Chapter 172: The Ship of a New Era in the Music Scene Slowly Sets Sail

Qian Jiang, who should have been carrying a sack of money to confront Sony Music head-on, was now sitting in the Warner Maidian office. Holding a document in one hand and touching his increasingly thinning hair with the other, a reckless smile lingered on his lips that he could not suppress no matter what—

"That sausage from Sony, it's hilarious. If I were on the board, I'd definitely make a note of this: nearly one million New Taiwan Dollars in promotion budget, yet the effect was absolutely terrible."

"Can't blame Sony for this. Who could have foreseen such a globally sensational event?"

September 12, morning.

Due to the 9/11 incident, almost every media outlet, big or small, across the globe was scrambling to report on it.

When domestic citizens woke up today, all they saw was content about the 9/11 incident, and all discussions revolved around America's various actions.

Amidst this global frenzy, entertainment news was nothing but a little brother; no marketing campaign could work.

Precisely because of this, the domestic entertainment industry had, for once, fallen into a state of genuine reality.

Capital always seeks profit.

With the obvious mismatch between input and return over these few days, both the music scene and the film industry had become much quieter.

Only when the tide of marketing recedes can one see who is swimming naked.

"Wang Lihong is just unlucky. Right now, the most discussed songs and albums in the mainland are yours, followed by Xie Tingfeng's unreleased new album and songs, and third is him."

Qian Jiang, holding the statistical data, felt somewhat schadenfreude.

"The Only" is a new song, and its momentum is still so fierce; if Sony were to throw money at it to force a surge, "Jiangnan" would truly be in danger.

But now, thanks to its broad popularity among all ages, "Jiangnan" is likely to secure another weekly chart-topper on the mainland's pop song rankings, extending its consecutive win record to 14 weeks.

"The only pity is Hong Kong. Because of your feud with Chow Yun-fat, your "Stubborn" took a weekly chart-topper, breaking Jiangnan's consecutive streak; otherwise, the single's consecutive win record in Hong Kong could have continued."

Looking at the Hong Kong sales data and single radio chart data, Qian Jiang sighed: "Taiwan is completely hopeless."

Taiwan's F4 is too overpowered; even Zhou Yi can hardly compete with those four now. The hype is too high, and they have no regard for martial ethics either; after returning from Hong Kong, they held handshaking events daily across Taiwan.

It would be strange if Zhou Yi could compete; he cannot even appear in public, and the impact of the lawsuit persists to this day, making it impossible for the initial high hype to remain.

"Just keep a calm mindset; at least we haven't suffered much loss in promotion."

Zhou Yi, flipping through the newspaper, casually offered comfort, after all, F4 had not yet reached their peak.

When "Meteor Garden" goes beyond China, begins airing hotly across Asian countries, and tops the charts, that will be when F4's hype truly explodes.

Within a one-year album sales cycle, the official sales across Asia exceeded four million copies.

They held a truly pan-Asian tour of exactly 19 shows; not a single one was a sham, and each show had an audience of over 30,000 people.

A genuine phenomenon-level idol group, the pioneer that opened the door to idol dramas single-handedly.

Honestly, relying on a few marketing campaigns combined with the quality of the song "Jiangnan," being able to tangle with the monster "Meteor Rain" in Taiwan until now has already exceeded Zhou Yi's expectations.

Anyway, for the time being, he cannot think of any other method to stir up hype that would bring a hundred benefits and no harm.

"Zhou Yi is very right; in the next week or two, every record company will cut marketing spending as much as possible, waiting for the news impact of this American incident to pass."

"And our loss in marketing is the lightest."

Zhou Jianhui, who pushed open the office door, was followed by Sun Yanzi and Chen Zeshan, who had also returned after finishing their promotional activities.

The moment she saw Zhou Yi, Sun Yanzi quickly made a funny face at him, then followed behind Chen Zeshan as if nothing had happened.

Zhou Yi directly rolled his eyes back at her.

"Zhou Yi's previous decision to launch "Lazy Song" in the Japanese market first, for the sake of caution, saved the company a loss of hundreds of thousands of dollars in promotion budget."

"Of course, there is also Yanzi's new album; he still hasn't finished recording the songs."

Seeing this open "transaction" between his two ace cards, Zhou Jianhui's eyelid twitched, but since it turned out to be a blessing in disguise, he pretended not to see it.

He knew Sun Yanzi had been clamoring for a break.

Based on Zhou Yi's past songwriting and recording speed, he could basically judge that Zhou Yi was indirectly helping Sun Yanzi secure time to rest.

After all, the amount of promotion required after releasing a new album is absolutely incomparable to the current situation.

If anyone else did this, he would have fired them, but alas, this is Zhou Yi, his lucky star.

Especially after avoiding 9/11.

Zhou Yi's suggestion at the time was: since the hype for the North American premiere of "Rush Hour 2" was missed, why not ride the wave of the movie's premiere in Japan?

Coincidentally, the premiere of "Rush Hour 2" in Japan was on September 22.

Sun Yanzi's new album "Kite" was originally scheduled for release in July, but back then Sun Yanzi started slacking off, using Zhou Yi as a shield whenever she had nothing to do.

Later, when Zhou Yi came to write and record songs, these two simply conspired together to scam Chen Zeshan.

"Ahem, uh, President Zhou, I suddenly remembered I have something else to handle; I'll leave first." Almost being named as the one helping Sun Yanzi slack off, Zhou Yi lifted his head and prepared to slip away with righteous confidence.

Seeing this, Sun Yanzi immediately panicked.

Why are you running away? Leaving me alone, what if I get scolded?

If the two of them got scolded together, she would have a companion; getting scolded alone would make her feel psychologically unbalanced.

"President Zhou, I just happen to be unsure about some songs for my new album; I'll take Zhou Yi to help look at them and give a reference opinion."

"Sure, go ahead."

"?"

Zhou Yi, who was grabbed by the arm and dragged out of the office by Sun Yanzi, looked at her sideways: "Looking at your cowardly state, what are you afraid of? Collecting songs for a new album? You collected nothing; you probably haven't even looked through the song submissions."

"What do you know? I call this striving for perfection; the third album is very important, okay?"

Ever since conspiring with Zhou Yi to scam Chen Zeshan, Sun Yanzi, who had been hovering between stages of "making songs soon" and "already working on it," had returned to her original energetic self, full of vitality.

One can only say that reasonable rest is really important.

"Where are you taking me?"

"To look at songs. I really am collecting songs, but I'm unsure; come help me look." Sun Yanzi hummed proudly twice.

As a major company, Warner receives many submissions from musicians every week; those people just hope that a top singer inside Warner will like their songs and buy them.

Last year, Jay Chou was like this.

This year, JJ Lin is also like this.

When Zhou Yi saw a song titled "Remember" among the many songs, his gaze was immediately drawn to the name of the song's composer—

Lin Junjie.

(End of this chapter)