I’ve just published a list of 100 songs in Chinese (mostly Mandarin, but also Cantonese… and maybe Hokkien… can’t be sure of that) that’s a great cheat sheet for anyone wanting to show off their knowledge of the scene. There’s definitely a wide variety of artists, so you’re sure to find something you enjoy.
Visit YAM Magazine for the list with a link included to the YouTube playlist.
It’s been roughly… four years. Give or take. It’s been a good ride, and it’s still going strong… so we still got a long way to go. Guys, if you would’ve gotten me at my “good” times, you’d be millionaires by now. Back when I was in high school I bought anything I could… even if I only like one song- I would have bought your whole album for that one song. I’ve got around 30 physical album with music in Mandarin — that’s roughly 7 albums a year… which is about an album every two months. Trust me, it’s not a bad deal.
Plus, imports are expensive…
All of the albums’ artists have their tags on the blog except for SingerSen. I haven’t talked about her much on this blog… yet. But maybe one day in the near future, I’ll add her own tag.
This is also not counting the music DVDs xD so there’s a couple more.
As a fan, I think I’ve been good to Chinese music fandom.
Am I starting a series? Nah… I don’t think I can come up with a Jpop list xD
Unlike the Kpop list which it focused 99% of the time on dance pop friendly tracks that went beyond American commercial pop, this “Cpop” list is… not really pop.
Popular music in Taiwan, Hong Kong and Mainland China (but mostly Taiwan) tends to be pop/rockish flare. Sure there are dance pop friendly, but even they have moved or are moving more towards pop/rock. They also love indie flavor, and accept not particularly attractiveness in their idols… even though there are some very good looking people who are immensely popular.
To be completely honest, compared to Korea’s pop music charts, Chinese music charts have a broad variety. But then again, compared to Japan’s pop music charts (which is comprised of AKB48 and Arashi xD), even Kpop charts (mostly 2NE1 and Big Bang now that DBSK is gone) seem to have some variety. xD
So this list of great Chinese music includes varying genres from R&B, pop/rock… more rockish, ballads (regular and of the indie type), etc. once again listed by year of release.
Again, it’s a bit weak on the earlier years… but you are welcome to make suggestions (for any year). A few guidelines would be that they cannot be too indie (I couldn’t fit Cheer Cheen or Mavis Fan in the list because they don’t feel completely pop, if you know what I mean), must include MVs (so songs released as singles), not older than late 90s.
Also… song must work as MV too. So no awesome songs but tacky videos. Sorry.
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What do you like about the Cpop industry?
Who are your fave artists?
I just finally burnt Zhong Ping Huang’s (黄中平) name in my head.
Because of A-Mei’s latest MV.
Having realized that he’s made my favorite Faye Wong video, I just spent all night “curating” a list of 77 MVs of some of the music videos he’s directed since 1997… but only of the artists I follow… otherwise the list is just endless~
Most of the time, his style is described as just about style, emotion and composition. Though, I have seen a few of those that have something resembling a plot.
Faye Wong – Bu Liu/ Nothing Left
I think that video captures what I essentially love about Faye Wong.
I’m a dork, you can’t deny it.
I’m a dork, and I’m proud of my -mostly- tidied up iTunes library.
As with my CDs, and my DVDs… a little bit of books, and mostly with computer files, I like to know where my things are. Of course, iTunes makes it way easy to keep things organized with their “copy to folder” and “keep things organized” options, but then we’ve got album covers, song names, artists names… and music can get a little messy.
YAM Magazine