Xie Tianxiao: Blast from the past
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E-mail China Daily, March 29, 2013
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Xie Tianxiao gets a wild reception from his fans at a 2009 concert. |
Xie Tianxiao is back with a new album and imminent stage show in Beijing that promises a dramatic landing.
Chinese rock's reliably passionate and moody star has riffed, screamed and smashed his guitar for 20 years. It has won Xie Tianxiao the titles "King of Live" and the "New Godfather of Chinese Rock 'n' Roll". He has long experimented to create rock that belongs to China, including his introduction of the Chinese instrument guzheng. Plucking that became a trademark.
However, he's been out of the public eye for a while. The only time Xie has made headlines in recent years was when he was arrested by police in January 2011 for drug possession.
After performing at Strawberry Music Festival in May 2011, which received wild acclaim from nearly 30,000 spectators, he withdrew from the music business.
Sitting quietly inside a teahouse, he ties his long hair back neatly. The image is far from Xie's onstage persona. Only his hatchet-like profile and skinny figure remind one of his rock star status.
He doesn't think the arrest was bad for his career, which was skyrocketing at that time. On the contrary, it gave him the opportunity to muse and be alone.
"Sometimes fame itself hurts," says Xie, 41. "I tried to regain the feeling when I first wrote songs and the feeling of being nobody."
After a two-year gap, Xie returns to the limelight with a new album, Illusion, and he is enthusiastic about playing live again.
He recorded songs at Baihua Studio, where he recorded his first song at the age of 21. He and his band recorded the album live, reducing the use of guzheng solos in an attempt to shake off his old approach.
If his last album in 2009, Guzheng Reggae, was dedicated to his idol Bob Marley, then this new album is dedicated to himself, he says.
Some of the songs on the album are Xie's old works that have never been released before, such as Dancing With My Voice and Blacken the Night. He gave them new arrangements, simple but elegant.
A father of two, Xie also wrote a song titled It Won't Change for his children, which displays his soft side.
"Before having children, my world was rock. I rocked like there was no tomorrow. For me, my band is the best on the planet and I feared nothing. But now I have become tolerant and peaceful," he says.
In conjunction with the new album, he will perform at Beijing Workers' Gymnasium on March 30, seeking to reclaim his King of Live title.
"I feel anxious before a show. But as soon as I step onto the stage, everything is fine. I never design any plot for my show. The emotion is right there, I lose myself and I just go with it," says Xie.
His reputation for being volcanic on stage came from early influences during the years that he, together with his band Cold Blooded Animals, developed during his career in the United States.
Formed in 1994 by Xie, the band released its first self-titled album in 2000. It sold about 150,000 tapes and 40,000 CDs in China. The grunge music and Xie's guzheng fusion carried the band to rock festivals in Japan and the US.
As a rock singer, he couldn't make ends meet in China then. But each band member could get paid $300 to $500 by performing at a music festival in the US.
Then the band went to New York in 2001, where he gained a fresh perspective about rock music.
For two years, Xie worked in restaurants and sang in subways to support himself. The rest of the time he was busy watching live shows by local bands.
He was impressed by a show from a band comprised of people in wheelchairs. During the performance, the frontman lit fireworks on his belly while lying on the floor. The visual impact was overwhelming for Xie.
He also watched a blues band, featuring a musician who played the guitar so naturally it was like an extension of his body.
"The music came from his blood. It was also that moment that I realized I should find my own personality onstage," he says.
"The Western audience didn't know that China has rock bands. People came to our show out of curiosity and they would compare us with Western bands," he adds.
He uses the guzheng, which he learned on his own decades ago, to create a contrasting sound: soothing guzheng strings and hard rock beats.
Jonathan Campbell, who has been in China for five years promoting local bands and documenting Chinese rock history, in 2000, chose Xie's album, Cold-Blooded Animal as one of the top five Chinese albums of all time.
"If you've seen this guy play, you know it's very natural. There were a lot of bad, derivative grunge bands when I first appeared, but this guy took it on and made it his own," Campbell wrote in his book, Red Rock: The Long, Strange March of Chinese Rock & Roll.
"His live performance is breathtaking," says Shen Lihui, the founder and owner of Modern Sky Record, a record label based in Beijing. Two years ago, Shen offered Xie a contract.
"The live music market in China is taking off but is in disorder," says Shen, who also founded the Strawberry Music Festival in 2009. "I believe Xie can lead the young bands to another level."
As a rock musician, Xie doesn't look at the fame or position he holds in the music scene. The priority now is to rehearse with the band and try out new materials, such as Peking Opera, which he learned when he was 5.
He sees rock as the most suitable guise for him, though. He's been sure about that since the age of 15, when his guitar teacher showed him a picture of long-haired rockers from Beijing.
"I guess they were early rock bands such as Tang Dynasty and Black Panther," he recalls. "At that moment, I found my spirit."
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