soft Heart." It is generally thought the success was not connected so much to the music as to the fact that the song describes the rapid social change in the mainland these past few years, and expresses the frustrations that people have built up in their hearts.
Taiwan songs are particularly welcome to mainland listeners, even in comparison to Hong Kong songs, because, in the eyes of mainland Chinese, Taiwan has not recently been under the influence of a colonial culture, and therefore shares the same foundations as mainland culture, "so communication is especially easy."
"Beginning in the late '90s, most of the jargon in youth society has either come from satirical anti-traditionalist pulp fiction or else from Taiwan popular music," says Jin Zhaojun. He says that there has even been an undeclared competition between the Beijing Youth Daily and the Beijing Evening News to see who can make more clever use of such youth jargon. Traditional culture critics may disparage such practices, but this has not stopped them.
Learning market manipulation
Mainland music makers are now learning how to respond to the market. "Music companies are beginning to explore more orthodox methods to produce albums," says Wang Xiaofeng. In the past mainland record companies either pirated music or made a few "greatest hits albums" gathering together a number of different singers. But, beginning in 1993, companies began to sign singers to contracts, and to establish planning, marketing, production, and star-manager systems to systematically commodify artists.
Ai Jing, whose album My 1997 brought together many first-rate musicians in Beijing, became an overnight success as a "female Cui Jian" with the help of "carpet bombing" advertising. She has also released two albums in Taiwan, and recently signed a contract with Japan's Sony records. Mao Ying, who came to Taiwan last year, and Zhu Zheqin, whose 1995 release Ah Jie Gu created quite a sensation in Taiwan, are all artists that have been promoted under the new system.
Jin Zhaojun is critical of this development. Though companies have escaped from the heavy folk music coloring of the "northwest wind" style, they place too much emphasis on packaging of artists and not enough on content, and they have not yet built the foundations for the flourishing of the mainland's own music industry.
By the latter point, Jin is referring to the fact that Hong Kong and Taiwan records still dominate the mainland market. As record company exec Chen Xingqiu explains: "The total value of the music market is about RMB 1 billion, of which popular music accounts for 80%; and of the pop music market, Taiwan and Hong Kong products take four-fifths of that. For ten years now, this structure has changed little." He estimates that Taiwan's share will in fact continue to experience steady growth, even more so than Hong Kong's, because Taiwan music has a language advantage (it is mostly in Mandarin, whereas Hong Kong music is mostly in Cantonese). Another reason is that "market manipulation for Taiwan records is mature, whereas mainland companies are still not up to speed," he admits.
Dai Fang points out: "Currently trends in the mainland simply follow Taiwan popular culture." The record industry there is still learning, but it is having trouble keeping up with the rapid transition from one musical generation to another.
Voice of a new generation
Recently, the Beijing boy band The Flowers has become a hot topic among Taiwan music fans. This group is only the most noticed of the new generation of rock outfits to crop up in Beijing in 1998; others include Awake and New Pants.
Dai Fang suggests, "In their understanding of music outlook on life, this generation of young groups tends toward individual experience." Compared to the generation of Cui Jian or Tang Dynasty, although they are more shallow, they are less abstract.
The Flowers are three middle school students aged 16 and 17. Fans of Green Day, they do pop punk. The lyrics are about frictions they have with their parents, or day-to-day concerns of being a middle school student. No songs exceed two minutes. Asked by a reporter, "It is said that Cui Jian likes your stuff, how do you feel about that?" they responded, "That's impossible-we don't like his stuff, why should he like ours?"
The Flowers' style calls to mind recent hits in Taiwan like Hsu Huai-ning's "Monster," and Chang Chen-yu's "Daddy, I Want Money! I Want Money!" No wonder in recent years there has been a "Beijing fad" in Taiwan music circles. Pop artists Karen Mo and Faith Yang have both recorded Flowers' tunes, while Su Hui-lun has covered a New Pants number.
Peter Loehr, managing director at Magic Stone (China) Music, asks: "Why do the albums of Chang Chen-yu sell well in mainland China? Why did the film Love Spicy Soup, made in mainland China and targeted at trendy youth, do well in Taiwan?" Answering his own question, he says: "Because kids in Tokyo, Taipei, and Beijing are all thinking about the same things! The times are changing, and youth culture is sharing in the change."
"You can't expect popular music not to change with the times!" says veteran Taiwan music critic Chen Le-jung. Each era has its own stories. In the new millennium, as the popular music of two sides of the Taiwan Strait increasingly overlaps, what do these songs say to you?