It takes a bold man to title his own tour "Incomparable," but, as the king of Mando-pop, Jay Chou (
Starting with his entrance onto the stage at Taipei Municipal Stadium on Saturday night, by being lowered from the rafters on a glowing bright red crucifix, the show was an extravagant statement of Jay's status within the pantheon of Taiwanese pop music.
And the crowd of at least 20,000 who turned up under threatening skies indulged him every step of the way by singing along through all but the newest songs. They even shrugged off Jay's occasional stumbling over his own lyrics.
"I can never remember my lyrics. Thanks for filling in the gaps there," he joked after the crowd eased him through Tornado (
There were also a few awkward audio adjustments at the beginning to make Jay audible over the two drum sets, a bank of extremely enthusiastic back-up singers, a couple of keyboards and three guitars that threatened to smother his voice.
Yet by the fourth song, when he blasted into Yeh Hui-mei (
Jay was on his own, though, through most of his fast rap songs and defied his critics by nailing his lines while keeping step with his dancers through a jamming Aborigine-flavored medley, Father I'm Back (
In the middle of another dance routine moments later, he answered a call on his cellphone, saying: "Hey, I can't talk right now, I'm giving a concert," and then hung up right on cue as the beat came back in. It was all perfectly executed and the kids went wild.
He slowed things down a bit with a short set of acoustic songs, including Clear Stars (星晴) from his eponymous first album, and Love me, don't leave me (愛我別走) by Chang Chen-yue (張震嶽), a perennial KTV favorite that reverberated off the stadium's grandstands.
A two-song interlude by Jay's Alfa Music label-mates Nanquan Ma-ma (
Landy (
But the night belonged to Jay and if the crucifix routine hadn't made that point, then he drove it home with a ripping medley of Luanwu Chun Qiu (
Having hit that high, he made his first exit with Simple Love (
Having gotten what they came for, namely pyrotechnics and a handful of hits, fans started to stream out of the stadium. But Jay returned again to the stage for an anti-climactic rendition of his two contributions to the Hidden Track soundtrack.
After an evening of fireworks, flame-throwers and a solid performance by a singer who's forte is not live concerts, the finale was lackluster by comparison, but as always, the kids screamed in approval. After all, Jay can do no wrong.
Sept.16 to Sept. 22 The “anti-communist train” with then-president Chiang Kai-shek’s (蔣介石) face plastered on the engine puffed along the “sugar railway” (糖業鐵路) in May 1955, drawing enthusiastic crowds at 103 stops covering nearly 1,200km. An estimated 1.58 million spectators were treated to propaganda films, plays and received free sugar products. By this time, the state-run Taiwan Sugar Corporation (台糖, Taisugar) had managed to connect the previously separate east-west lines established by Japanese-era sugar factories, allowing the anti-communist train to travel easily from Taichung to Pingtung’s Donggang Township (東港). Last Sunday’s feature (Taiwan in Time: The sugar express) covered the inauguration of the
The corruption cases surrounding former Taipei Mayor and Taiwan People’s Party (TPP) head Ko Wen-je (柯文哲) are just one item in the endless cycle of noise and fuss obscuring Taiwan’s deep and urgent structural and social problems. Even the case itself, as James Baron observed in an excellent piece at the Diplomat last week, is only one manifestation of the greater problem of deep-rooted corruption in land development. Last week the government announced a program to permit 25,000 foreign university students, primarily from the Philippines, Indonesia and Malaysia, to work in Taiwan after graduation for 2-4 years. That number is a
This year’s Michelin Gourmand Bib sported 16 new entries in the 126-strong Taiwan directory. The fight for the best braised pork rice and the crispiest scallion pancake painstakingly continued, but what stood out in the lineup this year? Pang Taqueria (胖塔可利亞); Taiwan’s first Michelin-recommended Mexican restaurant. Chef Charles Chen (陳治宇) is a self-confessed Americophile, earning his chef whites at a fine-dining Latin-American fusion restaurant. But what makes this Xinyi (信義) spot stand head and shoulders above Taipei’s existing Mexican offerings? The authenticity. The produce. The care. AUTHENTIC EATS In my time on the island, I have caved too many times to
In a stark demonstration of how award-winning breakthroughs can come from the most unlikely directions, researchers have won an Ig Nobel prize for discovering that mammals can breathe through their anuses. After a series of tests on mice, rats and pigs, Japanese scientists found the animals absorb oxygen delivered through the rectum, work that underpins a clinical trial to see whether the procedure can treat respiratory failure. The team is among 10 recognized in this year’s Ig Nobel awards (see below for more), the irreverent accolades given for achievements that “first make people laugh, and then make them think.” They are not