HuaYu97: Starting as a Singer

Chapter 424 [424] The Chinese music scene is buzzing again as the fifth Chinese major is warmed up!

Before Qi Yuan joined the cast of "Hero", Zhang Hao returned to Warner Music Taiwan.

While in Taiwan, he witnessed the frenzy of the Taiwanese media these past few days.

Zhang Hao called Qi Yuan and said, "Since your debut, you have suppressed the Hong Kong and Taiwan music scene for more than three years. The Hong Kong and Taiwan music scene has suffered from you for a long time."

With the album "Ye Huimei", Jay Chou proved that he has not run out of ideas and that he can continue to innovate.

They saw a Taiwanese singer who had the potential to shake your position in the Chinese music scene; no wonder they were happy.

It's impossible for Chou Chieh-lun to end the Qi Yuan era created by Qi Yuan with just one album, "Ye Huimei".

Even if Qi Yuan starts to slack off from today and does nothing, Zhou Jielun would still have to release one or two more albums of this caliber before she dares to say that the Qi Yuan era is coming to an end.

Qi Yuan fully understands the Taiwanese media's frenzy.

Hope is important; sometimes confidence is more valuable than gold.

It's okay if we can't kill Qi Yuan for now; the most terrifying thing is losing hope and confidence in killing Qi Yuan.

The emergence of Jay Chou and "Ye Huimei" gave people in the Taiwanese music scene hope and confidence.

They saw someone with talent, potential, and the ability to consistently produce high-quality work who could keep up with Qi Yuan's pace.

As Qi Yuan further expands into the European and American markets, these markets will consume a significant portion of his energy, leaving him with insufficient time to dedicate to his Chinese album.

In this context, Zhou Jielun's challenge to Qi Yuan is like using two hands to fight Qi Yuan's one hand.

If Qi Yuan can maintain this level of quality for three years, and given that the quality of Qi Yuan's Chinese albums has declined, Zhou Jielun has a real chance to shake Qi Yuan's absolute dominance. At the very least, she can create a situation where Qi Yuan in the North and Zhou Jielun in the South are on equal footing.

Within the Chinese music scene alone, there is currently no singer in China who can compare to Qi Yuan. To be precise, they don't even qualify to be compared to Qi Yuan.

Zhang Hao continued, "This Jay Chou is really a bit strange. It's unbelievable that such a small company like Alpha could produce such a musical genius."

Warner Music's marketing department estimates that his new album could sell 250 to 300 million copies.

In the current climate of a rapidly shrinking physical record market, achieving this sales figure is absolutely top-tier.

Zhang Hao was starting to admire Zhou Jielun; she was truly a model of an underdog's rise to success.

Later, people always said that the other three, Zhou, Wang, Tao, and Lin, were not as good as Zhou Jielun because Zhou Jielun's production team was too strong. There were several master arrangers and excellent lyricists like Fang Wenshan.

This statement is very inaccurate; most of these people were not famous before they met Jay Chou.

Fang Wenshan is someone that other record companies don't want.

If we're talking about a powerful production team, Wang Lihong, Sony's top executive, would rank first in this group.

Secondly, there's Lin Junjie, who later joined Ocean Butterflies.

Their album production team includes not only a large number of well-known domestic musicians, but also many well-known international musicians.

……

In August, Jay Chou dominated the Chinese music scene.

He visited the mainland's "Happy Camp" once again.

The current Jay Chou is much more confident than she was back then. She no longer needs to wear a baseball cap and deliberately lower her head to pull down the brim every time she attends a public event.

On the show, he imitated Qi Yuan and showed off how to play a song using only three keys, while also responding to the hype from the Taiwanese media during this period.

“There is still a huge gap between me and A-Yuan. I am far behind him. I can only say that I am working hard to catch up with him.”

Qi Yuan stayed in Duncheng, Gansu Province for a while before moving with the film crew to Jiuzhaigou in Sichuan Province and Zhuozhou in Hebei Province for location shooting. Time flew by, and they encountered many difficulties during the filming process.

For example, the duel between Wuming and Canjian on the water in Jiuzhaigou, which ended with a brief exchange.

To achieve the best visual effects, filming could only take two hours each morning. The crew used two super-large wire stunt machines, and Qi Yuan and Tony Leung were almost sick from being suspended by wires.

Fortunately, the effort paid off, and the resulting footage can only be described as absolutely stunning.

……

The time comes on June 9th.

A major event has occurred in the Taiwanese music scene: Wang Lihong has released his new album, "The Only One".

With his self-titled hit song "The Only One," Wang Lihong became a sensation in mainland China.

Like Jay Chou, he took advantage of Qi Yuan's suppression to quickly conquer Taiwan and then went to the mainland to promote himself.

Qi Yuan's three-year endorsement deal with Wahaha has expired.

Because Qi Yuan had signed with Coca-Cola and her endorsement fee was too high, Wahaha chose Wang Lihong, who was much cheaper, to replace Qi Yuan as the new spokesperson for its purified water.

Fortunately, Wahaha is doing things more gracefully now; the two sides parted ways amicably, and they didn't say that Qi Yuan was too old.

Previously, Wahaha bought the cover rights to an English song that Qi Yuan didn't sing. This time, they asked Lin Xi to rewrite the Chinese lyrics and had Wang Lihong cover it. The Chinese version is called "Loving You Is Loving Myself".

This was another huge hit song, and coupled with Wahaha's powerful ground promotion and marketing network, Wang Lihong's fame and popularity soared rapidly in mainland China.

On mainland music charts, "The Only One" even topped the list, while Jay Chou's "Sunny Day" could only rank second.

The most popular song on the album "Ye Huimei" is "Sunny Day". It is not true that it was not popular when it was released and only became popular in the Internet age.

The fact that billions of people listened to "In the Name of the Father" at the same time is a result of marketing.

Only die-hard fans would know about these kinds of songs used to show off. Anyone with a brain knows that it's impossible for hundreds of millions of people to be listening to them at the same time, let alone hundreds of millions of people across Asia. That's even more absurd.

Let alone Chinese songs, even Qi Yuan's two English songs, which topped music charts in more than 30 countries, couldn't achieve this.

In short, Chou Chieh-lun released a phenomenal album, reaching new heights.

Wang Lihong became a household name across the country with his songs "The Only One" and "Loving You Is Loving Myself," as well as his endorsement of Wahaha Pure Water, reaching the peak of his popularity.

Wang Lihong's success has once again given a boost to the Taiwanese music scene.

……

Qi Yuan, who was on set, remained unfazed upon seeing these messages.

The new albums by Jay Chou and Wang Leehom have been a huge success, making the Taiwanese music scene even happier than during the Lunar New Year.

But anyone with eyes can see that this is the Taiwanese music scene and Taiwanese media trying to piggyback on his fame and boost the status of Jay Chou and Wang Sicong!
He succeeded in the US market, and his impact on the Chinese music scene is like a game-changer.

Unless his new Chinese album and second English album are both so terrible that no singer in the Chinese music scene would dare to challenge him.

There's not much to say about this "copycat" thing. Didn't Warner Music also copy Richie Jen and the Four Heavenly Kings in their marketing back then?
To be more precise, all the most popular celebrities will be targeted by paparazzi; it's unavoidable.

They fight their battles, while Qi Yuan fights his own.

Having been on set for almost two months, he continues to stay and focus on filming.

Warner Music, meanwhile, launched a promotional campaign to hype up Qi Yuan's fifth Chinese album, "Wish for Rain in the Empty Mountains," making the already bustling Chinese music scene even more lively.

(End of this chapter)