3 posts tagged “china”

Silver Ash (2005 lineup)

Since writing about the (first) Chinese visual kei band Silver Ash (official homepage) more than a year and a month ago, I never did make good on my promise to post part 2 of their Sohu interview. The truth is, I had begun working on it after finishing translating part 1 of the interview. However, I soon become frustrated with the massive! amount of ambiguities in the transcript. Everything from the lack of subject, tense clarity, and context, possibly exacerbated by the online chat interview format, discouraged me and I pretty much abandoned that project.

Recently, my interest in Chinese rock music resurged and I plan to write more about the subject in upcoming posts. By chance, I once again stumbled upon the Silver Ash vocalist Ling's blog. Looks like many things have happened since last October when I first wrote about the band. According to Wikipedia:

It was last heard that they were still without a record label, as well, but were given various offers from Japanese record labels, such as Avex Trax. They were previously signed to Toshiba-EMI, but were released from the contract again due to government problems.

In the most recent news, Silver Ash held a live on August 30th (2006) with Japanese band, La'cryma Christi, particularly to be viewed by the record label SWEET-CHILD.

Their most recent release is the PV for a track named 海的女儿 (pinyin: Hai de nu'er). The title of the track roughly translates into Daughter of the Sea.

In addition, as recently as this September, Silver Ash had performed along with Japan's rice and Gram Maria in Beijing.

Alas, Silver Ash is terribly ill-fated. The departure from their record label in 2004 also marked the end of the band's career pinnacle. Even though the members were forced to leave the band and despite the setbacks and traumas the vocalist Ling faced, he still was able to keep Silver Ash alive after 3 years of unbelievable hardship.

As I began to browse through Ling's blog entries, I was continuously struck by his strength of character, his perseverance. I've come to admire his relentless struggles against one setback after another. No matter how beatdown he may be, he still retains that glimmer of optimism and smiles in the face of adversity.

I decided to translate one of his recent entries and present it here. In this particular post, Ling speaks of his life outlook and talks in detail of how Silver Ash's ascent to success came about. For all of us who face challenges of all forms in our daily lives, here's the take of one musician on his experiences.

Me in 2001

The "Tower" tarot card (1) Xiaobai read for me on the train to Sichuan (2) had clearly been taking effect on my life... My entire second half of the year, family, life, and work had all reached their nadir. The traumas took place one after another.

I still insist on not believing in fate; I insist on believing that one can control one's own destiny. So, I told myself that the fate dictated by cards can the changed by one's own determination. But I had forgotten, no matter how hard I fought, I could only influence my own decisions. Sometimes, events and people are outside of your control, but the decisions and choices derived from them have profound impact on your life, your happiness, even your faith in humanity. Now... at the time my life is about to enter the next yearly cycle, I think of three months ago, when things had yet to come to pass. It's with hope, that I think back on the band's history. It's with hope, that I face my future. I now continue to write about that time, when my sole focus was on the band's future... when I was bursting with excitement and creativity for music.

After "Lunar Eclipse Night", the band's collaboration with Youth.cn came to an end. But the biggest change to the band came when our guitarist Nancy made the decision to study abroad in Canada. The band once more reverted to a four-piece ensemble. Losing a guitarist meant that the band, in order to maintain the richness of the sound when performing live, must play some pre-recorded music. For our drummer, this was a big challenge, because he must precisely match his rhythm to the recording. For the longest time, the band's practice solely focused on perfecting this. During this period, I mostly worked with Lucy to tweak the finished songs, though most of the work that went into changing the compositions fell on him. But I, who initially was not familiar of this area, gradually began to acquire the knowledge of whole-piece music composition and verse structure as a result of working on revising the songs.

One day I went online, and received an E-mail....

It was signed "Lu Bo, Scream Records".... (3)

It was the first time a record label had come to us, yet our performances to date only added up to four or five lives total.

I was so excited. Even though at the time I didn't really like Scream Records, I thought that fortune had finally beckoned, its gate was about to swing open for us.

I had already written about our acquaintance with Lu Bo in the blog, so I won't repeat myself here. Anyway, our three-year collaboration with Scream Records formally commenced. From a new-born band, we slowly began our ascent to maturity and style.

When the band first signed, because our operation and style are completely different from the label's other bands, every decision needed discussion with all involved because no one had any previous experience. The first photo shoot was going to be a test run with makeup, but somehow this set that we spent a night shooting became the most widely circulated, most widely recognized photos of the band during its early period. Even now, the most commonly seen photos of the band found online are all from this set. In the end, the first official photo shoot with official costumes wasn't really used, though this set of photos appeared on the band's first single.

Lucy in white

Because we never wanted our band to become overly feminized, for that photo shoot, we all had prepared black costumes. But at the shooting session, Lucy insisted on wearing a white gown. Seeing the makeup artist also supporting him, I backed down. In the end, I think it's this "how can they tell if I am he or she" (4) white gown image that first, on a visual level, began to propel Lucy to his later immense popularity.

Soon, we released the "Organum" single which included the band's self-recorded demo. Additionally, the pre-order numbers broke Scream Records's CD retail record. And it was this single that changed the face of China's rock bands' product release structure, for a mere three-track CD with a simple video was able to compete with ten-something-track albums on the record store shelves.

- Ling, Silver Ash

Silver Ash in 2001

(1) In tarot card reading, the Tower symbolizes destruction and loss.
(2) 四川 (Sichuan) is also spelled Szechuan or Szechwan. It's a province in western China, famous for its spicy cuisine.
(3) 嚎叫唱片 (Scream Records) is a sub-label of Jingwen Records and one of the major rock, punk and new metal labels. It's the biggest alternative rock label in China and committed themselves to sign every year several bands and release at least 10 records (from: Rock in China wiki).
(4) 安能辨我是雌雄 (An neng bian wo shi ci xiong). This is the last line of the "Ode of Mulan". Thanks to Disney, most people have a general idea of the story of the young lady who disguised herself as a man to serve in the army in her father's place. The translation was from The Flowering Plum and the Palace Lady: Interpretations of Chinese Poetry, by Hans H. Frankel, Yale University Press, 1976. The full translation can be found here.

I translated half of Silver Ash's Interview with Sohu Online in August of 2004. This is such a hugeass-ly long transcript that I have to take a break before tackling the second half. This interview gives us overseas people a very insightful view of the Chinese music industry. The struggles Silver Ash faced/faces in China really makes me realize how lucky the J-Rock bands are for being able to develop and expand in a much more receptive and accepting market.

Please do not reproduce this translation (or any part of it) anywhere in any form without getting explicit permission from me beforehand (see my e-mail at the end of the post). Translation is a lot of work. I won't appreciate people just taking things without asking first.

Host: Good afternoon, everyone! Because Silver Ash had to attend a promotion event today, this interview was delayed to 4:20pm. Thank you for your understanding!

Host: Silver Ash has just arrived. The interview will begin in ten minutes. Let's let them rest a little. Really sorry about the wait!

Host: Good afternoon, everyone! This weekend, we invited the four members of Silver Ash rock band to our Sohu Guangdong Chat Room. Hello! Everyone's been looking forward to your arrival. First, please greet your fans!

Silver Ash: Hello, everyone! Thank you for your support.

Host: First, welcome to Guangdong to promote your releases. You're known as "China's first visual kei rock band". How do you look at this concept?

Silver Ash: In addition to having a visual impact, we want to have an aural impact. Simply put, we strive to look good and sound good.

Internet Fan "Xiaomi": I really like Mr. Zhen on drums. I've also bought the third release, but now I live in Japan and can't purchase your CDs. Do you plan to expand to Japan?

Silver Ash: If an opportunity arises, we'll look into it. Please contact us when we visit Japan, since we also have people in Japan listening to our music.

Host: Japanese visual kei has reached the pinnacle. However, it's slowly getting lighter. The bands' costume and music style are gradually going downhill. What do you think of this phenomenon?

Silver Ash: I think this is simply a continual evolution. Your style can't be stagnant, just like you can't wear the same clothes for four years straight. Japanese visual kei is about ten-something-years-old from the early 90's to now. Listeners are receptive to all bands, but I also think it's like the ocean tide washing up against the sandy shore. The good bands will remain, but the ones that aren't will be washed away. It's better to say that visual kei is at a settling down stage. During this period, the bands without substance will be eliminated, while the ones with real talent will remain.

Internet Fan "Xiaomin": Mr. Ling's lyrics are so beautiful. They remind me of a band that I used to really love called Autumn Bug (note: Qiutian de Chongzi). Their band members also put on makeup, but they aren't really visual rock. And, the members aren't as aesthetic as Silver Ash, but their songs really are great. Yingzi's (note: Sakurako) voice was especially awesome. I wonder how they're doing now?

Silver Ash: Haha, you've come to the right place! I'm really good friends with them. We had rented the same apartment together and shared living expenses. I heard that they're on hiatus. The vocalist and the guitarist are a couple. They're busy making ends meet right now.

Host: A lot of bands like Autumn Bug used to have lots of fans. But now they're merely trying to survive; their fansbase declined. Do you face similar problems?

Silver Ash: We mentioned that this is our last album on this trip. We do face the issue of making ends meet. We need to survive, meaning two meals a day and a bed to sleep in at night.

Silver Ash: Right now, I live at home. I use my dad's car and spend my dad's money. But I'm the only member who's a Beijing local. Everyone else isn't Pekinese (note: a resident of Beijing). We must deal with the issue of daily survival.

Host: Right now, you still don't have a big enough presence in the music scene. How do you plan to expland your influence?

Silver Ash: Sohu is a major web site (note: it's like Yahoo!). If you enter "Silver Ash" as keywords into the news search, you'll get 52 pages of hits. So in reality, we do have a pretty good presence. But the issue of making ends meet is affecting our music. We're quite influencial in a lot of areas, but this popularity hasn't helped our goals, because there are too many communication problems.

Silver Ash: We're already working so hard, including at every tour. We produce materials and inform fans of band news ourselves. In terms of media promotion, we're doing okay. Our vocalist takes care of the band's makeup all by himself. We do a lot of things ourselves.

Host: I think you should focus on communication with the overall market, not just the niche. In the current music scene, every Jay Chou release triggers a massive pre-ordering wave. How can you achieve this?

Silver Ash (Ling): How we wish that we can be that popular, too! But in the end, it can't be helped. We aren't that well-known right now. A fan had said something that really hurt. People scoff at visual kei. They really have no idea how much we dedicated ourselves. I make the trip to stores to purchase makeup personally. That fan really doesn't know what it's like for us. They have no right to criticize us. Even if I stop doing this some day, no one has the right to say that we've abandoned visual kei. At least, we're working really hard. They don't know this, but I have grievances, too. Having to do the makeup for all four band members by myself is exhausting.

Silver Ash: We still have more lives. I'm so tired. My arms hurt after putting on makeup for the band. No one has the right to criticize that we've abandoned visual kei. We've done our best, including investing money. Now our main goal is to make music. We want to continue producing music. Zhen wants to drum, Yue and Yu want to play their guitar and bass. It comes down to wanting to continue our music. I wish the critics can be more forward thinking. They should at least know that in order to achieve commercial success, you must "look deeper" and not be deceived by the surface.

Silver Ash: These years we went from the dilemma of choosing the music or the visual, to being deceived by surface issues and losing our head to success, to many other challenges, but at least, we still know what we're doing.

Silver Ash: Our promotion schedule isn't like that of the other artists. Promotion begins after the album is released. This method results in less communication with fans and listeners. At this promotion, we'd like to tell people that whether you're a Chinese music consumer or watcher, you should communicate with the creators and the artists more.

Silver Ash: The media is the most important, whether it's web, TV, radio, or print. Consumers, creators, and the media should cooperate and work on changing the current state of the industry, instead of criticizing and blaming each other. Artists blame fans for not buying CDs, fans then criticize the artists, while the media just worsens the issue by egging everyone on. I understand that foreign music industries have more specialization.

Silver Ash (a different member from above): I'm no expert in this, so I won't criticize. If you like metal, you needn't say bad things about other bands. You have a right to your personal preference. That's what I think.

Host: Your words make me heavy hearted. What you said is very frank and direct; it's the market's current state. At Sohu, we have always tried to support original music and local music. We hope to promote real music. The main thing is for you guys to presevere. We at Sohu will support you and promote you.

Internet Fan "Wanou": After you guys signed with Scream, you are glam rock to the outside, while remaining visual kei to the inside. Do you think you can have a breakthrough in your style?

Silver Ash: I haven't listened to too much 60's rock. I've never done glam rock. We really don't have a strategy for the "outside". Outside is overseas, inside is mainstream. Once your CDs sell over a certain number, no matter what kind of music it is, it become mainstream if it's successful.

Host: Will you continue preservering with quality music, or will you turn to mechanically manufacturing "canned music"?

Silver Ash: I don't understand what you mean by "canned music".

Silver Ash: I'd like to release CDs in a can. Hope he can help us. (note: whichever member said this was joking, I think)

Internet Fan "Wuyan": Do you use other bands as reference? What are your future goals for development?

Silver Ash: We use Silver Ash as reference, and our own band is used to plan future goals, though some say we're influenced by Japanese bands.

Part two will be posted once I translate it. Again, do not reproduce this translation anywhere else in any form without my explicit permission (e-mail me at: auralcandy [at] gmail.com).

银色灰尘 (Silver Ash)

Silver Ash was the first and only major visual kei band in Mainland China. A Beijing band formed in 2000, Silver Ash had been producing music actively under the Scream Records label until 2004. Supposedly, due to pressure from the Chinese government, the band members began leaving one after another. It was announced that the remaining members will be forming a new band called TOY with various musicians from other groups and would abandon the visual kei path.

However, Silver Ash still performed with the J-Rock band La'cryma Christi (just disbanded about a week ago) at the Star Live House in Beijing in August of 2006. There's a gap of information here between that announcement and the performance. I haven't figured out exactly what happened yet. I'm not sure why the 2005 album, "Wei Jin Ji" (未尽集) was still released under the name Silver Ash.

Edit: After finding the actual text of the official press release from 2004, now I know that Silver Ash was simply put on the backburner in favor of TOY. The press release specifically mentioned that TOY would be targeting the domestic mainstream market, while Silver Ash would be targeting the overseas market. Silver Ash hadn't really disbanded, just on a semi-hiatus. Their contract was also transferred to Scream Record's parent company, Jinwen Records. Of course, this was the "official" press release. In China, anything "official" means heavily sugarcoated. There are more details I need to uncover. Something still seems off. End of Edit

I'm still saddened by this whole problem with the Chinese government. Silver Ash could have become the X Japan of China. Alas, the band was getting strangled before it could have made a difference in the Chinese rock music scene. Almost everytime they get a chance to play overseas or join other major artists like Japan's T.M.Revolution, Pycho le Cemu, and Sons of All Pussys, the Chinese Homeland Security steps in and put a stop on the activities. Why did the Chinese government interfere? Why would it have such a problem with visual kei? Or is it actually due to the political content of Silver Ash's songs? I don't know and I'm terribly disappointed by the turn of events.  I wish Silver Ash can just migrate to Japan and miraculously be able to sing in good Japanese.

But in the end, this post is a tribute to this pioneer Chinese band. As an initial introduction, I present to you Silver Ash's two music videos and my translation of the lyrics to these two songs. Please do not reproduce the translations (or any part of it) without getting explicit permission from me before hand (e-mail: auralcandy [at] gmail.com).

Lunar Eclipse

This is a very poetic song. As a result, the lyrics are more difficult to translate due to the form and the usage of metaphors (and the ambiguity of pronouns and tense). I tried to preserve as much of the original Chinese meaning and form as possible in the translation, so as to not mangle the beautiful lyrics too much while maintaining coherency.

Title: Lunar Eclipse

The frozen moonlight, entangled in a dark room
Is dissolving in blue and seeps into the gray wall
The frozen moonlight, entangled in a mirror
Is dissolving in paleness and seeps into the gray wall

In the sunken depth of my eyes, glitters a nightmare from childhood
Trembling, I open both eyes, peering from the window at the...*
Moonlight that uncaringly burns my icy blood and frozen gaze***
In the dark, the iron window of ice, the mysterious melody is the imagination of happiness

The mangled shadow, careless scattered, is carved into my body
Seeping into my blood, the blue iciness freezes in my heart
The mangled shadow, careless scattered, is carved into my face
Seeping into my flesh, the blue iciness freezes in my heart

A beam of moonlight falls on my eyes, and pierces the shadow in the depth
Trembling, I close both eyes, dodging from inside the window the...**
Moonlight that uncaringly burns my icy blood and frozen gaze***
In the dark, the iron window of ice, the mysterious melody is the imagination of happiness

Moonlight that recklessly burns my icy blood and frozen gaze***
In the dark, the iron window of ice, the mysterious melody is the imagination of happiness

* A more conventional translation would be: "peering at the moonlight / outside the window" instead of "peering from the window at the... / moonlight". The reordering is to preserve the form of the original lyrics.
** Like above, conventional translation would be: "dodging the moonlight / outside the window" instead of "dodging from inside the window the... / moonlight". The reordering is to preserve the original form.
*** The original Chinese is 蓝色的血液, which is literally "blue blood". In the translation, I used the metaphorical meaning, "icy blood".