yaogun yinyue: rethinking mainland chinese rock 'n' roll

Yaogun Yinyue: Rethinking Mainland Chinese Rock 'n' RollAuthor(s): Hao HuangSource: Popular Music, Vol. 20, No. 1 (Jan., 2001), pp. 1-11Published by: Cambridge University PressStable URL: http://www.jstor.org/stable/853691Accessed: 09-09-2016 23:39 UTC

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Popular Music (2001) Volume 20/1. Copyright t) 2001 Cambridge University Press, pp. 1-11.

Printed in the United Kingdom

Yaogun Yinyue: rethinking mainland Chinese rock 'n' roll

HAO HUANG

International discourse on Yaogun Yinyue (mainland Chinese rock music) has been

coloured by the early identification of Chinese rock 'n' roll with the aborted student

democracy movement of the late 1980s. This has led to a simplistic valourisation of

Western representations of rock rebellion by the global mass media, characterised

by a lack of awareness of changing social circumstances within the People's Repub-

lic of China over the past decade. Originally, Yaogun Yinyue did indeed share a

generational root with student radicals who expressed frustration with the severely

limited life choices in a Chinese Communist Party (CCP) controlled state. However, in response to the periodic political crackdowns during the post-Tiananmen mass-

acre era, most current mainland rock musicians have consciously avoided rhetoric

which might lead to unhealthy repercussions for their careers. 'Empathetic' Western

rock critics may be disillusioned to learn that recently many Chinese rock musicians not only reject popular reifications of rock 'n' roll but also express vehemently

anti-foreign sentiments (Barme 1996, p. 202). Historical Sino-Western antagonisms

have combined with individual resentments of foreign record companies'

exploitative practices to create genuine suspicion about the West as a cultural and

economic hegemon. This article offers a social and historical analysis in an attempt

to reframe the meanings of Chinese rock as cultural product.

Tim Brace and Paul Friedlander's discussion of popular music, cultural ident-

ity and political opposition in the People's Republic of China (PRC) suggests a

chronological progression in Chinese popular music: it begins with Ganghaiyue (pop

music produced in Hong Kong and Taiwan), proceeds to Xibeifeng (music influ-

enced by Northwest folk songs) and culminates with Yaogun Yinyue and its first

popular idol, Cui Jian. It is proposed that Kaifang, the 'Open Door' policy of 1978, was crucial to the development of Chinese rock music by opening the gates of communist China to previously forbidden foreign influences, both economic and

cultural. Ironically, 'Open Door' originally denoted the nineteenth-century policy

imposed by Western military powers on Qing China. 'Open Door' agreements

forced China to relinquish land: Hong Kong to the British, Macau to the Portuguese,

with land concessions to the Germans, Americans and French. A heritage of national shame for the consequences of these policies accounts in part for complexes

of both superiority and inferiority which inform Chinese attitudes towards the

West. Contempt of foreign cultural crudeness is leavened with dread and suspicion of Western technology and military power.

The second Chinese-initiated 'Open Door' policy described a domestic econ-


2 Hao Huang

omic initiative with complex and paradoxical historical allusions. Its social ramifi-

cations, too, were significant for Chinese popular culture. Large-scale economic reforms of the centralised state inevitably led to discrepancies with conditions imposed by the CCP's monopoly of power. The Party, which doctrinally encom- passed all legitimate social constituents, discovered that new interest groups had been generated by economic and social changes. Official denial of recognition of these groups led to the forging of 'informal' paths to permit public expression of alternative points of view (Rai 1991, p. 205). Rock music constitutes one such 'informal' path. A key to reading the history of contemporary Chinese popular music can be found by following contemporary inclinations towards decentralisation of political and economic discourse in China.

In the early 1970s, the government-owned popular music industry fulfilled its mandate to 'serve the people' (Wei renmin fuwu) by producing praise songs to socialist idealism, Tongsu yinyue (common music or music for the masses). This music was

the sonic embodiment of socialist art: Soviet realist 'workers' songs' were directed at the populace to inspire communist values. They featured plain, folk-inflected melodies backed by Western-style orchestral accompaniment, with a few token traditional Chinese instruments to lend cultural credibility. Songs usually exhibited

pentatonic melodic outlines and predictable I-IV-V harmonic progressions, and, broadcast over public loudspeakers in the street and radio, were an inescapable aspect of daily life.

By the 1980s, market forces converted state-owned music enterprises to 'serve the people's money' (Wei Renminbi fuwu) with alternative pop music styles. Avail- able for free in public and on the radio, Tongsu yinyue had failed to produce revenue for the CCP. Ganghaiyue answered market demand for contemporary, popular music

which appealed to Chinese as desirably 'modern'. Guangzhou province in the South, capitalising on its closeness with Hong Kong, was the first region to embrace this new style of music. Hewing the market economy path, the government music industry began to aggressively promote sales of this commercially viable popular music. Although Ganghaiyue shared a smooth melodic shape and simple harmonies with previous popular music, it incorporated more electronic sounds and slicker production values. The lyrics are mildly plaintive love poems and the music does not so much excite passion as entertain soothingly.

During the mid-1980s, doors were blown in by Xibeifeng, 'the Northwest wind', inspired by Shaanxi folk songs. The Northwest has always existed on the cultural periphery for the Han Chinese as the domain of the Shaoshu Minzu, or minority peoples - Mongols, Kazaks, Uighurs, Hui and others. China's Northwest conjures the 'exotic other' in Han China, a place where border crossings are possible: the Great Wall ends there at the Jiayuguan Pass in Gansu province. From this region, the Mongol horde of Kubilai Khan burst through the Middle Kingdom's frontier defences to conquer the Han Chinese, ruling as outsiders for a century. The 'rough vocal delivery' characteristic of Xibeifeng (Brace and Friedlander 1992, p. 118)

speaks to Han majority urbanites by evoking stereotypic ethnic minority virility. To this distinguishing feature are added musical elements such as rock beats and instrumentation, melodic archaisms (microtonal pitch inflections), drones, Turkish folk music instruments, and pitch ornaments sometimes referred to as 'arabesques'.

Brace and Friedlander's discussion of 'pre-rock and roll' Chinese popular music overlooks a provocative distinction: GangDaiyue is produced usually in Hong Kong and Taiwan, the East of China, where the West has dictated power relationships


Rethinking mainland Chinese rock 'n' roll 3

with China for over a century. In contrast, Xibeifeng comes from the West of China, where the Yellow River basin is located, long revered by Chinese patriots as the cradle of Han civilisation. It constitutes China's window to the West on its own terms, via the Silk Road. The former speaks of submission to the West, while the latter suggests a virile Chinese nationalism which selectively incorporates Western elements. The difference of signification between these two Chinese popular musics suggests that the complex narratives in Chinese popular culture must be under- stood with respect to historical perspectives. Western critics' attempts to come to a hermeneutic understanding of Chinese mass culture of the twentieth century have overlooked fundamental points of insight- in a culture as rooted in history as China's, close familiarity with aspects of the past is necessary to comprehend details of the present.

Chinese rock began in Beijing in the 1980s, sparked by the combined presence of a large foreign diplomatic community, a sudden influx of American foreign exchange students and an inquisitive Chinese university population. Mainland rock musicians have admitted in interviews to early infatuations with tapes belonging to predominantly white and middle class American students and overseas visitors of the 1980s, which they tried to play along with and to imitate. Most of the inspirations which mainland Chinese rock and roll bands have mentioned reflect mainstream North American tastes: Queensryche, King Crimson, Genesis, Pink Floyd, Rush, Guns 'n Roses, Led Zeppelin. Few visitors from underprivileged communities of the USA had the opportunity to interact with Chinese students, and the musical influences, predominantly white Heavy Metal, illustrate that point. A conspicuous absence of knowledge of African- American R & B, soul and funk exists among Chinese rock musicians. This can be attributed in part to the limited contact Chinese youths had with African Americans in the 1980s. However, it is also important to acknowledge a racial antipathy towards people of colour felt by many Han Chinese, demonstrated by numerous fights over several decades between visiting African university stud-

ents and Beijing's Chinese students and townspeople. Ethnocentrism and its cohort, racism, constitute an ancient tradition in China, reaching back a millen- nium to the Tang Dynasty, circa 600-900 CE (Liu 1992, p. 14).

In the late 1980s, Chinese rock musicians helped to construct a cultural oppo-

sition against Ya yi, pressure against individual expression, liberty and creativity by an authoritarian, conformist, even 'feudal' cultural tradition. Their anti- traditionalist individualism advocated a cosmopolitan internationalism, Kaifang (liberalised, open), as opposed to traditional culture, Fengbi (landlocked, closed). Two conflicting yet overlapping interpretations of the word Kaifang reflect generational fault lines. An older generation used the term in its 1978 sense of the 'Open Door', referring to the official policy of intercultural contact limited to a tightly

controlled selection of technology and trade, the implication being sharply exclus- ive. The younger generation adopted the same word 'Opening' to mean acceptance of a broad range of foreign influences which threaten official orthodoxy by embrac- ing new patterns, new ways of life from the outside. The latter concept contains the potential for redefining the homeland's cultural core in the future. This posed a perplexing threat to the CCP: how were old party cadres to react to their own children talking about 'feudal repression' in an officially communist society? Fur- thermore, what was the old guard to do when their children chose Cui Juan's 'I


4 Hao Huang

Have Nothing' as their generational anthem, in satiric response to the Chinese lyrics of the socialist anthem, the Internationale:

Slaves rise up, rise up, We cannot say that we have nothing We will be masters of all under heaven. (Jones 1992, p. 137)

Chinese rock broke down barriers not only in politics but also in terms of musical formats: hence Cui's remonstrance, 'Rock is an ideology, not a set musical form.' Early leading rock musicians such as Cui Jian and He Yong created a mix of music that was so hybrid and experimental that it cut across genre divisions of established pop (Lent 1995, p. 5): 'Loud punk was tempered by traditional Chinese instruments, synthesizer dance music would spin into jazz improvisation - all sometimes during the same song.' (Mihalca 1992, p. 34) The suggestive power of musical border crossings in Chinese rock was enhanced by mass distribution through unofficial market channels. People chose to switch off government- controlled radio and TV to turn on tape players to listen to music of their own choice. The power of individual agency is suggested by the construction of musical meaning by a listener through unofficial, uncontrolled channels of distribution. The very act of listening becomes an act of self-creation or at the least, self-reference.

Cui Jian, star of the movie 'Beijing Bastards', has been lionised by the international press as a rock rebel with a cause. Since the early 1990s he has been por- trayed in numerous Western newspapers and magazines as China's indomitable political conscience, a musician whose rock lyrics scathingly indict the brutality and corruption of the current regime. It is true that he showed tremendous courage in breaking his 'iron rice bowl' when he left his lifetime job as a trumpeter with the Beijing Philharmonic Orchestra, to gamble on performing music of his choice, Yaogun Yinyue. Early recordings of Cui from 1986 demonstrate that categorical dis- tinctions between Yaogun Yinyue, Xibeifeng and Ganghaiyue are not entirely appropri- ate, and that no simple chronological relationship exists between those categories. Chinese rock and roll did not displace earlier pop styles; rather, it synthesised dis- parate elements from previous musics. In Jia Cuo de Yu San ('Holding the Wrong Umbrella'), Cui uses a slightly hoarse, 'sincere' voice reminiscent of Xibeifeng, and electric guitar pop licks. Calling this rock 'n' roll is questionable, although there is a momentary hint of a reggae beat towards the end of the song. The lyrics are not even remotely political: Cui's early songs all have to do with being heartbroken ('there are pieces of my heart in your eyes', 'I hold an umbrella full of the absence of you', etc.). Rey Chow has asserted that Cui engaged in a subversive act when he used the 'official instrument' of a state-run orchestra, his trumpet, to play quasi-jazz riffs during some of his early songs (Chow 1993, p. 150). It would be well to ques- tion whether Chinese audiences in the 1980s interpreted Cui in this way. After all, Cui caused a sensation in 1988 when he appeared on national television with shaggy hair and studiedly shabby clothes. This dramatically contrasted with the conventional costumes of the co-appearing Tongsu singers. Aside from Cui Jian's throaty vocal delivery, his early songs resemble hundreds of contemporaneous popular Chinese music releases. The man commonly described by American media as 'China's Bob Dylan' wrote standard love songs in the mid-1980s.

Only two years later, Cui transformed his music and its impact. Cui Jian's first chart-busting release, 'Rock and Roll on the New Long March', was produced by a state-run record company in March 1988: it electrified Chinese youth with daring



challenges to conventional social values. 'Rock and Roll on the New Long March'

not only alluded to the heroic history of Mao Ze Dong and his dedicated comrades,

it converted popular music from an insipid Western import to a contemporary rev-

olutionary weapon against institutional inertia and corruption. The founding deeds

of Communist Chinese leaders were joined to a driving rock beat, and instead of

veneration, an irreverent challenge was unleashed in the form of rock energy. An

entire post-Cultural Revolution generation seized upon this song as the soundtrack

of the Tiananmen democracy movement. Not only did Cui Jian play live for student

demonstrators in the Square during Gorbachev's visit; he was heard on countless

personal tape players in the tent city. In 1989, Wuer Kaixi, the media-favourite

Tiananmen student leader, presented rock singers as agents of change:

Chinese college students have been stressing the individual, the self, and rebelling against all sorts of authority . . . but this idealism and the sense of the individual is contrary to the reality of present society . . . The people who are most influential among young people are not (the dissident intellectuals) Fang Lizhi and Wei Jingsheng, but singers such as Cui Jian. (Jones 1992, p. 123)

At this time, Chinese rock and roll held a central role in the struggle for control of

meaning in a Chinese mass culture, as a point of resistance to social and political

repression. Wuer's words recall Peter Manuel's invocation of pop music as an

'arena of negotiation ... an active participant in the mediation and expression of

broader conflicts' (Brace and Friedlander 1992, p. 125).

On the second day of the 'Spring Festival', 28 January 1990, Cui persuaded

government authorities to permit the first official rock concert in the PRC by offer- ing to donate one million yuan from concert proceeds towards the costs of produc-

ing the Asian Games which had taken place earlier in Beijing for the first time. His

promises to provide revenue to help recoup major financial losses by the govern-

ment led to an authorised tour in March of that year. Ten concerts in Zhengzhou,

Wuhan, Xi'an and Chengdu triggered mass emotional response:

The lethargy, indifference and shyness of the Chinese people seemed to have disappeared and were replaced by excitement and wild exuberance. The reason why Cui was able to provide such a strong reaction in his audience lies in his themes, which he has incorporated into his lyrics . . . Cui expresses the things that young people, want, but never dare, to say . . . The extreme liveliness of the audience during these concerts made authorities afraid that they would lose control. (Liang and Stobbe 1993, pp. 90-1)

Eventually, the potential political implications of the spontaneous enthusiasm

expressed by rock audiences became such a palpable threat to the central government that it cancelled the second part of Cui's officially sanctioned tour. Rock bands

were compelled to return underground, performing in small private bars and dance

clubs instead of large halls and stadiums. Cui has continued to survive because he has successfully manipulated shades of ambiguous meaning. In Cui Jian's third

album, produced in 1992 called Balls under a Red Flag (more accurately translated as Eggs under a Red Flag), there is a terrific song, 'He zi', ('The Box'). The lyrics of

the song are not printed in the liner notes; rather an image of a Red Guard girl in pigtails is presented with the ironic words, 'The Ideal', in the background. This

visual symbol violently clashes with the pictures of the long-haired, unkempt rock

musicians of Cui Jian's band on the CD cover and liner back. A challenge to a

Chinese Communist Party icon is suggested by Cui's appropriation of an old socialist anthem in the song, recontextualising it as part of an oppositional call to resist


6 Hao Huang

'The Box' of Chinese socialist ideals. The implication is, just who will hatch from

those cryptic eggs of the album title?

After the brutal post-Tiananmen crackdown, and as a result, as well, of selec-

tive economic reforms, Chinese popular culture underwent drastic changes. Social

alienation and dislocation were expressed in mass consumer culture, by slogans

printed on 'cultural T-shirts' which were favoured by Chinese urban youths before they were banned by Jiang's regime in 1991: 'Depleted', 'There is no tomorrow -

get drunk today', 'I'm terribly depressed! Keep away from me!', 'I don't have the guts to be a smuggler, I don't have the capital to be an entrepreneur, I don't have

the cunning to be an official. I mess around, I break my rice bowl, I am nothing.'

(Lau 1992, p. 33) Rock and roll's emotional connection with political dissidence dissipated. Currently, several Chinese rock musicians express irritated contempt of dissidents who continue to try to bring up issues of democracy and human rights. These would-be radicals are perceived as heedless idealists whose actions endanger all nonconformists. Jing Wang eloquently expresses the dilemma of current Chinese

dissidents, who are popularly dismissed as unrealistic, and irrelevant:

At the dramatic consummation of their enlightenment cause at the Tian'anmen Square in June 1989, who could have foretold that the moral and cultural influence of Chinese intellectuals at home would die an uneventful death in the immediate wake of their world-televised celebrity? Who could have predicted in 1989 that it was not communist authoritarianism but capitalist consumer culture that would mark the sudden downward turn of their fortune . . . The l990s dawned in China with the ironic truth: commercialism could turn yesterday's cutting edge into tomorrow's museum piece. (Wang 1996, p. 116)

Although Yaogum Yinyue continues to be centred in Beijing, since 1990 rock

performances have been banned in Beijing for the entire month of June because

government officials are wary that rock audiences may publicly commemorate the

anniversary of the June 4th massacre. In the major metropolitan cities, rock perform-

ances centre around private clubs which cater to trendy young Chinese and the

tourist trade; public concerts are mainly limited to outlying regions, where enter- prising presenters do not come under the close scrutiny of the central government. Currently, rock and roll concerts are still banned from being broadcast on state-run

television.

Lacking truly profitable domestic avenues, rock musicians have been forced

to rely on contracts with offshore Hong Kong and Taiwan record companies, which often dictate production values and marketing. Mainland rock music is often 'imported' back to China through the Hong Kong-based Star TV cable network and

overseas-produced tapes; as a result distribution is distanced from current mainland market trends. In many cities other than Beijing, young people hoping to get rich

often hold two or three jobs, and when they take a break they relax by going to easy-listening karaoke clubs or discos. During a visit to Guangzhou in December 1997. I informally quizzed the young Southern Chinese who I met in stores, on the street and in restaurants. The recurring sentiment was that rock music is 'only for

young people who have lots of free time'. At present, Chinese rock is identified as

'angry' music; rock fashion, hairdos, and a Liumang (hooligan) lifestyle that requires money as well as time to indulge in drink, sex and drugs. These days, the decision to become involved in the rock scene is perceived as a personal act, not a political

one. Major structural problems with the Chinese pop music industry- lack of copyright protection, intractable logistical problems with marketing and distribution,



corruption, etc. - have had a much more devastating effect on Chinese rock music

than official government repression.

With the fading of the political role it held in the late 1980s, rock's power as

signifier has been compromised. Pre-Tiananmen, rock was the preferred music of

China's elite 'grey' culture, that border of negotiation between the official 'red' CCP

cultural canon, and the 'black' milieu of banned dissidence and other illegal works. Due to social and market changes, rock's popularity with the trendsetting, self-

employed private entrepreneurs, or getihu, is being eroded by jazz. Jazz has been

removed from the government's official blacklist of decadent culture because it

often has no lyrics, and when words are present, they usually convey nonpolitical messages. In the spring of 1997, the commercially successful Beijing International

Jazz Festival was established with the backing of the central government. Rock bands have genuine concerns about whether foreign music businesses will turn to

jazz as a less risky opportunity for investment.

Inevitably, questions about the authenticity of Chinese rock 'n' roll as a Chi-

nese cultural phenomenon have arisen. The challenge of creating You Zhongguo

tese de yaogun yue (rock and roll music with Chinese characteristics) has stimulated

self-conscious construction of rock identity by rock performers. Lao Wu (Liu Yi

Jun), former lead guitarist of China's star band, Tang Dynasty, adheres to an essen-

tialist principle that Chinese and Western cultures are irreconcilably distinct: 'Rock

is based on the blues and we can never play the blues as well as an American. It's

just not in our blood. We can imitate it, but eventually we'll have to go back to the

music we grew up with, to traditional Chinese music, to folk music.' (Jones 1994,

p. 159) Even Cui Jian has joined the bandwagon of nationalist exclusivity by voicing

the opinion that northern, Beijing-based rock is different from and stronger than

Hong Kong and Taiwan imports. In a 1993 interview, he asserted 'that northern

Chinese can produce a robust, positive and socially progressive type of music that

is quite different from the negative and decadent rock of the West' (Barme 1996, p.

201). By recasting rock identity as fundamentally Chinese, rock musicians have

attempted to scale the heights of cultural authenticity, seeking not only self-

affirmation but also self-definition as legitimate Chinese worthy of mass support.

In contrast, the concept of Kaifang, 'Opening', directly influenced the self-

definition of China's premier power band, Tang Dynasty. Countering the doctrine

of nationalist exclusionism, Kaiser Kuo, an American-born Chinese (ABC) who is a founding member and guitarist for the band, says that the band's name, Tang Chao,

was chosen to evoke a cosmopolitan dynasty. That ancient dynasty's legendary

openness to cultural influences (and particularly exotic new musics) arriving from

central Asia and the Middle East through the frontier province of Xinjiang inspired

the band's choice of musical elements - a mix of heavy metal, Xinjiangese folk

harmonies and traditional Chinese instruments. The promise in the 'border-

crossings' of Cui Jian's hybrid popular music style found fulfilment in Tang Chao's

integration of Chinese ethnic minority musics.

The eponymous song of Tang Chao's debut album, Meng Hui Tangchao, 'A

Dream Return to Tang Dynasty', contains these lyrics:

Wind - cannot blow away our grievances Flowers - cannot colour our longing for home Snow - cannot reflect the mountain stream Moon- cannot fulfil the ancient dream Following the lines on my palm


8 Hao Huang

Branded there by fate Following fate I fall into a trance In dreams I return to the Tang dynasty

The song's music is a rich melange of Uighur folk tunes and Western heavy metal

riffs with Chinese melodic inflections and quartal harmonic orientation. The pri-

mary focus is on the melodies of the lead guitar and voice, and the percussion does

not perform in rigid lockstep but actually paces a dramatic framework for the piece.

Ideologically, attacks on official hypocrisy have turned to dreams of refuge from

grievances, longing and fate. A complicated web of relationships between China

and the West comes into play when discussing what inspired the members of Tang

Chao in their music. Interestingly, the late Zhang Ju, former bassist and lyricist of

the band, did not express resentment towards repressive traditional Chinese cul-

ture, but rather condemned modern Western corruption of Chinese culture:

I've been westernized almost my whole life . . . I never knew anything about my own tradition . . . And now I really hate anything from the West. I resent its influence . . . modern Chinese culture has never lived up to tradition because it's been ruined by Western influence. We have to get back to our roots . . . that's what the mission of this cultural phenomenon (rock music) should be all about. (Jones 1994, p. 160)

Ironically, advocating a return to authentic traditional roots has converted an

oppositional subculture, which was originally a locus of resistance against the status

quo, to a nationalistic symbol praised by the official press as a domestic alternative

to foreign imports. Desire to produce a purely Chinese rock music appeals to the

CCP's post-Tiananmen, market-oriented authoritarians. Recently, the chief of the

Beijing Bureau of Security praised Tang Dynasty 'off the record', citing them as

examples of assertive Chinese nationalism, while deploring the addiction of certain

band members to narcotics. Tang Subei, chair of the Chinese delegation to the

Cross-Straits Talks between Beijing and Taipei, has acknowledged that he was

pleased to hear from a Taiwanese delegate that while rock has existed in Taiwan

for decades, it has never been properly Sinicised, whereas the Mainland can already

boast of Tang Dynasty. In 1991, the China Youth News printed an article that asked

the government to tolerate rock music, because it was the only effective defence

against the flood of Western-deprived pop music in the mainland market (Barme

1992, p. 20).

A number of mainland Chinese bands (Black Panther, the Tutu Band and Tang

Dynasty are most prominent) have been devastated by drug abuse problems. In

China, drug addiction is even more politically charged than in the West because of

historical context. Chinese of four generations ago fought the British in the Opium

Wars, attempting to rid Chinese society of the destructive consequences of foreign-

dictated quotas of Chinese drug consumption. It can be argued that these first drug

wars were waged over international free trade (on Western terms); their effect was

to establish the invincibility of Western military power and its authority not merely

over Chinese armies, but over Chinese moral 'virtue'. National memory identifies

the use of narcotics as a parable of catastrophic failure of idealism versus odious

Western-dictated degradation. Western cultural critics have tended to essentialise

rock and roll rebellion as 'sex, drugs and rock 'n' roll', while failing to recognise

the particular consequences of local heritage. By emulating Western rock bands'

penchant for drug addiction, have would-be nationalist Chinese rock musicians

internalised a symbol of Western corruption? The layered association of such an



internalisation differentiates it from popular anti-authoritarian representations of drug use in the West.

In addition to the historic, social and economic factors discussed above, Chi- nese rock will confront several other issues as it evolves. Its relationship to the history of Western rock and roll is one. Can a distinct authentic Chinese rock exist, independent of knowledge or application of African-American musical roots? Another is the problem of tonal language: how will the new generation of Chinese rock musicians deal with the problems of superimposing a melodic line over a language in which the meaning of words alter according to pitch intonation? A real problem with the comprehension of rock lyrics exists: many native Chinese need to read the texts in the record booklet notes to understand the words to most rock songs!

Will rock bands regain their position as crucial sites for negotiation of mass culture identity, by powerfully expressing alternative perspectives to official CCP ideology? Theories of subculture expressed by the Birmingham School of cultural studies do not provide an optimistic view of the potential of rock culture as a source of political resistance. Dick Hebdige recognises that rock rebellion against established norms is limited to symbolic 'semiotic guerrilla warfare' at the level of music and fashion (Hebdige 1987, p. 91). In Michael Brake's view, subcultural groups often limit themselves to asserting an expressive identity against cultural hegemony, by failing to organise to form an 'articulated opposition' (Brake 1985, p. 7). Given the overwhelming power of economic coercion and mass-media indoctri- nation, co-optation by capitalist culture inevitably results. In fact, risk-free rebellious posturing may forestall implementation of effective political challenges.

Ironically, Mr Cui, who has been constructed by mass media worldwide as China's rock poet cum revolutionary icon, has grown tired of playing cat and mouse with the central government. He wants to be appreciated for his music, as a regular

. .

roc < muslclan:

In a 1990 press conference, Cui told his audience, 'I don't want to talk about politics ... Politics is not my work' ... [On 28 August 1995] ... in a radio interview, Cui Jian used 'commercial interests' to explain why his music is so strongly linked to politics. 'As music writers, we write about sensitive issues, and some people like to think (of them) as political and that makes our records more marketable' . . . Gary Chen, president of Prestige Modern Arts Exchange [adds] 'A lot of people just write articles on him and of course the easiest way to do it is just to use a label ... in order to attract an audience, they just say he's associated with certain (political) movements . . . (Cui Jian) always thinks of the art and his music as above all this, so whenever people try to downgrade his music to politics, he's upset' . . . Mark McEwen [explained] 'Overt political activities would inhibit his musical activities even more . . . As a musician, he may feel a certain responsibility (to speak out), but he has to figure out how to navigate himself so he can continue to make a certain social posture and still continue to build a career at a certain pace.' (Wong 1996, pp. 23, 2v5, 32)

Should Cui Jian devotees in the West accuse him of selling out? It would be judicious to consider what is at stake, to try to determine what the current rules are of the game he plays.

Lu Fei, a former drummer and opera singer who is presently manager of a Chinese rock band called Stones, has been quoted about the present predicament faced by Chinese rock and roll:

'Rock and roll in China is sort of lost now . . . Everything in China is kind of lost now, without an anchor. The music we do is for other people to explain, because we don't really know what it means.' His lament is the lament of what seems an ever-smaller circle of Chinese devoted to the rock


10 Hao Huang

music culture that was spawned in the 1980s by China's opening to the outside world and by the loosening of Communist Party controls over social life. (Tyler 1995, p. 10)

The official public amnesia surrounding the Tiananmen massacre has engen- dered a nihilistic public anomie. Activist students and intellectuals are currently regarded as having brought victimisation upon themselves through egotism, elitism and gross miscalculation of possible outcomes. China's Generation X finds itself dealing with an ever fluctuating job market, and is also in recovery from 'high culture' fever, a disease which was cured by the Tiananmen massacre and the flight overseas of many prodemocracy student leaders. Many people who were previously politically active have chosen to remain the mainland to try to capitalise on current economic opportunities, and have turned to money-making as an act of individualism, which may prefigure future social reform. Consumerism as liber- ation may be an anodyne cliche to Westerners, but it is a recent phenomenon for most mainland Chinese.

And yet, Chinese cultural critic Jing Wang confirms that Cui Jian's suggestive power has not become extinct:

Nobody who has heard Cui Jian sing 'Changzheng lushang de yaogun' (Rock 'n' roll on the Long March) has the heart to trivialize the post-new-era. The l990s, after all, is a swarm of contradictions: It sells environmentalism alongside conspicuous consumption ... it places the subdued vignettes of daily life and common humanity side by side with sensational gossip about the underground industries of prostitution, drugs, and gambling . . . this is not a tame era. Behind the spent utopianism lurks the beast in the jungle. (Wang 1996, p. 108)

In the People's Republic of China of 2000, three Yaogun Yinyue scenes can be described: the first is the previously discussed old rock music 'mainstream' of Cui Jian, Tang Chao and Dou Wei; the second is the young punk scene, dominated by twenty-somethings entertaining other twenty-somethings; the third comprises the genuine underground/experimental scene of the late 1990s. Cold-Blooded Animals, founded in 1996, have successfully bridged the gap between mainstream popularity and cult status. Their live performances galvanise audiences with genuine rage and despair. Their lead singer Xie Tianxiao ('heavenly smile') is also the lead guitarist, and their sound contains the rage and noise of punk, integrated with strong vocal melodies, beautifully conceived and tastefully executed guitar riffs (with hints of Xinjiang folk melodies) and sophisticated instrumental arrangements. Their lyrics lie on the dark side of punk, which is evident when receiving some of their song titles: 'Patient: Terminal', 'Epitaph', 'I think I Might Have Died Last Night'.

The Fly, formed in 1993, is hailed by most Beijing rock aficionados as China's pre-eminent underground band. Their style is best described as experimental punk, incorporating unconventional guitar melodies and sounds (derived from Japanese 'noise music') by the innovative lead guitarist Takahashi Koji, and sexually provocative lyrics written by lead singer Feng Jiangzhou (who was originally a classically trained painter). The band is notorious for describing vile social conditions in the PRC with obscene language, referring to Bu Ya (raw) body functions. The Fly has been critically acclaimed for their uncompromising focus on the social and economic sleaze of today's PRC - Zang Luan Cha (dirt, chaos and trash). The band culti- vates solidarity with mainland Chinese youth, by espousing a collective rage at current social squalor. Instead of heading a movement advocating openness versus repression, rock musicians are scrambling to find a tenable niche in Chinese popular culture. A publicly dishonoured regime presides over an age of paradox, where


Rethinking mainland Chinese rock 'n' roll ll

ostentatious entrepreneurship co-exists with blatant political repression. Con-

sumerism has changed the rules, not only for the CCP, but also for others who may

wish to arbitrate China's cultural agenda. Trading fever has displaced cultural

fever. Professors set up bicycle shops; party cadres pursue individual overseas trade

contracts on the side. Rock musicians are no exception. In the 1980s, they proudly flaunted their individualism, outside social norms. In the 1990s, they clawed their way into the commercial arena by pledging allegiance to the Chinese cultural core. Living outside mainstream economic discourse has become too hearry a price for those who once symbolised resistance to a corrupt, superannuated regime. Now, it is rock musicians themselves who are fighting to demonstrate that they remain relevant to China's mass culture, present and future. Their success depends on the

power of the roar of Wang's 'beast in the jungle'.

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yaogun yinyue: rethinking mainland chinese rock 'n' roll

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