Waves of Chinese popular music

The history of Chinese pop can be dated back to the pre-war era, although the modern production of Chinese pop does not have a long history. During the Cultural Revolution of the 1960s and 1970s, the one-dimensionality of the ‘red propaganda’ songs of the Chinese Communist Party (CCP) was prevalent. When the People's Republic of China (PRC) started to open its doors to the outside world during the early 1980s, albums from outside her borders were not yet permitted to be imported, to prevent these cultural products from ‘polluting’ the spirit of the population. Amid this cultural vacuum, the state-owned Chinese record companies enabled conceivably the first wave of Chinese pop. Jin (Reference Jin2001, p. 6) notes that in 1979, with the production of audio cassettes in China by the newly-founded Pacific Audio-Video Company, the pop music industry in China had rejuvenated and become a very lucrative business. In the mid-1980s the number of such companies reached 300 and the net profit of a single cassette could reach 1 Yuan (RMB): given that a company's sales in the 1980s could reach eight million a year, this was a very high number (Jin Reference Jin2001, p. 77). Although close in form to Western pop, the melodies of such music borrowed largely from traditional Chinese hymns, ethnic ballads and folklore. These can be seen as part of a continuum of music, from worldly, melodic and pentatonic ballads to a more artistic and modern Chinese operatic singing termed ‘pretty voice’ (Meisheng). More importantly, most of these songs carried a political theme, from loving our comrades to serving the country. Chinese pop music at that time was in essence confined to the party's united front.

With China's quick move to commercialisation in the name of a socialist market economy, such music had slowly evolved and metamorphosed into something akin to Western musical form, though one less loaded with political overtones and imbued rather with lyrics of love and romance. Officially, with a view to nourishing the music business and accommodating the newer Chinese musical form, the authorities legitimised this pop music and allowed its emergence – although with continued censorship – while at the same time steadfastly defending the formerly national music. It is because of this relaxation in policy and globalisation – including China's entry into WTO and its launching of the Olympics – that this wave of apolitical Chinese pop burst onto mainland China (Fung Reference Fung2008).

Undeniably, the rise of such Chinese pop is attributed to the intermittent influx of popular music from Taiwan, Hong Kong and the West. While early Hong Kong Cantopop becomes the foreign-but-modern form of entertainment of the populace – because Hong Kong symbolises the world of freedom, capitalism, Western civilisation and enlightenment – Taiwan Mandopop evolves as the prototype of pop music that Chinese musicians, singers, lyricists and composers can mimic.

The widest concern is unquestionably the rise of Chinese rock music in the mid-1980s – defiant, subcultural and counter-hegemonic in nature (Baranovitch Reference Baranovitch2003; de Kloet Reference de Kloet2010). These Western studies contribute to the understanding of the generations of urban youth that grew up with the unique pop produced in China. Early rock'n'roll singers from the late 1980s, such as Cui Jian, are still considered influential to the wider culture; nevertheless, the popularity of this home-grown Chinese alternative rock prompted the state to marginalise it. For a long period, state-owned radio stations banned the broadcasting of such music and these (in)famous singers were never permitted on television. The rationale for this is simple: in an authoritarian regime, free cultural forms can easily become the ideological resources of the long-suppressed dissidents, rather than propaganda tools of the authorities. For example, in 1989 Cui Jian's ‘Nothing to My Name’ was an anthem to the Tiananman incident – an indication of the potency of music in this controlled territory.

Political suppression often drove such rock music underground. During the 1980s and 1990s, despite the creation of pop music charts and radio station playlists, rock music was not recognised. In a public interview in Southern Weekend in conjunction with the official event for the 30th Anniversary of Chinese music in 2008, Jin (Reference Jin2008) explicitly acknowledged that the ‘stalemate’ of rock music – which was collectively known as the ‘north-west wind’, meaning rock forms carrying the strong-willed and mourning sound of northern China – was due to the critical nature of the cultural text. The state's direct suppression of locally produced Chinese rock then left room for other imported Chinese music from Hong Kong and Taiwan to flourish.

Although figures are difficult to confirm, within a more established system of importation and cultural localisation, albums by Taiwanese and Hong Kong singers are allowed to enter and dominate the Chinese market and drive out the relatively immature local production. An example of this is Taiwanese singer Jay Chou, who has sold 30 million albums across the territories of China since 2003. In other words, globalised Chinese pop – now mainly imported from Taiwan – dominates the local pop music market in China. The authorities now not only welcome the influx of globalised Chinese pop, but also actively promote it by enhancing its appearance and circulation in the Chinese media. For example, the Hong Kong singer Andy Lau, who glorifies Chinese culture in his song ‘Chinese’, is often invited to perform for official occasions. Chinese Central Television (CCTV) arranged for Jay Chou, who produces music that combines traditional Chinese elements and hip-hop, to perform jointly with Song Zuying, the patriotic Chinese singer and member of the military music troupe. The arrangement is strategic: the state is able effectively to control the importation of these cultural products by either direct censorship or co-optation. While censorship filters out the undesirable dissenting views embedded in pop music, co-optation is a mechanism by which the state–private joint music company can ‘coach’ the foreign companies to abide by the informal rules of operation of the music industry. As a result, there exists an imbalanced ecology of pop music in which overseas Chinese pop music outweighs the music produced by local music companies, and ideologically the more nationalistic fraction dominates the market.

The new wave of Chinese singers

Local Chinese pop had never gained the popularity of Cantopop or Mandopop, at least in terms of album circulation; however, this changed with the televised Chinese ‘diva’ competitions. The winning singers are able to produce a unique ‘genre’ of Chinese pop that reflects local taste. Given their status as locally made public figures, they bear legitimacy, a popular mandate, cultural significance and relevance, and above all, they remain relatively free from top-down structural control. This paper aims to examine the nature of this new music by the new generation of Chinese singers whose popularity and public legitimacy are gained through the process of public deliberation. This ‘new wave’ of Chinese pop, together with the fandom and persona of the singer involved, has significant implications for the younger generation and for contemporary youth culture. Given that the new musical form embodies both the values and cultural forms of Western pop, the interpretation of the meanings of this new wave of Chinese pop also bears a strong implication for the state's acceptance of cultural globalisation. This paper chooses to illustrate this phenomenon using the mainland Chinese diva Chris Li as an example.

Chris Li (Lee, or Li Yuchun) is perhaps the most prominent superstar in the formation of the new wave of Chinese pop. Another Supergirl, Jane Zhang (Zhang Liangying) now also performs music in the same style. Her closest competitor in the Chinese version of Pop Idol, Bibi Zhou (Zhou Bichang), has also changed musical direction, now churning out ballads after steadfastly maintaining her tomboy image. But Chris Li is perhaps the best example of this changing cultural form, and in order to highlight the nature of today's Chinese pop music I will consider Chris's work in the context of other contemporary Chinese and Western popular musics.

Chris Li is used to represent many things: democracy, universal referendum and popular deliberation in China. As the winner of the Supergirl competition she has gained a sacred position in the Western media – not only a pop ‘spectacle’ but also an icon of democracy (Meng Reference Meng2009). It is difficult to validate the popular claim that she essentially serves as a cog in the political engine that democratises China; the public discourse surrounding Chris Li as ‘the elected diva’ overshadows her unique contribution to the trajectory of Chinese pop music in contemporary China.

To explicate this new wave of Chinese pop, and to illustrate its distinctions from previous waves, I would now like to focus on Chris Li's music, musical style, persona and performance, through analysis of musical content and performative style, and a consideration of the importance her fans place on her music.

A methodological note

In order to trace the trajectory of this emerging pop, I interviewed music critics, producers in the Hunan Broadcasting Group, Chris Li's artistic manager and the manager of her company (Tianyu Media), and fans; I also led ethnographic exercises both at real events and online. For the analysis of the nature and aesthetics of Chris Li's music I relied – sometimes directly and sometimes indirectly – on the critics' and fans' interpretation of her music online. To trace the activities of Chris Li and her fans, along with first-person interviews, I also relied heavily on baidu teiba, the public Chinese blog where Chris Li's fans exchange information, taking part in some of these activities myself where possible.

The elected diva as a backdrop

Supergirl is produced by Hunan Satellite Television, a provincially based television station with a national audience. As part of her prize for winning Supergirl in summer 2005, Chris Li was awarded a management contract with Tianyu Media of Hunan Broadcasting Group. Super Female Voice or Supergirl was a calculated cloning of the successful format of ITV's Pop Idol (UK) and American Idol (Fox Network, USA); it also incorporates the kind of interactive audience participation of BBC's Fame Academy. From regional eliminations to the national contest, along with three professional judges evaluating and critiquing, anyone with access to a mobile phone with sms (short message system) capabilities has the power to vote for their favourite contestants. Although televised talent contests are not new to China, none had ever generated the same level of viewer enthusiasm as Supergirl.

The crucial thing about Supergirl for the purposes of this paper is the audience participation during the competition itself and in the subsequent online discourse, for it is here that Chris gained public legitimacy, as opposed to other idols or ‘politically correct’ singers explicitly supported by the authorities. As reported by the Asian edition of Time, one of the event's judges, Hei Nan, publicly stated that Li was ‘the worst of the top six in terms of singing skills’, but noted that she was the popular favourite. In other words, the contest involves another set of standards of evaluation in this show (Jakes Reference Jakes2005); the ‘votes’ from the public not only empowered the audiences but also ensured that the champion had the strongest affinity to the fans.

Supergirl was first broadcast in China in 2004, but it really became a powerful cultural force during its second run in 2005, becoming the main topic of public discourse on national and local television, printed media and blogs. It also overwhelmed other television programmes, social and political agendas, and even the working and study habits of ordinary youngsters on the mainland. The Supergirl logo also became a shorthand for direct elections in China – a social consequence far beyond the expectation of educators, social critics and political leaders, who subsequently felt obliged to intercede and banned the so-called ‘democratic election’ of talent on television. It is this level of popularity and the investment of cultural importance in Supergirl which explains the authorities' exasperation with the show's unmanageable fandom.

The dual formation of fandom

Hunan Satellite Television have clearly identified Chinese youth as the target demographic for Supergirl (China Youth Press 2006). These youngsters have organised online fan clubs, plotted campaign strategies, lobbied for their favourite candidates, formed booster clubs, garnered votes for their candidates online, and canvassed youth locales in major cities to court prospective voters. The right to suffrage from the very outset of the programme was embraced by fans of Supergirl. In its 2005 season Chinese fans, both local and diasporic, cast more than three million text message votes. Li's success is the product of a grassroots effort; more importantly, fans consume Supergirl and take ownership in Li's elevation to ‘diva’ status.

In a country where it is still illegal to organise public gatherings and formal fan clubs, Chris Li's fan clubs have never formally existed, yet fandom and its activities seem to be the silhouette of Chris herself, following her from the contest through all the activities she organises in different places, including Hong Kong. Following the strategic management of the television show, Chris Li's fandom is naturally a dual production by the media and fans.

Chris Li's fandom is mutually produced and constituted by the practices, rehearsals and performances arranged by the show's producer as well as the interactive relationship between fans and the station. Supergirl is constructed in a way that intrinsically requires fans' activism. The very live presence of an audience throughout the contest played an important part in Li's fandom formation at the beginning, and since then audiences have grown accustomed to the interaction of their idol and themselves. For Supergirl does not only focus on the individual contestants' performances, but rather it includes close-up shots of the audience and the gamut of human emotion – disappointment, elation, tears and squeals. These touching moments and advantageous use of fan reactions were central to the programme's design in order to achieve maximum televisual impact. And its effects on Li's fans are clear: during the contest, fans gathered together and travelled to the taping, paid their fares and admission, and during filming led collective flag-waving, yelling and calling out, all of which have become almost ritualistic, and which have important implications for her ‘deliberating fandom’.

The deliberating fandom

When fandom is qualified to be deliberative in terms of values or behaviours, that means either the stars produce a fantasised version of the social milieu for the fans or the fans can articulate an ideal realm of their own through consumption or spectatorship. Chris Li's fans seem to express and retain certain values and world views. Because of their right to ritualistic involvement (voting, being part of the adjudication process) Chris Li's fans have maintained a determined agency in her stardom. Chris Li's fans reject the undemanding attempt to ‘escape’ into popular culture as a withdrawal from society; rather, fans seek to perform rituals together to undertake a ‘purposeful escape’ from an unsatisfactory habitus. According to Roger Aden (Reference Aden1999, p. 82), this is a symbolic ‘pilgrimage’ to seek interpretation intently from the media, and to counteract the dominant social ideology. In Chris Li's case, fans name themselves Yumi, meaning corn. (Yumi phonically is read as Yu's fans in Putonghua.) Yumi regularly seek material incentives from the management company (for example, tickets for gatherings and concerts) and above all participate in various activities (e.g. a charity show for Sichuan's earthquake, a foundation and donations for the international charity group the Red Cross) to expressively galvanise their views and values.

Self-image in music

Since her success in Supergirl, Chris Li has been able to produce a new musical style that is somewhat different from other pop music genres on mainland China. On the one hand, the music that she produces provides a stark contrast to the existing popular musical forms in China; on the other, her trajectory of musical development also transcends the one-sided and commonly perceived political nature of her position as an ‘elected candidate’. In the music she performs and produces, Chris Li rarely expresses her own views, apart from the inevitable Supergirl idea of ‘being myself’. Li sells her image unwaveringly with her songs. Her 2006 album, The Queen and the Dreams, was basically a self-revelation of mood and emotion in the wake of her ‘divahood’. Similarly, her 2007 album, Mine, can be regarded as an egocentric expression of the singer. For example, the lyrics of ‘My Kingdom’ embody not only the meaning of an individualistic space and self-creation but also her resilient confidence and slight arrogance. However, it was never meant to be revolutionary. While claiming the self-constructed image, Chris Li never attempts to challenge the state and the establishment by offering clear, radical comments about Chinese society, community or culture. Self-centred and unrelentingly independent as the lyrics appear, they never mingle with politics.

Her lyrics do not reveal her entire persona, though; her blatant appearance supplements that function. Li's confident outlook and style – casual and neutral – might represent the new Chinese generation. This generation changes, defies or even intermittently challenges gendered social norms as many avant-garde global artists would like to do. However, Chris Li's lyrical expression is never provocative or political. Youngsters that I interviewed always commented first on Li's fashion and style, not on her music or lyrics, and of all her potential constructions of image, the tomboy was most noted.

At Li's audition, she chose to perform ‘In My Heart There's Only You, Never Her’, an oldie made famous by the Taiwanese male singer Liu Wenzheng. In the televised Supergirl competitions, she selected and performed songs originally written for male singers. As a result, Chris Li became a symbol for challenging gender norms and cultural values of femininity. The ensuing public fascination with her also spearheaded a nationwide online discussion about her sexuality. Homosexuality has never been legal in China; a female artist's departure from the gendered norm was therefore a bold new step. Until 1997 the CCP upheld laws against ‘hooliganism’, which in essence outlawed homosexual activity (Lo Reference Lo2006), and even despite the reversal of the law, homosexuality is still not widely tolerated in many domains of Chinese life today. Given these constraints it is perhaps surprising that Chris Li's challenge to the social pressures facing young women, and her refusal to conform to passive cultural stereotypes, have earned her so much positive publicity. Her resistance to the discussion of her sexuality further heightened the public's fascination, and though she initially refused to respond to questions about her orientation, she did ultimately self-identify as a tomboy. It was not until a concert appearance in Hong Kong, a city of cosmopolitanism and free media expression, that she admitted to being heterosexual.

According to Stacey (Reference Stacey1994), at the moment of reception, fans might actually ‘bypass’ textual messages, inferring rather that Li is masking a lesbian identity. Much of this is due to the intentions of Li's producer and the music industry in general, which might cause some scepticism: the self-observed empowerment of Li's fans is basically built on a calculated and capitalist enterprise, which might be in fact counter-intuitive to the empowerment that they infer.

Rocking romance and conventionality

In a capitalist market, Chris Li is no different from other female pop singers who attract the majority of their fans by emotionally selling to them utterances of love, unchained melodies and stories of romance. But judging from fan interviews and online fora, Li is not viewed as a fragile, dependent, helpless woman: her message is one of strength and vigour that surpasses that of any ‘traditional’ female roles. For example, ‘I Knew Earlier’, from the album N + 1 Evolution (2008) is a rockabilly song about romance – a story about a tough lady who unreservedly falls in love with someone who she ‘knew earlier’ would break her heart. Li offsets any potential melancholy with strong drums and the eloquence of her expression. The song's style would seem to be incompatible with the romance, but this tension, if not discordance, gives the ballad its characteristic power.

Chris Li does not ignore or erase the traditional desires and roles of the female in Chinese society; she preserves and inherits them but invokes them in unexpected musical forms, thus subverting the listeners' expectations. Despite the conventionality of the lyrics, the musical code suggests an unconventional character singing them. As such, Li and her production team not only craft a new ‘unconventional conventional’ music, but create an image to match this persona embodying the self-rule, autonomy and determinacy that fans have projected onto her.

In the song ‘Me’ from the album Mine (2008), the lyrics express that Li has learned what loneliness is, a ‘unique experience’ that no one will comprehend. However, she does not sound desperate: with a sense of self-reliance, coupled with energy and power, she appears brave. Again she does not mask the loneliness that many teenagers normally live through, but chooses to overcome it with her music.

In a capitalist market, singers – including the new generation of Chinese pop stars – are fully aware of the values, style, aesthetics and musical taste of their target demographic. Thus I would argue that it is not too different from the marketing strategies of Western pop. While at a televised function in Shenzhen in July 2008, I asked one of the fans, aged around 25, about the unique characteristics of Chris Li's music, she replied, ‘I don't know. It's not about Chinese tradition. It is modern and cool. It's like [Western] pop … but it is not exactly Western pop. …’.

Does music genre really matter?

So what is so special about this new Chinese pop? It is an emerging potpourri of genres, ranging from the more popular pop, rock, electronica, R&B and hip-hop to big band and jazz. Non-exclusivity is one of its characteristics, but that non-exclusion rule is largely applied to Western music, regardless of genre. As opposed to early Chinese rock, this new wave does adhere to one musical form. In other words, by integrating different Western musics and presenting the finished product as Chinese, it distances itself from the longer tradition of Chinese music – ballads, folk and propaganda opera – which represents to the younger generation the obsolete, the passé and the pre-modern China, but also the historical trauma of the past that no Chinese dares confront at a time of growing Chinese national and economic power. It is precisely this distance from ‘traditional’ Chinese pop that defines the music of Chris Li and other contemporary mainland Chinese singers. But this pop also serves a much more delicate function: to domesticate Western pop in a way that preserves the ideological and cultural meanings of Chinese music, and to garner the support of the state in its development.

The constituent components of the DNA of this new wave of Chinese pop are borrowed from the West. This also means that the rule of the organic formation of the DNA and the function of the new formation are on a par with those of Western pop. Given the specific political and economic contexts of China, this new wave has to serve as cultural intermediary between the singer, her fans, the youth market, the record companies and the authorities. Although full of contradictions and tensions, the new formation yet allows each aspect to pursue its own mission, express its values and commemorate its own subjectivities.

Music, state and nationalism

This symbiotic relationship between fans, Chris Li and the Chinese music industry primarily concerns commercial strategies and gestures toward conventionality, but the stance of the authorities towards this potentially anti-hegemonic icon and her strategic position towards the authorities might need further exploration. To summarise, Chris Li's music is not just a celebration of freedom, collective rights or democracy, even though she is the icon of semi-universal suffrage organised by the entertainment industry. Similar to her predecessors in the earlier waves of Chinese popular music in the 1980s, ideologically her career is carefully designed not to run afoul of the authorities: she avoids addressing issues that might infuriate the political leadership, such as ethnicity, or instigating controversy, such as vulgarity, or other social immoralities. The relationship between singer and state is a consensual and constantly negotiated one, prevalent in the market and influential among the younger generation, but to a degree that is tolerable to the state.

Given this dependence on deliberating fandom, the music industry must mould the singer based on generational taste, and the singer's music must therefore satisfy the audience's and fans' culture more than that of the state. Chris Li's music, as well as her persona, are deemed to be different from a state-decreed model. But a deviation from the latter should not suggest that the music can function as a counter-hegemonic tool. It is true that Supergirl emerged within China's relaxed media policy, but this does not mean that Chris Li's evolution will continuously be inadvertent, unpredictable or uncontrollable by the state.

Without state support, and aesthetically hybridising with Western musical forms, genres and rhythms, this new pop could have explored and appealed to the suppressed desire of the people – a potential anti-nationalising momentum echoing a suppressed anti-hegemonic public sentiment that has been developing since 1989 against and under the state-constructed nationalism (Zhao Reference Zhao2004). This is a desire of the public to dislocate from a state-constructed nationalism that forcefully attempts to append patriotism of the state to the cultural or ethnic identification with the nation (Guo Reference Guo2003). Yet, as we can see in Li's music and fandom, this anti-nationalising tendency seems minimised, mild and subtle. The new wave of Chinese pop, despite its connection with deliberating fandom, does not foster any connections with political dissidence. Neither does it create a menace to the state nor imply that the new pop will follow the historical legacy of rock'n'roll like Cui Jian, which rocked the status quo. In fact, the new pop only briefly detaches itself from the state-imposed nationalism without challenging the legitimacy of the state. As Wright (Reference Wright2010) argues, because of their accumulation of wealth, Chinese citizens, at least those in the city, have developed economic dependency on the state, a tendency to perpetuate the status quo and a disincentive to ask for a liberal democratic reform. This renders the subversive potential of many cultural forms, pop included, irrelevant and obsolete.

The Westernised nature of the new pop creates a sense of divergence from the traditional Chinese music genres, and in Chris Li's case there are other deliberate attempts on the part of the producers consciously to ‘Westernise’ her albums. For example, many feature English titles: The Queen and the Dreams, Mine, Youth of China (2009) and Chris Lee (2010). This was not a common practice for artists of the last generation. Almost every album features a couple of tracks with English titles, and on The Queen and the Dreams four of 11 songs are in English. This trend is common to other Supergirls including Jane Zhang, with Believe in Jane (2010), and Bibi Zhou, with I Fish Light Mirror (2010). The latter even features two English songs, an overture, ‘Miss U Missing Me’, and an epilogue, ‘Love & Life’. The easy adoption of English once again confirms the very fundamental value of the new generation who admire the West and Western modernity, and offers a strong disbelief toward the Chinese state and sovereignty.

The reason for adopting that Westernising tendency as the ‘detachment strategy’ lies in the fact that the safest method for producing a cultural product is not to challenge the cultural order or status quo. Thus, it comes as no surprise that, in contrast to the earlier rock music generation, rarely do Chris Li's songs and performance engage in political debate or use excessive Chinese elements in their packaging. For mainland composers and lyricists, looking to the global world for musical resources is a practical way to create pop. In short, globalising the musical form by mixing and adopting Western musical elements, symbols and icons is a cultural technique to avoid any nationalistic or patriotic ideology associated with the cultural form. This wave of Chinese pop relies heavily on the global cultural resources to distinguish itself from, if not to resist, the state-controlled cultural circulation and dissemination.

Conclusion: global influence and state control

Borrowing global cultural and musical elements, this new pop music differentiates itself from traditional Chinese music, the communist propaganda and earlier waves of pop music. The borrowing of the global is, however, in this case neither an act of imperialism nor an influx of cultural and popular musical forms; modern Chinese popular song is an active appropriation and integration of different genres of Western music and culture, and it is an innovation. By embracing the global, this new music production can evade any direct state-led nationalism, ideologies and indoctrination.

For the society and the youth, Chris Li's performing of this new music creates not only the prototype of a deliberating fandom but also a new knowledge which can only be seen in the inseparability of the elements of her success – her status as an elected diva, her manufactured persona, her singing style, the music and lyrics. This new wave of Chinese pop gives a clear message to the new generation that inherits it. Chris Li gives the new generation a modern persona that they have already articulated and adopted into their own lives: it is an individuality that is unfettered by social norms or the jurisdiction of the Communist Youth Party. Chris Li delineates a clear boundary between politics and non-politics. Political matters are best left untouched, and this new pop circuitously confirms to the new generation the subtle but vital imperative of the state. Music is free to develop as long as it does not transgress the boundaries of the state's power. Non-political domains can be fully explored, yet there is a lack of commercial forces potent enough to challenge Chinese society and culture. For this reason, the winners of Supergirl do have the potential to contribute to a broadening of the terrain for social discussion and cultural explorations, especially in the arenas of love, romance, family, philosophy of life, social norms and, to a certain extent, sexuality and the nature of Chineseness.

The social importance of this music goes beyond idol worship. Indeed, the nature of the music, the persona of Chris Li and her contemporaries, and the fandom that crystallises around these idols might represent a new epoch of youth culture in China that should be explored further in future research. Such fandom could well reflect the real solution to social problems that might intersect with today's youth culture, the essence of which is a belief that they are a generation insulated from the uncontrolled vicissitudes of life and worsening social inequities. Within this self-imagined space, a range of noble ideals – democracy, equality, fairness, individuality, individual freedom – can be preserved. The deliberate attempt to cultivate this space is manifest in the blunt refutation of the revolutionary legacy of the PRC in this emerging Chinese pop. By distancing itself from a nationalistic space, agents in the new Chinese pop can uphold their own independent thinking, self-indulgence, passions, emotions and individualistic desires. Yet the state today is also clever enough to see a potential for cultural influence. Now the state has stopped all televised music contests and by extension the potential perpetuation of this deliberating fandom and music. It is yet to be seen how and whether this wave of Chinese pop can continue to exist.