the song picks up a little before the halfway mark, and you can hear elements taken from the Northwest Wind, aka xibeifeng, a musical trend that came out of a contemporary cultural movement post-Cultural-Revolution called xungen, or ‘root-seeking’. it features music with folk influences from northwest China, and likewise, Cui Jian uses suona, a traditional trumpet-like instrument associated with northwestern China. (I’m not sure how to cite sources in a blog post, but I’d like to give credit to Paul Clark’s Youth Culture in China: From Red Guards to Netizens and this TimeOut article on Chinese musical genres for the information in this paragraph.)
but more importantly, this was the seminal song in the history of Chinese rock ‘n roll. Cui Jian’s performance of it on May 9, 1986 at the Workers’ Stadium essentially marks the birth of Chinese yaogun, and it later became the anthem of the students at Tiananmen Square. (he also performed it live at Tiananmen in 1989. afterwards, in 1990, the authorities forbid him from playing anywhere bigger than a bar in Beijing until 2005.) it was a song for a generation. strictly speaking, the lyrics make it a love song, but they mean much more.
so in memory of June 4th, 1989, here is Cui Jian’s Nothing To My Name.
