Journey Into The Night
William Wei
Just when you think of William Wei as a guitar-playing troubadour, the Taiwanese singer-songwriter upends that image on his third album. Its title in Chinese, You Suo Wei, means something to fear and is also a pun on the phrase meaning “it matters”. And he confronts all manner of fears here.
Opening number Wolf is a rock number about keeping one’s impulsive animal instinct in check: “I’m afraid when the moon is full, in just a flash, I lose my cool/Don’t be afraid, don’t be afraid, there’s still a light on.”
He has not completely severed links to his previous style – sensitive ballad By Your Side harks back to tracks such as Because Love and Still Loving You on his self-titled debut (2010) and Someone Is Waiting (2012).
Elsewhere on this record, the Golden Melody Award winner for Best New Artist in 2011 ventures into electronica and collaborates with reggae group Matzka and rapper Soft Lipa. Eventually, it ends with Dawn, offering hope and reprieve.
This is thoughtful, adventurous work. Whatever fears Wei might have, stretching himself is not one of them.
(ST)

Overheard 3
Alan Mak, Felix Chong
The story: Against the backdrop of property dealings in Hong Kong’s New Territories, a tale of greed and vengeance unfolds. Jau (Louis Koo) grows up with the thuggish Luk brothers, including Keung (Sean Lau Ching Wan), the right-hand man of the powerful Uncle To (Kenneth Tsang). He kills a major landowner in a car accident for To, who pays him off. Five years later, Jau is released from prison and plots an elaborate surveillance operation to take down the Luks with the help of expert hacker Joe (Daniel Wu).

Same concept, different story.
Writer-directors Alan Mak and Felix Chong of Infernal Affairs (2002) fame team up for a third surveillance thriller.
Overheard (2009) and Overheard 2 (2011) featured the same key actors – Lau, Koo and Wu – but as different characters. After all, to get overheard again on the part of the same perpetrators would simply be too much carelessness on their part.
By the third instalment, though, the idea is getting a little stale. And the three leads seem to be shuffled from role to role in each film as though they were playing some kind of musical chairs.
The first instalment remains the most compelling. Not only did the concept seem fresh then, but the film was also anchored by the dependable Lau as its moral centre.
In the less tightly knit Overheard 2, the focus shifted to Wu as he sought vengeance for past wrongs.
Somewhat confusingly, Wu again plays a tech- savvy character named Joe here, though the centre of the piece is now Koo.
Released from jail after five years and now a cripple, Jau is plotting to take down the crooked Luk brothers. He is driven by a mix of motives, including a thwarted romance with another Luk, Michelle Ye’s Yongyu.
Add Tsang as an imperious patriarch, Huang Lei as a wily businessman and Zhou Xun as a character linked to Keung and Joe and it is little wonder many of the characters seem underwritten.
The story of title grants and unscrupulous property developers with their bullying tactics is actually interesting enough to stand on its own, and there is a poignant lament about the cost of development and the debasement of land.
But since this is part of the Overheard series, there has to be a surveillance element worked into it.
The complicated web of relationships and land dealings plus the high-tech electronic monitoring make Overheard 3 feel overstuffed and underwhelming.
(ST)

Coming Home
Zhang Yimou
The story: During the Cultural Revolution in China, Lu Yanshi (Chen Daoming) was sent away to a labour camp as a political prisoner. He finally returns home when it ends in 1976, only to find that things have changed at home. His wife Feng Wanyu (Gong Li) blames their daughter, Dandan (Zhang Huiwen), for Lu’s recapture after an escape and, more devastatingly, no longer recognises him. He tries ways and means to rekindle her memory of him. Based on the novel The Criminal Lu Yanshi by Yan Geling.

It is a homecoming in more ways than one.
Coming Home reunites director Zhang Yimou and actress Gong since they last worked together on the opulent period piece Curse Of The Golden Flower (2006).
In spirit, though, it is closer to the earlier collaborations between the two in gritty dramas such as Red Sorghum (1987), The Story Of Qiu Ju (1992) and To Live (1994) – films which paint compelling pictures of China society with Gong as the charismatic centre in each offering.
And, once again, Zhang draws out a fine performance from his frequent leading lady.
Gong is the most restrained she has ever been, going for quiet naturalism and pulling her punches in a situation ripe for overacting.
Watch how she reacts when they meet again for the first time in years when her husband returns home, her blankly polite behaviour a contrast to his barely constrained joy, which turns to puzzlement and then sorrow.
She is matched by award-winning veteran Chen (Hero, 2002), who is unrecognisable when he first appears as an escaped prisoner buried beneath a layer of grime.
Later, when he realises that Feng no longer recognises him, he sets about trying to jog her memories of him, from posing as a piano-tuner to reading his old letters to her.
It is another tragedy of a family torn apart by the madness of the Cultural Revolution. And while the film does not dwell on it, there are chilling glimpses of its horrors from the poor letter-writing conditions Lu faced to the terrible fate that befalls Feng.
Although a bit slow-moving at times, this tale of love and sacrifice is genuinely moving and its emotive power builds up gradually.
After a string of big-budget martial arts epics such as Hero, House Of Flying Daggers (2004) and Golden Flower, Zhang proves that you can go home again.
(ST)

Are music awards still relevant?
It is a question that pops up from time to time given how many there are out there. Publications give out awards, radio stations give out awards, websites give out awards and even soft drinks give out awards. That is taking the pop in sodapop a little too liberally.
It is practically suspect if a singer or album does not end up with some kind of accolade or other.
With Taiwan’s Golden Melody Awards hitting a milestone 25th edition, it is a good time to take stock of the awards show even as it takes stock of the Chinese music offerings in a given year.
And the quick answer to the question is: Yes.
While there is a deluge of awards out there, there will always be room for an industry-wide exercise conducted by a respected panel. The Golden Melody Awards, Golden Bell Awards for television productions and the Golden Horse Awards for movies are considered Taiwan’s three major annual awards. But their influence extends to all of the Mandarin-speaking world, particularly the music and film awards.
While the Golden Melody Awards have been christened the Grammys of Chinese music, it is probably fair to say that the former has greater cache in comparison as the Grammys have been pilloried for being out of touch and irrelevant.
On the other hand, the Taiwanese award has tried to straddle mainstream relevance and music credibility. Four of Mandopop king Jay Chou’s albums have won for Best Mandarin Album, namely Jay (in 2001), Fantasy (in 2002), Ye Hui Mei (in 2004) and The Era (in 2011). But you also have feted indie singersongwriter Sandee Chan’s Then We All Wept In Silence taking the top honour in 2005.
It helps to have the judging panel helmed by respected figures such as this year’s Ni Chung-hua, a veteran who was responsible for bringing musicians such as rocker Wu Bai, singer-songwriter Chang Chen-yue and producer Lin Wei-che into the business.
And a credible award can also highlight changing trends in music.
A milestone year for the Golden Melody Awards could well be a watershed for pop music from China. One of the biggest surprises from the nominations this year is that the two frontrunners are both from China. The works of Li Ronghao and Li Jian are both in the running for five awards each.
Li Ronghao’s debut record Model is up for key awards Best Mandarin Album, Best Mandarin Male Singer, Best Newcomer and Best Album Producer and the title track is nominated for Best Lyricist for Hong Kong’s Chow Yiu Fai. Meanwhile, Li Jian’s Classic is in the running for Best Mandarin Album, Best Album Producer and three tracks have been nominated for Best Arrangement by Wang Zhiyi and Zhao Zhao.
In media reports, Ni has said that the awards will not be restricted to Taiwan and that the greatest consideration should be musicality regardless of where it is from and regardless of market response. And the stellar showing of China pop makes it clear that it is a force that cannot be ignored.
Just last year, the five nominees for Best Mandarin Album were all from Taiwan and Hong Kong. This year, works from China take up two of the five spots, thanks to Li Ronghao and Li Jian.
China is already a major market in Mandopop and artists have been flocking there to promote their albums and tour extensively. The flow of China pop outwards has been more of a trickle, but it was always only a matter of time before it makes bigger inroads into Mandopop as a whole.
True, a few of the big names in Mandopop have been born in China, including Faye Wong from Beijing. But they found success after moving to Hong Kong or Taiwan, in the case of Della Ding Dang.
Stars big at home in China, such as Han Hong, Lao Lang and Li Yuchun, have not enjoyed the same degree of success outside of it. Reasons bandied about have ranged from less slick packaging to differing tastes. But with convergence and greater interaction over time, there will be fewer obstacles to music from China getting a warm reception regionally.
Ni adds that the nomination list needs to be broad enough and not restricted to a few genres or a few people, otherwise, the awards will be acknowledged by a shrinking group.
Hip-hop’s growing visibility and acceptance is also reflected in this year’s nominations. Soft Lipa’s Renovate is up for Best Mandarin Album, Best Male Singer and Best Album Producer while rapper Dog-G is up for Best Lyricist for 100 Points.
It prompted Dog-G to remark: “Compared to when I first started out with MC HotDog, it feels that hip-hop has now taken root in Taiwan.”
They were dabbling in hip-hop in the early noughties and MC HotDog had won Best Album with Wake Up in 2007.
There is also the personal satisfaction factor to consider.
As a music reviewer, I get to see how my picks stack up. Chang Chen-yue’s Ayal Komod, Tizzy Bac’s Fragile, Wakin Chau’s Jiang Hu, The Rhapsody and Soft Lipa’s Renovate were among my favourites over the past year. It is always gratifying to have one’s choices affirmed by others.
Of course, when one does not see eye to eye with the nominees or rails over egregious omissions, it must be because the jury fails to recognise quality even when it stares them in the face.
Ultimately, an awards event is also another means of learning about the good music available out there and discovering voices that might have slipped under the radar. So before the results are unveiled on June 28, no prizes for guessing which China artists will be on my playlist.
(ST)

rice & shine
Eason Chan

Fans get a double dose of Hong Kong’s Eason Chan on his new Mandarin release, rice & shine. Split into two parts, he works with China’s Radio Mars on Rice and with Singaporean singer-songwriter JJ Lin on Shine.
Conceptually, the album is similar to what the singer did on The Line Up (2002), where lyricists Lin Xi and Wyman Wong were responsible for two different halves of one album.
In this case, Radio Mars did the music and lyrics for Rice, while Lin’s music was set to words by different lyricists for Shine.
The first collaboration with Lin that was plugged is Ni Gei Wo Ting Hao (Listen Up). It is a ballad that manages to capture something of Chan’s essence and master lyricist Lin Xi complements the tune perfectly with his nuanced wordplay. It goes: “Listen up, you must smile when you feel like crying/Actually, you know that troubles solve troubles/When the new arrives, the old will be forgotten/Tiny complaints only prove that life is not boring.”
JJ Lin has a knack for coming up with radio- friendly hooks but his work here, while easy to get into, also manages to be a little left of centre.
Another reason Chan wanted to work with Lin was because of the singer-songwriter’s ability to dabble in various genres.
Apart from the ballads, a highlight here is the jauntily jazzy Fang Qi Zhi Liao (Give Up Treatment). Wu Ching-feng from Taiwan’s sodagreen pens the sharp and darkly humorous observations here: “Lonely people are most afraid their phones won’t get a signal” and “Society forces you to burn, modern day thinking/I’m no good, why else do I have so many troubles/What the heck, suddenly remembered I forgot to take my meds.”
On the surface, Rice seems like the more upbeat counterpart to Shine.
Lead single Yu Le Tian Kong (High Light High Life) is a lively track shot through with sunshine. The lyrics, though, take a darker turn: “The sunlight is so dazzling/But my ideals are slowly rotting away.”
In fact, the mood is not all that different from Shine. Most of the tracks fall into the mid-tempo range and there is a light dusting of electronica here and there.
Where Chan gets to have a little fun is on Yu Ren Kuai Le (Happy Fools) as he lays on the Beijing accent.
Again, the sun is shining bright in the lyrics but there is an undercurrent of darkness tugging away at the song: “The dreams we have we have we have we have have woken/The person we love we love we love we love has gone/We enjoy loneliness, bear censure, see through everything/Each day we pass by, the sunlight is dazzling, sunlight is dazzling.”
The tracks on Rice feel more cohesive – perhaps not surprising, given that they were the work of one entity, but Lin’s music on Shine feels a little more compelling.
The debate as to which half of the album works better is one that Chan’s fans will relish.
(ST)

Aberdeen
Pang Ho Cheung
The story: Ching (Miriam Yeung) is a tour guide whose doctor husband Cheung (Eric Tsang) is having a fling with a nurse. She is haunted by a strained relationship with her dead mother. To (Louis Koo) is a star tutor married to a beautiful actress, Ceci (Gigi Leung). A strong believer that the beautiful will inherit the earth, he is worried about the prospects of their plain-looking little girl, Chloe. Dong (Ng Man Tat) is a Taoist priest who performs funerary rites. What seems like separate stories is revealed to be the portrait of one single family and of Hong Kong in miniature.

Aberdeen is an ambitious undertaking for Hong Kong auteur Pang Ho Cheung. The film’s Cantonese name, Heung Gong Zai, gives a better sense of the scope of the film. While it refers to Aberdeen, the English name of an area on Hong Kong Island, it also means Little Hong Kong.
In this portrait of the Cheng family, with patriarch Dong and his children Ching and To, Pang is also painting a picture of the territory’s chequered past as a British colony and the winds of change that have blown across it. Dong came from a family of fishermen but he had to learn new skills to make a living when those living on boats were forced to move into housing estates in the late 1960s.
History on large and small scale entwines as Pang explores its consequences in modern-day society.
The movie marks a change of style for the director as well. If you are looking for scabrous comedy of the sort found in previous works such as A.V. (2005) and the award-winning Vulgaria (2012), you might want to adjust your expectations. Admittedly, I do miss his outrageous sense of humour but Aberdeen, while more low-key, does have its funny moments, such as when Chloe asks for funeral rites to be performed for her pet chameleon Greenie.
There are also some entertainingly fantastical scenes, including Ching riding in a paper-offering taxi and Greenie as a Godzilla-like monster on the rampage.
For the most part, though, Pang has drawn inspiration from stories that have made their way into the news. They include the man who divorced his wife after the birth of their ugly children, not knowing she had gone for plastic surgery; model-actresses available for the picking at private parties; and callous tourists who posed with a stranded dolphin, reimagined as a beached whale here.
All this is meant to be part of a compelling tapestry, but Aberdeen feels scattered in a way that Pang’s best films do not. This is not the excellent movie about the weight of history, national and familial and its far-reaching consequences that John Sayles’ Lone Star (1996) is.
So it is thanks to Pang’s able ensemble cast that you get drawn in. Besides the main cast, Pang regulars such as Shawn Yue (Love In A Puff, 2010, with Yeung) and Chapman To (Vulgaria) also show up in interesting cameos.
In particular, singer-actress Leung is memorable in one of her meatiest roles in years. Some of the jibes about her character’s lacklustre acting career cut a little uncomfortably close to the bone, but Leung proves, once again, she is more than just a pretty face.
(ST)

Grand Piano
Eugenio Mira
The story: The last time pianist Tom Selznick (Elijah Wood) attempted La Cinquette, a so-called “unplayable” piece, he choked because of stage fright. Five years later, the one-time star is back on stage performing before a packed crowd. Turning a page, he finds a threat scrawled on the score: “Play one wrong note and you die.”

Talk about performance anxiety.
Tom Selznick already has to deal with the pressure of returning to the stage after an inglorious break and, now, he has to deal with making sure that he gets every note right of La Cinquette (a piece created for the film, but which alludes to Rachmaninoff’s technically devilish Piano Concerto No. 3). Or die trying.
It is an intriguingly warped premise and Spanish director Eugenio Mira (Agnosia, 2010) conducts a virtuoso performance with it, one packed with drama and suspense.
Who, exactly, has his sights on Selznick? An obsessive fan taking things one step too far? A nutcase? Or someone with a precise, unknown, agenda?
To make sure that Selznick plays ball, the writer of the note threatens to shoot his wife Emma (Kerry Bishe), an actress who is in the audience.
And then the fun begins in earnest as the fabulously dextrous Wood juggles playing the piano with trying to make a call and sending a message – all the while trying to avoid being seen by the mysterious sniper.
Wood is best known for starring in the hit trilogy The Lord Of The Rings (2001-2003) and his wide-eyed look is put to good use here as fear, anxiety and determination play across his face.
Fittingly, for a thriller about a pianist and a piano, the use of music here is masterly.
From the opening credits in which the camera takes us inside the workings of one specific grand piano to Selznick performing under duress on stage, the score works beautifully in tandem with what is unfolding on screen as it teases, trills and thrills.
Credit here goes to Spanish composer Victor Reyes, whose film credits include the thrillers Red Lights (2012) and Buried (2010).
His work on Grand Piano was named Best Score at the Cinema Writers Circle Awards in Spain this year.
To relieve the tension, there are moments of comic relief.
There are the two worst concertgoers in the world bickering in loud whispers and flashes of black humour as characters get killed.
There is more enjoyment in store when the mastermind is eventually unmasked and the reason for the unusual request is revealed with a final flourish.
Tinkling the ivories has rarely been this much fun at the movies.
(ST)

Rebel To The Right
Witness Huang
Nine years after his self-titled debut, American-Chinese rapper Witness Huang returns to a warm welcome from the Taiwanese hip-hop fraternity.
On the opening track, MC HotDog guests and Huang boasts: “My music’s going to make everyone high/I’m about to fly/So celebrate my return.”
Some of the tracks here deal with personal history. The Wanderer Returns is about him finding peace in religion, while Everything’s Gonna Be Alright is “about a Taiwanese kid who grew up in Texas”.
There is a sense that this album is about bearing witness to his personal transformation after having been through some tough times. My One And Only is a statement of fidelity from someone who has turned over a new leaf: “But now, I’m after stability/No more mixing alcohol/Just give the all-new Witness, only want just you.”
Stability? Fidelity? He is certainly rebelling against the worst of rap’s stereotypes.
(ST)

Lovelorn Aesthetics
Ming Dao
Previously part of the short-lived boyband 183 Club, which disbanded in the late noughties, Taiwanese actor-model Ming Dao is only now making his debut as a solo act.
The surprise is that he has a pleasant singing voice, one that can stand alone without blending with four other voices.
Unfortunately, the material here, a hodepodge of songs about love, is too generic.
The singer tries too hard to cover all the bases – from the title track that sounds like a synth-heavy Show Lo-lite number, to the ballad Tears Dried By The Wind, on which Ming Dao seems to be channelling Jay Chou (an impression strengthened by lyrics written by Chou’s regular collaborator Vincent Fang).
At least the opening track, Kiss Me, does something different with its big-band sound.
And the breezy pop of I Suddenly Want To Love Her is a theme song crying out for an idol drama.
The album cover has Ming Dao showing off his biceps while clutching a bouquet of roses to send the message that he is both manly and sensitive.
Maybe more lovelorn facets and less aesthetics would have made for a better record.
(ST)