Vae is someone whose pictures I had seen before I heard his voice, but apparently he was more than just a amateur net idol. He’s a polymath, someone who excels at many things. He was one of the top ten students in Anhui province, and graduated from Anhui Medical School. He also dabbled in writing and web graphics, publishing more than 20 articles in periodicals and winning an award for the later in Anhui. On top of all that, he’s somehow been a prolific songwriter as well, who does all the composing, lyrics, arranging, recording, mixing, etc for his songs.
On January 10th his first real “debut” album is supposed to be released (it’s been leaked though). The presale order for this reached 10,000 through orders on his website.
Vae – You He Bu Ke
His first claim to fame was when his song “Moth” was put on Sina in 2006 and received more than 70,000 downloads. He got a lot of offers after that, such as producing the 2006 Supergirls album. I’m not sure if he took up any of those offers (especially since that album sucked). He did however write a lot of songs in that time. He has written at least 110 songs so far, and despite only releasing a real album only now (with only 9 songs? what’s up with that?) , he’s gained a hoard of fans who love his music.
He’s also gotten a lot of Jay/Hou Xian comparisons (he even kind of looks like Jay, with bigger lips), leaving me scratching my head as how I’ve never heard of him before this release since I love both Jay and Hou Xian’s compositions.
This is a collab between Vae and someone called “Jay’s Shadow”, called such because he sounds like Jay. Who is Jay’s Shadow? Who knows…definitely not Jay, and I don’t think it’s Hou Xian like some speculate. I think it’s just some random dude, but anyway, it’s a nice song to listen to.
Vae and “Jay’s Shadow’ – Liu Ni Wan (note: Jay’s Shadow is credited as “Jay de ying zi”)
In contrast to Hou Xian who apparently loves his Zhong Guo Feng style and is sticking to it until the bitter end, Vae sort of experiments around, and I feel like he still has much to explore with his music. Vae definitely has talent and at age 22 he can pretty much go any direction with his future. I’ve enjoyed what I’ve heard from him and I hope he sticks to music instead of all those other things, because selfishly, I will never be the recipient of any good medical care he gives. Watch this statement come back to haunt me.
His songs are pretty awesome… can’t say too much about the singing though.
err… does singapore sell his album ? i finding his album in singapore do u know where can buy?
Oh i haven’t heard of him yet, but I think his music is pretty good. Is the second also a song by him? It sounded familiar, but i like it though. I am not a big fan of Jay, but I do like his music. I just don’t really follow his news and stuff lol.
But I found some of his songs using Kugou and got lots of songs. Although I am not sure if it’s all his hahah.
But glad you posted some music of him, now I get to know more of artists in Mainland China XD
cfensi: Oh, I noticed the commercialism thing, but I hadn’t noticed that! I think he has reasoning behind it, but he’d get flamed if he said what it is. No one likes getting flamed.
Hmm…I thought “真实” might be Vae, but it turns out that it’s by someone else called Xun. Actually, some of the songs I have labeled as “Fake Jay” are kind of neat, but looking through trying to figure out who sang them, it seems that I’m finding out just how often Jay’s albums have leaked out ahead of time and how many times people have tried to substitute other people’s songs as Jay’s. These “Fake Jays” deserve some credit if they are getting compared to a composer like Jay! (Knowing about Vae and Hou Xian made me curious, so I’m trying to search down the real titles of some of these songs and their singers.)
Hmm…you think he hates the commercialism of China? I just didn’t like the fact that he spoke so blithely about Supergirls, since despite not having watched a single episode, he was so sure it was bad. But I guess that kind of falls into commercialism too.
But anyway…I should be really talking about another blogger on here.
idarklight: Vincent is really confusing! I think it’s better that I listen to a mix, since that way, not all the songs are so hard to figure out.
cfensi: I see what you mean, but you have to remember, Americans see things very differently from the Chinese, even with exposure to the culture. It still irks me a bit that artists are so commercial. While I guess Jay Chou posing for Metersbonwe is not really different from female artists having lines of perfume (I have Celine Dion perfume), the really popular artists do too many ads to keep up with! Soda, clothing, shoes, sports equipment, shampoo, instant noodles, potato chips! Of course, I can use this to my advantage. From Jay, I learned “雪碧,” which is much more useful than “可乐” because I hate cola, but I do like Sprite. I also learned “海飞丝” from LeeHom, and I use that every day. Still, you can see that this is very different from American culture. Sure, there are some songs in commercials, and Hannah Montana is everywhere, but then again, not many adults like Miley Cyrus and the commercialism isn’t so big that you find big, huge posters of Daughtry on the sides of buses.
I think Vae should go for whatever career he decides, but it’ll probably take him a while to decide with so many talents.
Oh I’ll definitely have to look that up when I have more time…I like John’s blog …some parts bother me a bit, but overall it’s one of the better expat blogs.
I’ll have to look that up when I have more free time though.
Vincent Fang is awesome. I love his lyrics despite the fact that half of the time I have no idea what he means ( I tried translating Jade Liu’s Yi Ju Yi Shang once and gave up after figuring out that Vincent Fang makes up words…)
LOL! I wonder how people freak out when they find out that I learned Chinese from Jay Chou. I mean, even Jay said not to listen to him while studying Chinese, though I think he was joking. While I had to learn pronunciation elsewhere, I think there were some good things about learning Chinese from Jay:
1. I had to listen harder. Not every person I’ll talk to in life with speak clear, perfect Chinese, so listen to Jay’s slurred, fast Mandarin should prepare me for the worst.
2. Chinese grammar looks easy, but it’s easier to learn when you hear it in use.
3. You actually learn some culture from listening to songs. Seriously, quite a few songs focus on family values and Vincent Fang lyrics are always teaching me something about Chinese history. Last year, I had to look up information on an ancient work of calligraphy, of course.
4. In order for me to learn something, it has to be fun.
5. I learn to read Traditional characters from reading the lyrics because Jay mumbles so much and the lyrics are too complicated for me to just pick them up all the time. Otherwise, Simplified Chinese is more my comfort zone.
Of course, it was just a silly mistake John overlooked on the blog entry, something that the writer wouldn’t notice but anyone else would, I think. I like reading John’s blog, partly because I’d like to imagine being in China myself and partly because I learn a lot, though quite a few things are just over my head. Have you ever read the entry about the ultimate Chinese proficiency test? It’s hilarious! It’s the first thing you’ll get if you search “Jay Chou” on the site. :P
http://z9.invisionfree.com/bww2/index.php?showtopic=93503&st=0&#entry15948149
The link above links to where you can download the album. You’ll have to register and post a bit first though.
I really like the two songs you posted up of Vae and I’ll be trying more of his music. (110 songs! o_O)
@windowwatcher – But you haven’t tried Jay Chou, and this guys sounds so much like him. Why don’t you try Jay first? I like his music better, so far.
Part of the reason I posted on Vae, besides just his music, is also because I am intrigued by the fact that he was able to compose 110 songs while in medical school. How is that even possible? I think a genius for composition does depend on how many you can produce sometimes…so it’ll be interesting to see what this guy can do if he actually concentrates on music. Although in reality, I don’t think someone should waste the good education he was given. Doctors are more needed in this world.
@DontWorryAboutIt
I have no idea where to buy his music. Sorry. :(
you he bu ke – Something like What reason is there not to? or Why not?
@ hobielover
By chance I went to sinosplice, and I saw who else you had corrected. Good job if you can actually correct the Chinese of a linguist whose passion for Chinese matches your own, but whose job is to learn Chinese, and has lived in China for eight years.
Does he know you learned Chinese through Jay Chou. :P
http://74.125.95.102/translate_c?hl=en&sl=zh-CN&u=http://mp3.baidu.com/singerlist/vae.html&prev=/search%3Fq%3Dhttp://mp3.baidu.com/singerlist/vae.html%26hl%3Den%26sa%3DG&usg=ALkJrhgxephSJgrEaRgpNM2pRe-uddU7OQ#
idk if that will help lol
can you tell me where i can buy his music?
and what does the first song title translate to?
thanks :]
cool, thanks for putting this up. He sounds a bit generic pop to me, but hey, I love that, and this was pleasant. how do I listen to his entire album?
7, I don’t know why I keep them, but they just sit there, from the days when I had eMule and found a lot of fake Jay songs. At least one of them is actually a David Tao song. “真实,” “深蓝色的情书,” “破戒,” and “一个人的生活” are some of the other titles. I don’t know if they are also by Vae, but it’s possible that one or more of these is actually a Vae song. There’s also a mystery song that was evidently included on a fake version of the “黄金甲” EP, no idea what that is.
@hobielover – Yup, that’s one of his. How many fake-Jay songs do you have?
@VII Oh really?
Tell me if you want info for any of your LJ comm updates…I’ve been not really reading LJ much anymore due to lack of time, but later I should be able to tell you some facts on people. China’s has a whole bunch of new artists, it’s really hard to keep track. It’s tiring actually. I want to post on people that I find really interesting like Vae, but I don’t have the time!
I actually got this album a couple days ago – haven’t listened to it yet. I’m always getting music that no ones seems to have any information on outside of chinese news sites i don’t really read, so thank you!
Don’t worry, this is the second little mistake like this I’ve pointed out in the last 24 hours.
Wait, did he sing “玫瑰花的葬礼” by any chance? I have it listed under “Fake Jay” in my music folders. I’ll have to beg someone to upload this album for me, since there’s no way I’ll be able to get it otherwise.
Whoops…you’re right. I wasn’t even paying attention. I was looking this at the same time as his full tracklist of all the songs he wrote, and one of the songs had a similar title I think.
Should have double-checked, but I’ve been trying to not spend too much time with these posts lately. My Chinese isn’t up to par with yours I think actually. I have to stare at words more one by one rather than looking at it as a whole…second-language learners know what I mean.
Yeah, yesasia won’t have it. My favorite on there is track two.
I really want to find all 110 of his songs. I don’t get why he doesn’t release them in album form if he did all the work for them.
I like the play on “Prague Square” towards the end of “Liu Ni Wan.” (Why would “遛” be “dou”? Does the sound change sometimes or something?) There’s also a bit that sounds like part of the song Jay sang about NQMM but never released, “大头贴.” (This one is a real Jay song, confirmed, but not released, unlike other songs that were just rumored to be Jay songs, and there’s even a music video for it.) That’s where “狗儿啊 狗儿啊” comes from.
Looks like YesAsia doesn’t have Vae’s album, but maybe I can listen to it over the Internet. ><