|
Foreigners with a (big) nose for
music
TCM's 'Foreigners in Taiwan' album
is getting a second release, with hopes that this time
it'll make a mark.
*By Max Woodworth
Foreigners have been washing up on Taiwan's shores for
centuries, sometimes playing a pivotal role in the
course of the island's history, sometimes moving about
on the periphery of the culture. "But they've always
been here," says Zhang 43 (張四十三), the improbably named
president of Taiwan Colors Music (TCM, 角頭音樂)."Books have
been written about this topic and there are lots of
other forms of records of the presence of foreigners in
Taiwan, but no one has made a musical record of these
people's lives here," he continues.
With this thought in mind, Zhang hatched the idea of
bringing together some of the musically inclined
foreigners that call Taiwan home to put out a
compilation.
At first, the plan smacks of gimmickry. Getting
foreigners to sing about Taiwan in broken Chinese has
the potential to be about as humorous as the many other
circus-type showcases where foreigners, mostly Western
or African, delight local audiences with their wacky
ways and funny talk.
No Joke
As it turns out, there is nothing tongue-in-cheek about
the album, titled simply Foreigners in Taiwan (台灣阿兜仔),
which is getting its second release now after a
half-hearted release last year that nonetheless saw
about 2,000 copies sold.Most of the musicians on the
album have been playing for years either in their home
countries or in Taiwan, and for the most part the tracks
take daily life as their focus, as opposed to the
foreigners being the butt of any joke.
The songs go all over the board, from folk, to reggae,
to an organ-heavy tavern tune and New Age, a formula
which basically rules it out from becoming a smash hit,
or even a modest hit for that matter.
"That's okay," says Zhang, who calls himself a
musicologist.
Coming from most any other record label president, such
a statement would sound like a businessman trying to
gain street cred. But then this is TCM, the independent
music label that since its founding in 1997 has made a
reputation with its seemingly quixotic album releases
and its almost academic approach to presenting Taiwanese
music.
In 2000, for example, the label released an album called
Oh Formosa! on which President Chen Shui-bian (陳水扁), DPP
Secretary General Frank Hsieh (謝長廷) and other political
heavyweights thrash out the old political activist songs
chanted during the democracy movement of the 1980s. None
of the politicians are gifted at singing, but the idea
was to provide a record of a significant event in
Taiwan's history, namely the transfer of power from the
KMT to the DPP.The Foreigners album serves a similar
documentary purpose.
"We knew there was a considerable pool of talent among
the small population of foreigners here. And with the
Foreigners in Taiwan album, we thought that what these
people had to say about Taiwan, or even just about life
here was significant at least in the sense of adding
some diversity," Zhang said.
As can be expected, and as the cover of the album
indicates with its picture of one of the featured
musicians, Timmy, pulling up to a betel nut stand on a
scooter, Taiwan's national narcotic gets more than one
mention.
"They asked me to think of something uniquely Taiwanese
and I thought, `Well, what's more Taiwanese than betel
nut?'" Timmy said, whose track on the album is a Beach
Boys-style love song with Hawaiian guitar melodies and a
tale of a hapless foreigner getting hooked on a
betel-nut girl.
But not all the songs center on topics as emblematically
Taiwanese as betel nut.
There's the mournful Sasquatch song Blue ( 藍 ) that is
vaguely evocative of the country's landscape and the
semi-serious commentary on relationships in the song by
the nine-woman band 69 Across titled Girls on Taiwan (
女生在台灣 ).Others have no apparent relation to Taiwan like
Dribdas' Baboon Butt Blue ( 狒狒屁股般的藍色 ) or Hayashi's (
林樹一郎 ) instrumental Live on Tri-Media.So even the
Taiwan-theme is inconsistent on this album. Scudder, who
sings the only Taiwanese-language song on the album,
said Zhang made no request to make a song specifically
about Taiwan. "It was the ideal recording situation.
They just told me to do whatever I wanted." It would be
hard to glean much of a perspective on Taiwan from the
songs on the album, but that is probably too tall an
order for this kind of documentary work, as Zhang
describes it. It's more a slice of life, and true to TCM
form, it's a slice that is way out on the fringes.
Can-do spirit
This album is a compilation of music by foreigners,
mostly Westerners, living in Taiwan. Taiwan is an
interface of many diverse cultures, a meeting point of
East and West, ancient and modern, local and
continental. By sharing their perspectives and their art
with the people of Taiwan, these musicians have served
as living seeds of cultural and spiritual amalgamation.
But cross-pollination works both ways, and in their time
here - some only for a year or two, some with lifetime
commitments - they have also absorbed indelible
influences from the people, streets, languages, and
customs of Taiwan. The artists featured here record
their impressions of everything from betel-nut girls to
classical Chinese poetry. The result is a rich musical
tapestry that cannot be defined by any single culture,
but is a wonderful celebration of the convergence of
diverse hearts and minds on Taiwan. |
