L-R Zhu Zixiao, Zhang Han, Zheng Shuang, Yu Haoming, and Wei Chen
Meteor Shower’s theme song was released featuring the voices of all four “Hua”. The soundtrack will feature the lovely voices of Wei Chen and Yu Haoming …and the voices of Zhang Han, Zhu Zixiao and Zheng Shuang. The series will be shown in early August on Hunan TV, after Always Smile! finishes airing.
Pianist Lang Lang, Folk singer Song Zuying, Cpop artist Jay Chou, and renowned Spanish opera singer Placido Domingo got together at the birds nest. Having read about the preparation work for weeks, and looking at the performance list, I can safely say that this concert was so much better organized than Jackie Chan’s concert, which seemed messy and thrown together. If I can find HQ videos of the performances I am definitely doing a post on this. Each and every performance meant something and showed off the variety of Chinese music.
Carsick Cars releases their new album: You Can Listen You Can Talk . The I haven’t listened to the album yet though so I can’t tell if they’ve fallen into Sophmore slump territory. Theya had a release party at Yugong Yushan in Beijing to the delight of their fans who hadn’t seen them perform in months. Not only did they sing Zhong Nanhai and other songs of their own, but the Dj also put on Michael Jackson songs with the crowd singing along .
A-mei Chang also released her album AMIT – Amei: Music is Transformed, with a new style. I like it a lot better than her last one. Listen to her album here.
On her blog HK singer-songwriter G.E.M. Tang posted a new song All About You . Not written by her but she sounds gorgeous like always. She has been in America recording her first album.
Jerry Yan releases MV “I Will Love You”. If the girl in the drawing @ 1:20 sec into the MV looks familiar, that’s because she’s Secret, Parking actress Gui Lun-mei. Although her face doesn’t actually appear in the MV besides that charcoal sketch, she was recently in a lengthy Walkman commercial with Jerry Yan that featured this song.
1983 group (two bald twins), sang their song Happy Zhu Bajie, at a festival in China in Chendu I believe. I lost the article link so the details of this are fuzzy. But I’m just glad they’re promoting this song, because it’s one of those fun goofy songs. They used to do ballads a lot, but I hope they go in this direction more.
Television:
The so-called “large-scale” TV Drama Remembrance of Dreams Past with Chen Kun as the lead released its first set of HQ stills and the sets look great. Chen Kun plays the son of a princess in the time of the last emperor, and will play his character from age 18 to 90 from the Republic of China to the 70s as he travels in the story from Taiwan to Beijing, to Shanghai and then finally to the South.
Another “large-scale” drama, The New Dream of the Red Chamber is so large that it’s “past caring about the money”. Its production cost has surpassed 200 million yuan (~30 million USD) , which is an absolutely ridiculous sum for a tv series and pretty much unrecoverable. I thought it had gone into post-production but it’s actually only a fifth of the way finished, and two hours of filming were shown on Beijing TV allowing for critique. It was said that Older Baoyu (Yang Yang) was very good, very professional, and didn’t seem as dull as in pictures (I have to agree with them on his dull look). Young Baoyu however seemed too crafty due to his eyes. The actor playing Young Baoyu (Yu Xiaotong) had also grown from 174 cm to 184 cm during the filming, giving them another cause for headache, and he had to squat down in many scenes because of his height.
Film:
(L) I love it when actors I like team up unexpectedly together, which is the case here. Wilson Chen Bo-Lin and Wang Luodan will star in a romantic comedy, “Rules Before Dating” based off a hugely popular online novel. He said he’s seen Fen Dou/My Youth, and she first saw him in Blue Gate Crossing, praising him as someone who became a skills-based actor from an idol.
(R) Ivy Chen’s Black and White has just finished airing, and she and Eddie Peng have just finished filming the non-profit film: “Ting Shuo” which is about a hearing impaired swimmer. This film sounds really sweet and definitely hope to see it soon. It comes out end of August.
The trailer for On Her Majesty’s Secret Service, one of those wacky “Chinese Humor” movies starring Louis Koo and Barbie Hsu is out. I love these type of HK movies, so count me in for this as well, especially since I think both actors can act and will do well together.
Tags: 1983 Group, Amei Chang, Carsick Cars, Chen Kun, Eddie Peng, G.E.M. Tang, Gui Lunmei, Ivy Chen, Jerry Yan, Meteor Shower, New Dream of the Red Chamber, Peng Tan, Remembrance of Dreams Past, Wang Luodan, Wilson Chen Bo-lin, Yang Yang, Yu Xiaotong
July 1, 2009 at 7:15 pm
Im looking forward to another one of Wang Luodan’s work.
isn’t Yu Xiaotong born in 1994? I was surprised when I checked at Baike yesterday and said he was 184. He grown like 10cms.
I haven’t watched Always Smile! yet, but apparently everyone’s been saying it is a good series.
I’m really excited for Meteor Shower. So will the english title be “Let’s Go Watch Meteor Shower” now?
July 1, 2009 at 7:36 pm
@yelei I was disappointed with Wang Luodan in An Xiang, especially in comparison to Yang Mi in Chinese Paladin. Both were given kind of annoying characters, but Yang Mi made hers more likeable. I think Wang Luodan is still better in the technical aspects of acting though. Hopefully she’ll be good in her first movie. Everyone has missteps. Chen Bo-lin usually has charismatic acting, but he wasn’t that great in his last movie either. This is a chance at redemption for both of them.
Yeah, Yu Xiaotong’s very young but doesn’t look it. The kids in China are getting taller and taller.
Always Smile is ok but I think I like Hunan’s first series with Zhang Jiani, Dream Links better (I only watched part of it though). Like idarklight said, Hunan dramas are usually fairly good. But under Hunan’s newish eeMedia division, Meteor Shower has the potential to be immensely good, or just spectacularly bad. I’m really, really hoping the latter. Don’t disappoint me Long Danni!
On this site, I’m going to just call it just Meteor Shower and act like there was no name extension.
July 1, 2009 at 11:05 pm
Is the charcoal sketch a throwback to “Secret,” where Xiaoyu drew Xianglun?
I’ve found a lot of clips from Song Zuying’s concert today when I checked Jay2U for updates, so I mostly found Jay’s parts. It seems I’ve missed some of my favorite folk songs, though. I’ve heard “苗岭飞歌” from my A You Duo CD, since A You Duo wrote the song. The only clip I can find of Song Zuying singing it is from another concert in the US. I can’t imagine that a lot of people can actually sing that song. I think the original is entirely in Hmong, but the version Song Zuying sings is in Mandarin.
July 1, 2009 at 11:54 pm
@yelei/cfensi
I think in terms of clothing, cinematography, prettiness and overall plot, Dreams Link was a lot better. But Always Smile! had more intersting fillers, which is pretty much all most idol dramas are about.
I think changing to “Let’s go watch Meteor Shower ” is a terrible name change. The “Let’s go watch” part is so boring and redundant, and adds nothing to the story.
July 2, 2009 at 12:48 am
@idarklight Good point.
@hobielover
Hmmm, maybe? But I don’t really think so. I think Gui Lunmei has probably moved on past Secret.
I saw those clips, but I can’t play youku and I think I’m just going to wait for HQ ones from after CCTV airs the thing.
This vid does a good job summarizing:
http://video.sina.com.cn/ent/y/2009-07-02/010646030.shtml
July 2, 2009 at 1:34 am
Ooh, that clip has a couple of parts of songs that I missed, and the clip of Jay playing “菊花台” is higher quality than what I saw, which was fancam. I hadn’t heard the “小河淌水” part, but I figured out which pictures went with that because of the costumes and the fountain.
I don’t think the whole thing got uploaded onto YouKu, anyways, but I was able to find full songs for most of Jay’s parts. I haven’t looked for the end song yet, though.
July 2, 2009 at 1:53 am
yea i was also dissappointed with Wang Luodan in An Xiang. i’m currently on the 8th ep and her character kind of bores me. i just finished the 6th ep in Chinese Paladin 3 and i think Yang Mi did a good job with her character but plot wise i think An Xiang has more potential. Chinese Paladin 3 is really light hearted but i think the ost is lacking (by a bit) compared to Chinese Paladin 1.
July 2, 2009 at 2:22 am
G.E.M. has some serious talent. She’s still quite young, but she has so much more potential (in terms of potential, I’d rank her above Jane Zhang, even).
Sure, her Mandarin isn’t perfect, but I’d love to see her active outside of just Hong Kong. I kinda feel a Coco Lee-esque career about her, though, so I guess I shouldn’t have to worry about her future career.
That being said, the world today is much different to what it was fifteen years ago. Taiwan is ‘the’ place for HK/Singaporean/Malaysian singers, even though there are far bigger markets out there. So, maybe G.E.M. should look elsewhere besides Taiwan to launch a career. Just a thought.
July 2, 2009 at 3:00 am
Well many of the older generation actors/actresses from Taiwan and Hong Kong are working in China instead, since they know that the market there is bigger.
July 2, 2009 at 3:28 am
@ Benji
I already gave up ranking on potential…there are so many singers that I think have more potential than Jane…but so many of them haven’t reached nearly the level that she did.
Either you have a really good manager and connections, or you work really hard yourself. I really like how sn0w puts it. /
On the other hand, I do wish G.E.M. would go outside of HK. She does have a lot of potential, and she’s so young, too.
I’ve never heard her speaking in mandarin before. Isn’t she from Shanghai, though?
July 2, 2009 at 4:21 am
@darklight
She doesn’t look shanghainese… if she is, I would assume she would know mandarin. many of the shanghaiers who reside in HK moved there in the 70s and 80s, my moms cousin moved to HK and her cousins children can speak putong hua and shanghai dialect very well. But she might be half shanghaier, in that case it would be understandable if she can only speak canto
July 2, 2009 at 6:42 am
I made a small banner for this blog and I’m using it as my signature right now in soompi and other forums im apart of. =)
http://xs941.xs.to/xs941/09274/untitled-1780.png
July 2, 2009 at 6:13 pm
@mrpeng
according to baidu baike (Chinese wiki), she was born in Shanghai and moved to HK when she was 4. When she was little, she was in a mandarin-learning TV show for little kids
@yelei
Gao Xiaochen lives! ;b
July 2, 2009 at 9:17 pm
another one:
http://xs541.xs.to/xs541/09274/untitled-2628.png
i havent touch photoshop in 2 years…
July 2, 2009 at 9:58 pm
@yelei
Thank you so much!!! Banners with Gao Xiaochen. Can I put them in the About Cfensi/Affiliate page? Means a lot that you’re helping to spread Cfensi around.
July 2, 2009 at 11:40 pm
No problem, and yes you can put it up. I would love to see this blog expand into something bigger, but of course we got to take one step at a time. Those high quality pictures were great, I didn’t really have to do much (Gao Xiaochen is such a hottie
)
July 3, 2009 at 3:41 am
testing testing testing…
can i comment?
July 3, 2009 at 3:43 am
omg omg omg i can comment!!! it works!!!! *happy*
G.e.m. is from Shanghai.
Im in china now and i was watching zhejiang tv the day before yesturday and i saw the girlband sister!!!! ya…thats about it….
July 3, 2009 at 3:51 am
and agreed…the new name for meteor shower is kindof stupid…if they didnt want it to be confused with the other versions, the “meteor” part should be dropped
July 3, 2009 at 11:08 am
The theme song to Meteor Shower is awesome. I reckon it suits the drama quite well.
What was the date of the concert with Jay Chou? I know he’s here in Australia at the moment…and I’m pretty torn that I’m not at his Sydney concert now =0
The New Dream of the Red Chamber – $30million USD?!? Wow. Good luck earning that much profit. And also just wanted to say that the Yu Xiaotong guy, he’s the same age as me, and he is so freaking tall.
Anyway, thanks for this post, I enjoyed reading it (Y)
July 3, 2009 at 3:03 pm
@yelei Yeah, I think even if Gao Xiaochen never ends up doing anything, at least I have that nice photoshoot of him.
@julie Hey! But I don’t think the producers of Meteor Shower actually want to erase the resemblance to other versions. It’s free publicity at it’s finest.
@megan I believe the date for the concert was June 30th. But don’t quote me on it.
July 4, 2009 at 2:19 am
i think “yi qi lai kan liu xin yu” sounds better the chinese way…when you translate it to english it sounds kindof corny even though it means the same thing…idk why lol
do you think they took bad shots on purpose to get ppl talking?
July 4, 2009 at 4:29 pm
Ooh, lotsa good stuff to look forward to, especially Remembrance of Dreams Past… and On Her Majesty’s Secret Service looks hilarious!