Unboxing, Director!

Chapter 25: The War of the Gods? (Two in One)

The last time he released a single, Lu Jiang was unknown and had no choice but to collaborate with Locke Anluo, who was almost bankrupt.

At that time, Li Chao sacrificed his dignity and asked his stepfather, his "enemy" who took away his happy family, for an opportunity to appear on CCTV.

Even so, the full rollout of other publicity and promotion channels will have to wait until "Fairy Tale" becomes a real hit.

Li Chao still feels heartbroken when he thinks about the impact of the loss of first-mover advantage on sales.

Today, Lu Jiang, who has already gained fame in the mainland music scene, even if he has not signed with Warner UFO, his publicity resources in all aspects can be regarded as a huge improvement compared to last year.

For this new album, part of the distribution business is still handled by Locke Anluo.

Li Chao simply said hello, and the first batch of promotional and marketing platforms covered all the platforms when "Fairy Tale" was released.

CCTV's China TV Music, CNR China National Radio, radio stations in the Beijing-Tianjin-Hebei region, etc.

If we expand further, although it is impossible to cover the major platforms in all provinces, cities and regions across the country, it is enough. Once the album becomes popular, these platforms will naturally follow suit.

In addition, there is print media.

Last time, during the initial stage of promotion, there wasn’t even any print media interviews or hype. Now it’s different.

Almost anything you can think of, with a high threshold, you can get space by paying some public relations fees.

Some music or entertainment-related newspapers will even proactively make reservations, not to mention asking you to pay. Some smaller ones will even give you money.

These are just the personal resources of Lu Jiang and Li Chao.

Now that they have signed with Warner, they will naturally not just sit there and watch.

As the former overlord, it is still a well-known record company at the moment. Even though it has not yet fully entered the mainland market, the publicity resources it can mobilize are not comparable to those of Lu Jiang alone.

The most important of these is the sales channel.

This time, Warner decided to order 80 tapes and 30 CDs in the first batch, and also prepared 5 vinyl records.

At the same time, pre-production of the second batch of CDs and tapes has begun.

Such a huge amount of albums are not only sold in the mainland.

Hong Kong and Taiwan are also the main battlefields this time.

The current sales of "Fairy Tale" are very impressive, reaching 64 copies, and even surpassed the number one album in mainland China, "Conquer", by Yehenara.

But you have to know that the sales volume of "Conquer" in Asia is now approaching 200 million copies.

But as for "Fairy Tale", excluding the mainland, the total sales volume is less than 15.

If Warner UFO had been in charge of the distribution from the beginning, the total sales of "Fairy Tale" would have exceeded 120 million copies by now.

So channels are so important!
If we want to fully mobilize these channels, the resources required will also be increased proportionally.

Without a big guy like Warner UFO, it would be impossible to do it.

The good news is that Warner's Zhou Jianhui has put in a lot of effort this time, and the entire Warner UFO has also mobilized as many resources as possible.

Next, everything depends on the response to the new album.

The name of this new album is "Lu Jiang".

This was named by Zhou Jianhui, just as he named Stefanie Sun's first album "Stefanie Sun".

There is no title song because it’s all title songs.

The first song released was "Twilight".

On Monday, November 11, the China National Radio Music Weekly Chart had new updates to the previous week’s chart.

First Place: Wang Fei's "Red Bean"

Second place: Power Train "When"

Third Place: Li Yijun, "Rain Butterfly"

Fourth place: Zhang Huimei's "Holding Hands"

Fifth place: Richie Jen's "Sad Pacific"

13th Place: Lu Jiang, "Fairy Tale"

"Fairy Tale" failed to make the top ten for the second consecutive week.

At this time, most people in the industry believed that the popularity of "Fairy Tale" and Lu Jiang had basically passed.

If there are no new songs, Lu Jiang will probably enter the decline period of singers who become popular through singles in a month, and then in another half a year or a year, he will basically be out of fashion.

However, on that day.

A new song called "Twilight" was first broadcast on Beijing Radio during the evening rush hour.

Within just one hour after the broadcast ended that day, Beijing Radio received more than 30 calls requesting "Twilight".

In the evening, after China National Radio broadcast "Twilight", the number of song requests for "Twilight" on the radio station soared rapidly.

At 9 o'clock, CCTV's "China Music TV 60 Minutes" broadcast the MV of "Twilight".

Then, from north to south, radio stations across the country began to pre-broadcast.

Then on November 11, "Twilight" started at the 23th place on the new week's China National Radio music chart.

At the same time, Lu Jiang's melancholy and sad singing voice could be heard in the streets and alleys of the country.

Dusk became popular

The singer of "Twilight" is "Lu Jiang" again.

Countless people in the industry were shocked.

Lu Jiang is back again!
The one who reacted the most was Yehenara.

"I still remember the tears that fell from your eyes, and I was heartbroken

There is an illusion of burning tears in the chaos
dusk horizon
Cut off happiness and joy
Love has been disillusioned
... "

Watching Lu Jiang singing soulfully on the grass at dusk, Yehenara turned off the TV in silence: "Feidie must have taken the wrong medicine to release an album in early December!"

No wonder she made such a fuss.

It was really that "Fairy Tale" posed too great a threat to her.

In this year's mainland sales chart, in the category of mainland singers, Lu Jiang actually surpassed Yehenara for a time with "Fairy Tale".

At the end of October, "Conquest" had a box office of 10 and "Fairy Tale" had a box office of 62.

So if someone asked at that time, who was the mainland singer with the highest sales in 98?

The answer is definitely Lu Jiang, not Yehenara.

Fortunately, in the past month, Yehenara worked hard, went to various radio and television stations, and invested a lot of publicity expenses, which increased the sales of "Conquest" a lot, while the popularity of "Fairy Tale" gradually weakened, and the gap was completely widened.

So much so that now, she has almost become the recognized singer with the highest sales in mainland China in 98.

EMI even prepared the draft.

It is to use the first place in sales in the mainland to completely consolidate the status of the queen of the mainland.

Some press releases have even been sent out.

As a result, Lu Jiang has released another song now.

And the quality of the first song is so good.

If I do this, when the total sales for 98 are calculated in a month, I won’t be able to keep my number one title!
She could already imagine how the media would portray her, especially the Hong Kong and Taiwan media.

It was said that she was a queen of the mainland, but she opened champagne at halftime, and her sales were crushed by a new singer who had only been popular for half a year.

She had no doubt that the media would do so.

They don’t care if you’re defeated by two albums or by a male singer.

The fans will only care that you celebrated in advance and were overtaken by others.

Thinking of this, Yehenara was furious: "Go ask Feidie what they are thinking and why they are picking on me!"

Her sister and manager shook her head and said, "It's useless. Lu Jiang himself said he would release the song at the end of the semester. Warner has also been tracking and reporting on the progress of the MV filming in the past few months. In October, they said the song would be released in December, but we didn't take it seriously at the time."

Yehenala remembered that this was indeed the case. However, everyone at the time had a preconceived notion that December was a bad time to release a song, and that it would be worse than January. Anyone would have made the same choice.

So everyone thinks that Lu Jiang will eventually follow the advice and release it in January.

In addition to this reason, there is actually another reason that no one is willing to say openly, which is that everyone does not really believe that "Fairy Tale" was created by Lu Jiang himself.

He wrote, directed, acted in and sang the song himself, and also wrote the lyrics, composed and arranged the music himself.

The quality is so good.

It's outrageous!
Such a good song, Lu Jiang bought it once, but can he buy it again and again?
So what if Lu Jiangfang releases it in December?
But it's different now.

Looking at a pile of introductions to "Twilight".

He wrote, directed, acted in and sang the film himself, and also wrote the lyrics, composed and arranged the music himself.

Yehenara, like many people in the industry today, has realized the seriousness of the situation.

At this time, Naxin suggested: "Why don't we work harder and be more secretive? We still have a month left, so maintaining our advantage shouldn't be a problem."

The two people's qualifications, fame and status are too different. If they openly play by their cards, people will easily accuse them of bullying the newcomer.

Yehenara thought for a moment and nodded: "Let's do it this way. I don't believe his entire album is this awesome!"

Naxin asked with a smile, "What if they are really that awesome?"

"Then I'll kneel down and kowtow to him, acknowledge him as my brother, and beg him to write a song for me, alright?"

Yehenara wants to suppress the enemy, but cannot play its cards openly, so the best way is to muddy the waters.

Her connections and resources are not to be underestimated.

For her, it is too easy to give some resources to some mainland singers in need.

The same goes for singers from Hong Kong and Taiwan. If they don’t really need resources, then just bundle them up.

For example, Jacky Cheung’s album “No Regrets” will be released at the end of November. Yehenara expressed their best wishes to him and promoted the album to each other.

Soon, in late November, many people in the industry noticed that the intensity of competition on the list seemed to have suddenly increased.

There are many singers releasing songs now, and they are all very popular.

Soon, various interesting stories about Valen Hsu became radio news reports.

A moment later, Jiang Shan suddenly discovered that her song "I Want a Home" entered the top three of the on-demand list.

Soon Zhao Chuan's "Zhao Chuan's Selected Collection" is about to be released, and then Zhao Chuan's old songs become popular again.

Soon, songs by veteran singers such as Qi Yu appeared in the top ten of the list.

Huang Lei also suddenly discovered that his song "I Think I Am the Sea" could also make it to the list, and even defeated Zhou Huajian in a short time!
But the current media is not paying attention to the undercurrents behind it.

I just feel that the current music scene is truly a battle of the gods.

A number of top singers including Jacky Cheung, Wakin Chau, Yehenara, Richie Jen, Wang Fei, A-Mei, as well as various veteran singers and unpopular young singers, all came out at once.

For a time, the overall popularity of the music industry was ten points, and three or four points were distributed immediately, and two or three points were quietly left to "Conquer".

Before we knew it, the three songs "Conquer", "Meet in 1998" and "No Matter How Hard It Is" once again appeared in the top ten of major music charts, and sales also ushered in another wave of growth.

So much so that many industry insiders saw that Lu Jiang's "Twilight" dropped from fourth place in the first week, stayed in the second position for a short time in the second week, and then dropped directly to tenth place.

This phenomenon, which is inconsistent with the quality of the song, was interpreted by the media as "too shallow foundation."

Lu Jiang’s debut time is too short and his fan base is too weak. His songs are good, but they are only good for a short burst of popularity, and his endurance is still a bit lacking.

Warner UFO no longer has the strength it once had and cannot adapt to the new competitive situation. You see, facing this tug-of-war like a battle of the gods, it will soon fall behind the pace.

Yehenara was very satisfied with this.

Although the cost of doing so is indeed not small, it is still worth it overall.

Because many resources are actually an exchange of interests, you may be able to earn them all back by using them once at a critical moment in the future.

So now, it’s about maintaining this momentum until “Conquer” firmly secures its position as the number one in sales.

However, just when everyone thought that Lu Jiang had a bad start and the new album was about to fail before it could gain momentum.

On December 12rd, "Lu Jiang" officially went on sale.

Then, soon after, seven more songs appeared on the major music charts.

The first song to hit the charts was "Jiangnan". As soon as it was released, it seemed to have instantly returned to its original state in 04, and it rushed to the charts with an unstoppable momentum.

Nineteenth place!

Eleventh place!
Seventh place!
Second place!
As for reaching the summit?

That's the brothers' business.

So before the "gods" could react.

"Maple", "Twilight" and "Cold to the End" all made the list.

Among them, the one that successfully took the top spot on the list was, unsurprisingly, "It's a pity there are no ifs".

This is due to the super popularity brought about by the MV after major TV stations such as CCTV started broadcasting it.

The 12-minute MV has a complete story and movie-level texture.

In the current music scene, differentiated marketing has once again taken shape.

Your songs are not as good as mine, and your MVs are even worse than mine.

If you go on the radio, I will go on the radio too.

You're on TV, and so am I, and my ratings are higher than yours.

How come you fight me?
However, "It's a pity there are no ifs" did not stay at the top of the list for long.

Soon I was pulled down by "Twilight".

And "Twilight" is worthy of being the best song on this album in Zhou Jianhui's eyes.

Once on the list, it never came down.

As for the other songs, they are not bad either.

In the eyes of fans.

If you want to listen to rock music, there is "Cold to the End", which is a standard sad rock music. It is not that dangerous and is still enjoyable.

If you want to listen to folk songs, there is "Our Time".

What is popular and best suits the public taste?

The majority of songs on "Lu Jiang" are popular love songs.

In addition to these, there is also a new style of music "Jiangnan".

When the Chinese style of "Jiangnan" began to be heavily marketed by Warner UFO.

On December 12, "Jiangnan" finally got its wish and overtook its senior brother "Twilight" to top the list.

This is the third time that "Lu Jiang" has been on the China National Radio Music Weekly Chart since its release.

Except for "Our Time" and "Let Tears Turn into Lovesickness Rain", all 7 songs are in the top ten, and "Dusk" and "Jiangnan" occupy the top two positions.

If Zhang Yu's "The Moon's Trouble" was not really strong, the fourth-place "Absolutely Crazy" would have taken its place and completed the first, second and third place rankings.

"Fairy Tale" was also influenced by the new album and climbed to eleventh place again. It is estimated that it will enter the top ten again next week.

Once this list came out, all the singers who were originally having fun on the list were numb.

I'm having a fight right now, you take the stage and I take the stage, it's so fun.

Seeing that the hot songs in the first half of this year and at the end of the year are about to be beaten down, I can still make some money.

Then suddenly a group of gangsters rushed in!
Click.

Not only did they steal the meat, they even smashed our bowls!

How cruel!

(End of this chapter)