Flower band interview

This is an interview record that we sorted out from the audio and video interviews that the Wal-Mart band has accepted since its debut in 1998.

Completion: Liu Fei Completion Date: 2000.

Interview record of flower band

Reporter: Why is your band called Flower?

Wang Wenbo: In China, the older generation called teenagers the flowers of the motherland. We were all very young when we formed a band, so we thought of using this name. We have a song called Flowers.

Reporter: When did you come into contact with rock music? How did they get together later?

Zhang Wei: Wang Wenbo and I are classmates in junior high school. We used to study orthodox music. I used to study vocal music. He studies piano, and his mother wants him to be a piano prince like Li Zide. (Laughter) In the second day of junior high school, we listened to the music of the Tang Dynasty and Panther, and then we knew that rock music was good and unique. Once we went for a haircut and met the lead singer of an underground band in the hair salon. He has long hair and we chat together. Later, he introduced the teacher to Wang Wenbo and me respectively. I went to learn the guitar and he learned the drum set.

Wang Wenbo: My teacher listened to Niwawa's album Never mind, and I was stupid.

Zhang Wei: But my teacher always teaches me to play van halen or something. I don't like it at all. Later, Wang Wenbo brought me the Nirvana album, and I immediately knew what I wanted to do. Then I stopped learning guitar and practiced at home. At that time, I didn't know what punk was, so I listened and bought a lot of mouthparts. I also started writing songs, but most of those songs were abandoned, and I don't remember them now. Wang Wenbo and I formed a band with some classmates at school. I'm not the lead singer. Later, I wrote a few songs that I thought were ok, so I asked my friend to find a musician who could be a demo (laughs). But at that time, I didn't know the band needed a bass player. I thought only jazz bands had bass players.

Wang Wenbo: Many of my friends study piano, and I also played drums for several bands. Yang Guo met in another band. At that time, I thought he was a nice guy, but I heard that he used to be a bad student.

Yang Guo: (Laughter) I'm not a good student at school. Later, I studied photography in technical secondary school and began to learn bass after graduation. When Wang Wenbo told me that they were going to form a band, they didn't know what style they wanted. I didn't know much about punk at that time, and I didn't know what was going on at the first rehearsal. Because I used to like jazz.

Zhang Wei: Old comrades.

Reporter: Yang Guo is the oldest in the band?

Yang Guo: Yes, it's me. But when I go out to perform, they always bully me together. I'm older than them. I'm too old to let them. But our band is very United.

Reporter: How do you know Hongfeng? What do you think after signing the contract?

Zhang Wei: When Yang Guo rehearsed with us for the first time, Da Le, the bassist of The Catcher in the Rye, came to see us rehearse. In fact, he didn't want to see us at first. He doesn't know who we are. At that time, another band was rehearsing at my house. Da Le came to see them. As a result, those people didn't come, so he watched us rehearse. He thought it was ok and asked us if we wanted to perform. Of course, the band had to perform, so we went to the Busy Bee Bar with him, and Hongfeng was in charge of the performance. We only performed seven songs for the first time. After the performance of Hongfeng, tell us that we can perform every weekend in the future. The second time we met, he said that he could sign an appointment with us as a broker. I don't understand. He can perform anyway.

Wang Wenbo: His real name is Fu. We all call him Brother Fu.

Yang Guo: Brother Fu arranged for us to perform in the bar every Friday and rehearse on Sunday. The facilities there were just so-so, but at that time we thought it was very good. Many of our songs were written at that time.

Zhang Wei: My parents signed the contract when I was fourteen. There is nothing special about signing the contract. I'm in grade three, and I have a lot of homework, but the weekend performance is still good. I like performing, and I get excited when I hear the drums. We rehearse in the bar every Sunday, and Brother Fu will accompany us, record samples for us and help us revise the arrangement. Those days were particularly good. During my summer vacation, Brother Fu stopped performing in that bar and said he would open a record company to send us an album. We didn't think so much, and then we went into the shed.

Reporter: When did you first enter the shed? What song was recorded?

Zhang Wei: About1early July, 998. (Look at Wang Wenbo)

Wang Wenbo: Yes, today is July 18, which means "School is over". Not the version in our album, but the DEMO recorded for China Fire 3.

Reporter: Tell me about your recording. What's the fun?

Zhang Wei: I was very excited to record in the shed for the first time, but later ... Wang Wenbo probably felt the deepest.

Wang Wenbo: (Laughter) In the past, people always said that I played drums well, so I was quite confident before recording, but I almost collapsed as soon as I entered the shed. You don't know what that feels like. Listen, continuous shooting can't even find the metronome. What was recorded at that time was the audition version of "School is Over". The song was only over two minutes in total, but I recorded drums for seven hours. Later, I completely lost confidence and almost cried. Zhang Wei and Yang Guo slept in the lounge. When they woke up, I was still on the swing.

Yang Guo: We waited for seven hours, and the excitement of entering the cabin has disappeared. Later, it was my turn to record bass. I was so nervous that the sound engineer asked me to make a sound. I fed the sound engineer for a long time and everyone laughed.

Zhang Wei: The official album recording was1September, 1998. Wang Wenbo and I are in Grade One, so we have to use weekend recording. Although the recording is very bitter and tiring, I still feel quite good. It feels quite different to record your own songs. We recorded for two months, and I always had the hardest time, because the daytime was occupied by Wang Wenbo, and recording guitar and singing was in the middle of the night. Brother Fu is our producer. He is very strict. He usually talks and laughs with us, but he is very fierce when recording, because our technology is really not so good. I was still writing songs during the recording, such as Don't Lie to me and Helpless, all of which were written in the lounge of the recording studio.

Wang Wenbo: Actually, it doesn't take seven hours to record each song. The key is that we modified the arrangement when recording, and I recorded some songs very quickly. However, The Master of the Future, which should have been included in the first album, was a cover of the songs of our Communist Youth League members. Because I can't play that fast, I didn't record it. This has always been my shame. It was finally recorded when it was included later.

Yang Guo: The recording is actually quite good. It's easy to find your own problems. Usually, performances are just exciting on the stage, and many problems are ignored. When rehearsing, you pay more attention to arranging music, so personal technical problems are particularly obvious when recording. After recording the first album, we all made some progress, but Wang Wenbo's drums made the greatest progress.

Wang Wenbo: Yes, I swing like this every weekend. I'm sorry if I don't make any progress.

Reporter: After listening to your CD, I found that the early works presented are not quite the same as now. When did you start to form this style? What music do you usually listen to? What will happen in the future?

Zhang Wei: I used to like nirvana, so those early songs were a bit rubbish. Those songs were written before I met Brother Fu, and I didn't intend to record them at first, but after thinking about it, I don't want to record them now. Brother Fu also said that those songs really represented the state when we first formed. After we signed the contract, Brother Fu introduced us to a lot of new music and recorded a lot of tapes for me, among which Green Day was my favorite. Because that kind of music suits us best, simple and pleasant, and extremely strong, I like extremely strong. Actually, it was then that I really started listening to punk music, which was very good.

Yang Guo: At first, I didn't really like punk. Later, after listening to Green Day, I began to like punk.

Zhang Wei: I don't know what style the works in our first album are. It's complicated. But our main style may be punk-pop, which is pop punk. We didn't think so much when recording, just recorded what we thought. Later, we came into contact with more music, such as RANCID, THE JESUS AND MARY CHAIN, ASH, SEX PISTOL, RAMONES, THE CURE, BLUR, WEEZER, MXPX. But what I dream of doing is not a punk album. I really want to write an album like HONEY'S DAED by Jesus and Mary Chain, but I don't think I can write such a good song, and there is no such timbre in China. But I think it's wonderful. I also listen to other kinds of music. Brother Fu introduced me a lot. I will buy it myself when I have time. Knowing all kinds of music is good for my creation. We will definitely change in the future, but I am in no hurry. I can't change for the sake of change. How fake.

Yang Guo: Actually, listen more. The growth of technology and experience will make us a little different from before, but the change should be natural, not forced. Besides, even pop punk music, there are many things we haven't mastered yet.

Zhang Wei: We didn't form a band to follow the fashion, so the trend has nothing to do with us. I feel particularly embarrassed that many people have changed in order to keep up with the trend. We express it in our favorite way. For example, a recent song has a little taste of SKA.

Wang Wenbo: I don't think we will change much in the near future, mainly in technology and arrangement. Definitely better than the first album. Now if you re-record the first album, it will definitely be better than the original.

Yang Guo: Yes, I have to re-record the bass of Nothing, which is a shame for me.

Reporter: Do your parents support you to make music? What about the teacher? What do the students around you think of you after you become famous? Do you think life has changed since you became famous?

Zhang Wei: My parents were not particularly supportive at first, but they were ok. It is better to form a band than to go out to play. In the past, my father kept many birds, especially rare birds. Later, we rehearsed at home, and all the birds were shocked to death. He was not angry, but he still supported me. But my mother thinks that all rock musicians have long hair, take drugs, are hooligans and rascals. After we signed the contract, Brother Fu was very strict with us. We don't smoke or drink. Teachers don't like rock music, so they don't count on their support at all.

Wang Wenbo: That's right. Being famous is not necessarily a good thing in their eyes. Some teachers are particularly unbalanced, thinking that you can make money at such a young age. They think that as long as you become famous, you will be rich, such as having a car and a house.

Zhang Wei: Being famous is very troublesome. In the past, teachers didn't have to pay special attention to you, but after the album was released, everyone knew you, so they paid special attention to you and demanded more of you than others. The students in our class found that our band was quite new when they first released the album, but they didn't feel much special when they mixed together every day. After class, they are still playing on the playground. Because we are still at school most of the time now, there is nothing particularly big change in our life, that is, holidays and rest days are used for rehearsals, performances and recording.

Wang Wenbo: It's different from before. We can earn money to buy clothes and records we like, and we don't have to ask our families for them.

Reporter: What kind of people are your audiences? What do you want to express in your work? Where did the inspiration come from?

Zhang Wei: Our audience? Most of them are about our age, middle school students. There are also college students and adults who like rock music. We are teenagers now, and we write about things we are familiar with. What happened around me, such as "School is over", was written when I was in the third grade, just to write about the feeling of yearning for school. Inspiration is my life. "Shoot Me" tells me that I can't sleep when I go home. When I was very excited, I suddenly thought of a sentence to fire at me. Turkey on straw is a bunch of foreign words that Yang Guo told me one night, such as eight-eared donkey and six-faced camel. Suddenly, a turkey came up from the straw. When he left, I thought the word turkey on the straw was good, and then I wrote it like this. I don't think animals need to fight for anything or be vain. They just crow every day. At most, they just found a hen. There will be no more thoughts, and life will be simpler. "Vigorous" means that we always have no opening remarks in the performance, and then after such a song, we begin to dance together as soon as we perform. The song "Flowers" is about the feeling of seeing a little girl when I was a child. I don't think such things should be interfered by parents' society. I think a person must have feelings for girls as long as he is more than 1.5 meters. During that time, my classmates were very busy and no one asked me to play. I feel bored. I am nearsighted when I watch TV. At that time, I watched TV until 2: 30 every night except sleeping, and my head was dizzy and stuffy every day. That's what I'm saying. "Four Seasons Songs" is to recall what you have done for more than ten years in one night. When I think about it, I feel that I have come here without doing anything, just to change my life schedule. "Takeoff" doesn't like homework, because homework is too annoying in grade three. I can't play the piano, practice or go shopping. I think it's good to have a proper extracurricular life. "Disillusionment" is because I heard that 1999 is a world disaster. Although stupid, I want to do one thing before I die, always destroying and changing everything I don't like. The name Next to Happiness has nothing to do with this song. At that time, my deskmate made a girlfriend and told me that she was very happy all day. I feel almost happy. Later, when I wrote the lyrics of this song, I thought of many words that I didn't have a chance to say at ordinary times. Melting is also that feeling. Some words are well written as lyrics, which is a bit silly to say. I don't think there was any song about the life of peers before. This is what we want to do. In fact, I just want everyone to know that if you have something on your mind, you must say it, especially to your elders. There must be many different ideas, so be sure to speak out and let them know.

Reporter: Just over a month after your debut album went on the market, Taiwan Province Magic Stone Records Company signed a contract for overseas release, and then Karen Mok and Yang Naiwen each covered one of your works. How do you feel?

Zhang Wei: Our album was originally planned to be released overseas during the summer vacation of 1999. Later, the earthquake in Taiwan Province Province postponed the release date to 65438+February. We are glad that more people can listen to our music. The cover was decided by the company and Magic Stone, and I also listened to it. Not bad, but not like us. The arrangement of Yang Naiwen's version of Still is quite good, while Karen Mok's Elimination tastes a little strange. I wonder if mainland music is easy to hear overseas. (Reporter: It's not easy) I think mainland rock music is the best among Chinese, and it can't be compared with Europe and America.

Reporter: Which bands in the Mainland do you like? What about Hongkong and Taiwan Province Province?

Zhang Wei: We like good girls and underground babies in Chinese mainland. I don't listen to rock music much in Hongkong and Taiwan Province. I think Zhang Zhenyue has some good songs. I like some popular music with beautiful melody.

Reporter: What is your future? Will you always make music for a living?

Zhang Wei: I think there will be no money in the future. Everything costs money. Tired, huh? Then you don't spend money on anything. Anyway, many friendships and feelings are frozen because of money. So if you have no money, anyone can do something casually, but the society with less desire is particularly good. Making music should be a pleasure. If you take it as a job, you must be very tired. I study art design. Maybe after graduation, when I'm not making music, I'll design the album cover in the company, and I'll talk about it when I want to do it.

Wang Wenbo: I am a fun-loving person. I like to be carefree. I don't know what will happen in the future, but I will always play drums.

Yang Guo: I think it would be nice if the music in the world could circulate faster in the future. Many bands can come to China to perform, and bands from China can often go out to perform. How fun.

Reporter: Does the domestic rock predecessors have a great influence on you?

Zhang Wei: It should be said that it has little impact. We only learned about rock music through them, and then we listened to western music. Rock music originally came from the west. When we first formed a band, we warmed up for good girls and spent a lot of time with them. When it comes to influence, we are greatly influenced by them.

Reporter: Have you been influenced by rock music (or bands) from Europe, America, Japan or China? What direction are you going to work hard?

Zhang Wei: Foreign bands have a great influence on us, especially Green Day in America. Their music is very good and full of energy. At first, we formed a band because we listened to Nirvana, and then the music changed. Now we listen to many records. We like Blink- 182, Ash, MXPX and some tough guys rap, and sometimes we listen to some electronic and skarn music. The image of Japanese band is ok. We don't like Japanese pop music. Japanese comics are quite good. For domestic bands, we prefer the good girls when the first album was released, as well as underground treasures and mirrors. In the future, we don't know what will happen in the future. This thing is unimaginable. Who knows what kind of music we will like in the future? If you still play this kind of music when you are old, it is estimated that your physical strength will not work.

Reporter: Some people say that your music is too simple, just three chords, and others say that your music is too commercial. what do you think?

Zhang Wei: Our music is very simple. Punk music should be simple and direct. There is nothing wrong with writing a song smoothly with three chords. The songs of many foreign bands are triad. In fact, complex chords are not necessarily good. When writing a song, you can write wherever you feel. The song Flower has only two chords. What they really want to say is that our technology is not good enough. I admit that our skills are not good enough and we are working hard, but I am not the kind of person who wants to be a guitar master. Technology should serve music, and I didn't come up with a guitar textbook. And simple things are often the easiest to move people. Our songs are very nice, and our albums sell well. Is this business? If so, I don't think there is anything wrong. Because I didn't consider whether to commercialize when writing songs, and Nirvana's album sold well. Is it commercial? I think everyone has different ideas. Some people want to do experimental music, but we won't. I think making music depends not only on what you want to do, but also on what you can do You have to do it step by step, right? I don't think making music is ugly, but swearing at random is thinking. I must think differently from you. I like to express my ideas in this way. I don't know what others think.

Reporter: Your music style is punk-pop. Do you also consider reasons such as being more acceptable to fans?

Zhang Wei: Our music is mainly influenced by punk-pop style, because we like that expression, which is more direct and powerful. As for whether fans can accept it or not, we are never willing, and the company does not require us to do so. As long as we feel good, we will do it, whether it is fashionable or not. In addition, if we write songs to express our happiness or troubles, you can't write about other people's happiness. I don't know the happiness of others. I think we should write what we know, what we are familiar with and what we feel.

Reporter: The creation of rock lyrics has something to do with my thoughts, feelings and life experiences. Will it be influenced by teenagers' shallow life experience?

Zhang Wei: This question is very interesting. What are the lyrics of rock music? We don't know. Do the lyrics of rock music have to have a special depth? It's like writing a composition. Teachers always praise students whose compositions are particularly mature, as if those who are precocious are particularly good. I think all ages should live in any way, and each age has its own way of life. We think that as long as it is true and fluent, it may be that the previous rock music made everyone feel too sense of mission, so many people think that the lyrics of rock music are shouting and demonstrating. The lyrics of rock music are actually about everyone's life and feelings. You can write wherever you want, so you must pretend to be profound and boring. We have only lived for more than ten years, and our experience must be relatively shallow. When creating, we try our best to express ourselves in a way that we can master, which is the same as playing the piano and drumming. Some people can't write a song after practicing technology all their lives, but many ideas can't be expressed until they get home. Is everything wrong? I just want to say that we will grow up one day and worry about our love career and family like everyone else, but at that time, you will definitely miss us more because we have not become hypocritical.