Chapter 124 - Black Tide
On August14, the "Singing China" tour team ended its competition in Tianfu.
Of the 10singers on the tour team, three was eliminated from the competition, includingLin Lang.
Withoutsuspense, Lu Chen defeated the challenger again and continued his nationaltour.
Thecompetition rules of "Singing China" are originally created byBeijing Satellite TV. Because of its cruelty, the ones left from the first top10 in Beijing singing area were Lu Chen, Mu Xiaochu and Zhang Junhua after theend of Hangzhou Station.
On the surface,such rules are very disadvantageous to the top singers in the singing area,especially in the Beijing singing area.
Because ifthey want to get to the top 10 in the country to take part in the finalelection, they have to overcome the challengers in the other six major singingareas all the way. If they lose any competition, they will lose the opportunity,and there will be no revival process.
But fromanother point of view, the contestant from Beijing singing area cantheoretically have the most appearances, and the intensive itinerarycompetition is a great test of will and endurance, and as long as they stick toit, the popularity accumulated is still very strong.
In addition,there are bonuses in the competition. A win is 50,000. After the competition inShengjing, Shanghai, Hangzhou and Tianfu, Lu Chen, Mu Xiaochu and Zhang Junhua allearn bonuses of up to 200,000.
Includingthe Beijing singing area top 10 champion bonus, Lu Chen has already received300,000 after-tax reward.
Although thesinging area contestants in the back position can wait for leisure, they also losea lot of opportunities to win bonuses and show their faces. Whether the bestchoice is to win or lose depends entirely on their personal freedom.
It is believedthat by the beginning of the second season of "Singing China" next year, choosinga singing area is going to be a big problem.
In the touringknockout competitions, Lu Chen is undoubtedly the most eye-catching contestantof "Singing China", because all the songs he took out were original, andnone of them were a cover song!
All hisoriginals were easily acknowledged. What's terrifying is that Lu Chen's works areof high quality.
Not tomention that the song "In Spring" has become a big hit, just his own "YouWho Sat Next To Me", "Fly Higher", "Love In The Wind","Those Flowers" and so on can be regarded as excellent or evenclassic works.
Theseexcellent original songs have been loved by a large number of audiences, andthe number of fans is increasing day by day.
In blogs,forums, and post bars, many fans praise Lu Chen as the leader of the newgeneration of singers.
More andmore people in the pop music and entertainment circles are beginning to discusshis works.
Some even clamoredthat domestic original works is rising again. Lu Chen's appearance is the bestproof!
As a result,the ratings of "Singing China" have been continuously improved.
In contrast,Xiangnan Satellite TV's "Super Singer" was undoubtedly overshadowed. Eventhough it entered the national final election earlier than "SingingChina", the ratings in recent issues have been only about 3%.
Some people jokethat the real "Super Singer" is in "Singing China". On thecontrary, "Super Singer" only has a few good singers that appeared. That bothsides took the wrong script.
On Inspur Blog,the number of fans of Lu Chen reached more than 5 million after the online battle.(TN: Original text was "Tianfu Battle" and since I have no clue what thatmeans. I changed it.)
As anunknown newcomer, Lu Chen has risen by rapidly and successfully. He has been applaudedby thousands of fans and viewers, but at the same time, he has also made somepeople hate him out of jealousy.
As a result,a black tide quietly rose.
August 18. Thesecond day after the end of "Singing China" knockout competition in the Huachengsinging area.
At about 7o'clock in the evening, a blog post was suddenly forwarded in large numbers andspread around in Inspur blog!
The title ofthe blog post is: My story and the story of "In Spring". Blogger ID is: WanderingSinger Lao Hai.
The newlyregistered blogger wrote that he was a singer who had been wandering in Beijingfor more than 20 years. When he was 19 years old, he left his hometown todevelop in Beijing and pursuit his own musical dreams.
However, thereality is very cruel, and he was badly battered because of his dream. He wasn'table to see any hope.
Over thepast 20 years, Lao Hai has sung in bars, underground passages, and in People'sSquare. In order to make ends meet, he has often worked in short-term jobs andworked hard for three meals a day.
But he nevergave up his dream and struggled on the music road.
Lao Hai haswritten a lot of works, probably because of the lack of talent, his works havealways been unpopular, but one of them is his favorite, and he firmly believethat it is valuable.
The name ofthis work is "In Spring". After several years of writing and repeatedrevision, it was still not been finalized, and even the lyrics are not perfect,so it has not been taken out for copyright registration.
But heshowed the draft to several of his friends, and they all said that it was avery good song.
He,therefore, became hopeful.
But to LaoHai's surprise, he suddenly heard his familiar melody in a bar some time ago.Only then did he know that a new song called "in Spring" was becomingvery popular and was sung by many people.
And thissong and his work, besides the lyrics, the melody is very similar!
At thattime, Lao Hai felt like he was hit by a bolt of lightning out of the blue. Hewas completely shocked.
How did thathappen?
Lao Haicould hardly believe this fact.
He could notlet go of this heavy knot, so he had to talk to his friends.
But there isnothing his friends can do, because this song "In Spring" has beencopyrighted by others, and his empty words are groundless. How can he provethat it was his own work?
So, justmove on. There's no need to shout around. People will just say you're jealousand slanderous.
Lao Haiknows that what his friends are saying is also for his own good. He is just a Beijingdrift singer with no power, no money, and no reputation. What qualifications dohe have to fight with others? His best choice is to give up.
But hereally didn't want to give up.
Therefore,he applied for an account in the Inspur blog and told his story.
Lao Hai didn'task others whether they believe it or not, he just want to get the fairness hedeserve!
This blogpost is very long and very emotional, with skilled writing that vividly depictsa middle-aged singer struggling at the bottom, and presented to everyone.
The storythat it told made passer-by who saw it couldn't help but be filled withrighteousness and indignation!
At the endof the blog post, Lao Hai also attached several photos of worn-out curlyhandwritten paper. The content of whichwas the composition of the song, and despite many traces of modification andsmear, one can still see the dense notes clearly.
As a newblogger without any fans, the post by Wandering Singer Lao Hai went unnoticedat first, but it was quickly forwarded and @ a number of big Vs and celebritiesin the industry.
Then, amazingly,in just a few hours the number of forwards has reached tens of thousands, whichhas been read by more and more people. The number of clicks and commentsincreased exponentially!
By 10o'clock in the evening, the blog post was on the hot list on the home page of InspurBlog.
110,000+forwards, 350,000+ comments, and 500,000+ likes!
In thecomments, many people expressed their support for the blogger, sympathized withhis experience, and supported him to defend his rights and fight a lawsuit.
However,many people are skeptical about the authenticity of the story and think it is amalicious hype.
Althoughthis blog post did not name names, but the one being pointed out is too obvious.So, after the blog post climbed to the hot list, Lu Chen's blog post was blownout!
Thosebloggers who don't know the truth accused Lu Chen of plagiarizing Lao Hai,which is simply shameless.
Some peopleasked Lu Chen to apologize to Lao Hai and return the copyright of "In Spring"to the other party.
Some peopletold Lu Chen to get out of the entertainment industry!
If Lu Chen,who participated in "Singing China" before, was still an unknownlittle newcomer, then now he seems to be a rising star, bearing countlesspraise and glory.
In contrast,the wandering singer Lao Hai looks pitiful and will naturally make peoplesympathize with him.
These peoplewho scold Lu Chen do not know the truth of the matter, nor do they care aboutthe truth.
They weretouched by the story of Lao Hai and felt great disgust for Lu Chen. Therefore,they spontaneously participated in the siege of Lu Chen in order to vent theiremotions.
Some people wentto Beijing Satellite TV, "Singing China" program group, and even TanHong, Chen Fei'er's blog.
RequestingLu Chen to be banned!
And somewell-known bloggers are also contributing to this.
A personfrom the industry with V certification lamented that the domestic pop music industrywas so corrupted that plagiarism became the usual hype without limits, whichmade many truly talented people unable to stand out.
He strongly appealedto Beijing Satellite TV to take the initiative to ban Lu Chen and not allowplagiarists to stand on the stage.
As if it wasalready determined that Lu Chen plagiarized the works of Lao Hai!
There are alot of big V and small V in the blogging industry who hold similar views. WhileInspur blog has set off to denounce Lu Chen's black tide, this matter hasquickly spread to posts, forums and even QQ groups.
Lu Chenseems to have suddenly become a falling dog that everyone is crying out for,and his plagiarism is already a sure thing!
But althoughthere are a lot of people who don't know the truth, there are also a lot ofpeople who have discerning eyes.
A newlyregistered blog, a blog post without any real evidence besides a few photos andemotional words, has unexpectedly caused such a big storm in such a shortperiod of time.
To say thatthere is no one is controlling this behind the scene is a complete insult to one'sIQ!
Who doesn'tknow that those few big V who are actively promoting these are people who obeyanyone that feeds them.
But itdoesn't mean that just because they see something strange doesn't mean they'llfight for Lu Chen.
Lu Chen has recentlybeen in a strong limelight, and some time ago he also offended XiangnanSatellite TV, making several people in the circle lose face.
Eitherthey're taking pleasure in others' misfortunes or sharing a common hatred of anenemy, many people chose to stand idly by, and some even followed a small push,happy to see Lu Chen fall! (TN: Followed a small push = add fuel to thefire/make thing worst.)
This is howthe entertainment circle works. Lu Chen is someone who has no roots and somewhatfamous, suitable for stepping on a few feet. (TN: Suitable to be suppressed?)
Everyone iswaiting to see how he will respond to such a fierce black tide!
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TN: Thetitle of the chapter "黑潮" is translatedas Japan Current or Kuroshio, which is also known as "black tide". After numberof hours of reading and research, I was able to find out that Japan Current orKuroshio is the strongest warm current in the western North Pacific Ocean. Itis the north equatorial warm current that turns north on the east coast of thePhilippine Islands. The mainstream flows northward along the east coast ofTaiwan Island and the west side of the Ryukyu Islands to the southeastern coastof the Japanese archipelago. Because the sea water is blue and black, hence thename.
Now, you may ask what does it have to do withthe story. And my answer is "Absolutely Nothing!". I still don't knowspecifically what it means as all I'm getting out from all the reading andresearch I did is the explanation above, but I think "Black Tide" means makingderogatory or malicious allegations. Maybe closer to the saying "pouring dirtywater".