Nobody Underchans Me

Is it possible to be blinded by over-exposure to the awesomeness that is Jackie Chan?

I knew the guy was popular in China, but what I couldn't have predicted is just how much he gets around. He must hire lookalikes just to get through a day's work.

He plugs cameras, which is not so silly. He makes films. And cars. Not so silly; he presumably drives. Then there's Jackie Chan's Anti Dandruff Shampoo - a bit silly. (Or maybe he's bravely overcome an embarrassing scalp condition.)

That's just the stuff I can wring meaning out of. There are bundles more examples where he gives the Chan imprimatur to an esoteric collection of goodies, ranging from life insurance (plugged by a man who falls on his head for a living) to all sorts of other plugging. I'm pretty sure he's even given the thumb up to constipation. Or at least the medicine.

But what really made me think that JC had started to believe he could also walk on water, was when I turned on Chinese MTV and saw him in the top-twenty countdown. He was singing a romantic little ballad alongside a girl a third of his age. We then cut to ads where he endorses a credit card.

I used to like Jackie because he didn't take himself too seriously. But the parody has become a monster and it's eating itself. His involvement in pop-music does offer me an excuse to wander into an aesthetic minefield though.

I'll probably end up on a blacklist somewhere for saying this (at least corrected) but as far as I can tell, China has no pop-music that sounds Chinese. Certainly none being broadcast on TV. Maybe some things are just universally catchy, and some things aren't. Perhaps you can't modify a traditional Chinese musical style in a way that'll get you tapping your toes at the traffic lights.

The West's pop-music comes from its traditional music in a pretty straight line. The structure, the time-signatures and the harmonies don't stray too far from the baroque. From a three hundred year old European salon, they stroll out to a cotton field, or into a Jazz club or Gospel choir and from there, it's just a hip-shake to Elvis. (Even shorter paths sometimes. Take the traditional English song, “Whiskey in a Jar” as interpreted by that classic folk group, Metallica.)

The only difference between China's pop-music and ours is that the words are a bit harder to understand. Oh, and they're two years behind. Every big group of the last five years in the West has an analogue here in China. Nothing in the charts sounds Chinese. It's Euro-pop with Mandarin lyrics. No micro-tones or Chinese time-signatures.

The one concession I've seen (and it's as agreeable as it is contrived) is an all-girl super-group of talented, young musicians who are selling big at the moment*. The job advertisement read “... be conservatory trained in at least three different Chinese instruments. Must be outrageously good looking.”

However, their sound is anything but traditional music. Underneath the yangqin and erhu is drum machine and synthesizer, pushing out perfectly predictable four-four beats. They're Sky in cute outfits.

I've seen a bit of Chinese Opera on TV now, and as far as the theatrical traditions are concerned, it might as well be Gilbert and Sullivan, or worse, panto. There was even a Chinese Bert Newton playing 'that' role. (Any hammier and you could sell it at a deli.) I was sitting there, opening my mind to the new experience and waiting for the musical epiphany of connecting with another modality, but the cat-strangling sounds had the locals clutching their ears and reaching for the remote. They wanted Blitteny Speals.

*I asked a local about the name of the group. He answered, “Ah, yes. That is Black Swan... no, Duck. No. I think again and it is Black Goose." Majestic sounding bird names have suffered in China before. The manufacturer of the archetypal Chinese bicycle had the choice of translating the name of their product to either Flying Dove, or Flying Pigeon. They chose the latter... and after doing some research, the name of the band is 12 Girls Band. Probably to be translated to Dozen Slappers Posse.