Among the female Mando-pop stars, there's a fairly clear division between the girls and the women, and it's not simply an issue of age.
In the girl camp, Jolin Tsai (蔡依林) epitomizes the lasting appeal of the girl next door, with the barely concealed, budding sexuality that she flaunted at a concert last weekend in Taipei.
PHOTO COURTESY OF SILVER FISH
Meanwhile, on the women's side, Faye Wong (王菲) reigns supreme for her grace and captivating unattainability, a type of regal aloofness nurtured over 15 years as a vaguely mysterious superstar whose audiences with the public are carefully staggered and always preceded by much fanfare and excitement. Her concert tomorrow at Taipei's Municipal Stadium is no exception.
PHOTO COURTESY OF SILVER FISH
As of press time, the only tickets remaining are for the "rock and roll" section of the stadium, which is the standing area on the field starting from about 50m from the stage. These are going for NT$1,500 a piece, but before anyone chokes on their tea, those are the medium-priced tickets. All the prime tickets in the NT$3,000 to NT$2,500 range were sold out weeks ago, along with the NT$800 and NT$1,000 tickets. The sales so far ensure a crowd of about 40,000.
Wong generates such massive following by being, first and foremost, one of the most gifted singers in Mando-pop, a talent handed down, she says, by her mother who was a revolutionary opera singer in China. It no doubt also helped that she inherited a 175cm frame and a model's good looks.
Her first album was her self-titled debut when she performed under the name Shirley Wong, released in 1989, less than two years after migrating from her native Beijing to Hong Kong's greener pastures. Since then, she's transformed herself multiple times, first ditching her original stage name in favor of her current one after taking a break in the US between 1991 and 1992, and later taking the path of most Hong Kong pop stars to experiment with movie roles, notably in Wang Kar Wai's (王家衛) Chunking Express (重慶森林) and most recently 2046.
Wong also had a brief fascination for the ethereal music of the Cocteau Twins in the mid-1990s, which manifested itself in three covers of the Scottish band's songs on Wondering Music (胡思亂想, 1994) and collaborations with the band on Impatience (浮躁, 1996), and Faye Wong (快樂不快樂, 1997). The collaborations seemed tailor-made, as Wong shares the same distant-sounding, high-pitched siren voice of the Cocteau Twins' Elizabeth Fraser, and the gauzy aesthetic of the Twins' album covers even made its way onto Wong's album cover art.
The overwhelming Cocteau Twins influence began to wane, though, with the release of Sing and Play (唱游, 1998) and Only Love Strangers (只愛陌生人, 1999), when Wong set off in a more blatantly pop direction. She still retained some of the edge that continued her flirtation with anti-pop status, but the sound became more accessible, and, dare one say it, KTV-friendly. Her most recent album, To Love (將愛, 2003), is a mosh of her two recent artistic tendencies: saccharine pop and daring avant-garde.
By juggling these two styles, Wong's status has only risen over the years. So much so that, even without releasing any new material, she can drop into town and pack a stadium, as she's sure to do tomorrow.
Performance notes:
What: No Faye, No Live
When: Tomorrow, 7pm
Where: Taipei Municipal Stadium, 46 Bade Rd, Sec 1, Taipei (
Tickets: Available at door or through Era ticketing at www.ticket.com.tw. Only tickets for NT$1,500 remain.
June 23 to June 29 After capturing the walled city of Hsinchu on June 22, 1895, the Japanese hoped to quickly push south and seize control of Taiwan’s entire west coast — but their advance was stalled for more than a month. Not only did local Hakka fighters continue to cause them headaches, resistance forces even attempted to retake the city three times. “We had planned to occupy Anping (Tainan) and Takao (Kaohsiung) as soon as possible, but ever since we took Hsinchu, nearby bandits proclaiming to be ‘righteous people’ (義民) have been destroying train tracks and electrical cables, and gathering in villages
Dr. Y. Tony Yang, Associate Dean of Health Policy and Population Science at George Washington University, argued last week in a piece for the Taipei Times about former president Ma Ying-jeou (馬英九) leading a student delegation to the People’s Republic of China (PRC) that, “The real question is not whether Ma’s visit helps or hurts Taiwan — it is why Taiwan lacks a sophisticated, multi-track approach to one of the most complex geopolitical relationships in the world” (“Ma’s Visit, DPP’s Blind Spot,” June 18, page 8). Yang contends that the Democratic Progressive Party (DPP) has a blind spot: “By treating any
This year will go down in the history books. Taiwan faces enormous turmoil and uncertainty in the coming months. Which political parties are in a good position to handle big changes? All of the main parties are beset with challenges. Taking stock, this column examined the Taiwan People’s Party (TPP) (“Huang Kuo-chang’s choking the life out of the TPP,” May 28, page 12), the Democratic Progressive Party (DPP) (“Challenges amid choppy waters for the DPP,” June 14, page 12) and the Chinese Nationalist Party (KMT) (“KMT struggles to seize opportunities as ‘interesting times’ loom,” June 20, page 11). Times like these can
Swooping low over the banks of a Nile River tributary, an aid flight run by retired American military officers released a stream of food-stuffed sacks over a town emptied by fighting in South Sudan, a country wracked by conflict. Last week’s air drop was the latest in a controversial development — private contracting firms led by former US intelligence officers and military veterans delivering aid to some of the world’s deadliest conflict zones, in operations organized with governments that are combatants in the conflicts. The moves are roiling the global aid community, which warns of a more militarized, politicized and profit-seeking trend
RSS