Chapter 258: What Do You Mean by

Look for Zhou Yi, but Zhou Yi is not in the country;

Look for Sun Yanzi, but Sun Yanzi is also not in the country.

What's more deadly is that neither of their managers is in the country either—Qian Jiang went abroad with Zhou Yi, while Chen Zeshan is in Singapore, communicating with the Singapore Indoor Stadium staff regarding Sun Yanzi's upcoming tour concert to be held there this year.

They're all damn "unreachable"!

Under the momentum of three men making a tiger, after fermenting for a day, the collapse of the Warner Twins almost instantly made Sohu and Sina the two focal points in the traffic pool—

Zhang Chaoyang of Sohu was very unhappy about this, but since he didn't have extra money to sign Sun Yanzi himself, he could only let it go; after all, he still held Zhou Yi as his trump card.

It's fine if they collapse; let Sina eat up this wave of traffic, so they won't be bound and split by the Twins in the future.

Everyone at Sina was panicking badly.

To be fair, after entering 2002, them gritting their teeth to spend 16 million to sign Sun Yanzi already counted as a gamble.

Who would have thought that right after signing, such a high-traffic news story would break out—

Good news is good news, but what does it mean if they collapse?

You Warner surely still don't understand why Sina would spend such a huge price to sign Sun Yanzi?

"Old Wu, have you clarified the situation?"

Inside the Sina boardroom, Duan Yongji frowned, looking at Wu Zheng, whose expression was already somewhat weary compared to last year: "If Sun Yanzi doesn't have the news value of the Twins, then this signing of ours is definitely going to be a massive loss."

In today's music scene, besides Zhou Yi and Xie Tingfeng, no one is worth an internet endorsement contract over 15 million, simply because only the two of them have high enough topic appeal.

Xie Tingfeng is even more in demand than available; because his asking price is so high, neither Sohu nor Sina nor NetEase has managed to reach an agreement with Emperor Music.

Under the internet winter, companies won't easily spend big money on endorsements.

As for why Zhou Yi could level up to 40 million, completely surpassing Xie Tingfeng and making people readily pay out, his achievements in the American music scene are the core matter.

If Sun Yanzi were to endorse at the normal price, a contract of five or six million like Sprite would be the absolute maximum.

If it weren't for Sun Yanzi's manager Chen Zeshan being too good at negotiating, painting such a big and round pie, the contract they actually prepared for Sun Yanzi would have been ten million.

"I asked Zhou Jianhui, and he said he hasn't heard about Zhou Yi and Sun Yanzi collapsing; this should be a rumor. The fact that it fermented so quickly probably means other record companies are also pushing the waves."

"I don't want 'should'; the shareholders don't want 'should' either."

"Chen Zeshan is also assuring me that the two of them absolutely haven't collapsed; my wife is also contacting Sun Yanzi; she is still in Singapore."

Wu Zheng also had a bit of a headache.

Logically, when signing such a contract, there should be a hard requirement that the Twins' relationship cannot break, or at least cannot break on the surface during the contract period.

But helplessly, this was Sina trying to take a shortcut to sign Sun Yanzi; it wasn't that people came knocking themselves begging for a contract.

Watching their own traffic slide day by day while Sohu's traffic exploded every day, Sina ultimately chose to gamble; either way they were dead, it was just a matter of losing another sum.

In fact, when Sun Yanzi, who was still leisurely enjoying the Spring Festival holiday, staying home all day playing "Makka Pakka," and going out for a stroll whenever she had nothing to do, was cornered by Singaporean Chinese media reporters for an interview, she was still in a state of complete confusion—

"What? You and Zhou Yi broke up? What do you mean broke up? Ah no, I wasn't even with him; what are you talking about?"

She just went home for the holidays; how did she and Zhou Yi go their separate ways?

Did Warner have an internal struggle? Did Qian Jiang and Chen Zeshan have a falling out?

Fortunately, Warner people arrived in time to resolve the situation, allowing Sun Yanzi to escape from the crowd chasing and blocking her and get into the van to go home.

At the same time, she learned the course of events from Chen Zeshan in the car and also received a phone call from Yang Lan, who was playing the persona of a caring big sister—

"Hello? Sister Lan?

"No, no, I don't even know the situation myself.

"Yang and I are perfectly normal; I just called him this morning, and he was still showing off that he was walking the red carpet today..."

Having become familiar with Yang Lan due to the Sina signing, Sun Yanzi decisively called Zhou Yi after dealing with the reporters—

"What? Oh, it's fine; I know about this. Qian Jiang just told me about it earlier; no need to pay attention."

In the hotel room, after putting on the bespoke suit tailored to his own figure, Zhou Yi tilted his head, pinching the phone between his ear and shoulder, while adjusting the position of his bow tie in front of the full-length mirror.

"Is that so? It's fine as long as you're okay. Are you about to head to the venue now?"

"Of course; you can turn on the TV around now to watch my heroic appearance."

After glancing at the time and chatting a few more minutes, Zhou Yi hung up the phone under the assistant's urging; when going downstairs, he happened to meet Xia Yaxuan, who was wearing a full Dior haute couture outfit.

"Not bad, that outfit of yours; which brand sponsored it?" Since last year, when she started attending events with Dior sponsorship, Xia Yaxuan asked a rhetorical question teasingly.

"Bespoke brand." Zhou Yi shrugged indifferently.

Having no luxury clothing endorsements on his body, he was too lazy to ask Warner to borrow so-called haute couture; anyway, male stars attending such red carpets didn't need any flashy clothes.

Everyone else was in suits; at most, it was just a difference in color or accessories. Moreover, no matter how flashy the suit, it would be hard to outshine his face.

This is confidence.

"That's true; female stars' outfits have too many variations." Xia Yaxuan, wearing a wine-red one-shoulder long dress, wasn't here to ride the hype on either side, so she didn't pursue those eye-catching, sexy outfits.

However, when she and Zhou Yi arrived at the venue, she finally noticed how wild the path of these Western female stars was.

The American hot girl group Destiny's Child were dressed one cooler than the next; Beyoncé's clothes were so tight that Zhou Yi even doubted whether the fabric of that thing would burst.

Kelly Rowland, the Australian Princess Pea attending as an award guest, was even paired with a super-short strap red dress plus black knee-high boots, radiating an aura of "I am the most gorgeous" all over her body.

Xia Qila, whom Zhou Yi had met a few days ago, was dressed quite with Latin bold style.

Because she was an award guest, Xia Yaxuan needed to go to the organizer's backstage first; Zhou Yi, bored and preparing to wander around alone, hadn't even walked a few steps before he was called out by Xia Qila, who saw him—

"Hey, Spike."

Everyone present was a musician; Zhou Yi, this unique Chinese face in the entire venue, couldn't be said to be overly eye-catching, but at the very least, he could be called a crane standing among chickens.

Xia Qila's preemptive familiar address actually surprised quite a few people on the scene.

Do these two know each other?

"You look very handsome tonight; I like your hairstyle." Wearing a black chest-high V-neck high-slit evening gown, plus a head of golden big waves, Xia Qila showed off her good figure without any hesitation.

"Just the hairstyle? I'm still a bit more confident about my own face."

After hugging Xia Qila, Zhou Yi joked teasingly; the latter smiled: "Let me introduce you, this is Alicia Keys."

In the future, Alicia Keys, whom a huge crowd of Chinese fans would come to call "Gun Sister," won five Grammys this February — Best New Artist, Song of the Year, Best R&B Female Vocal Performance, Best R&B Song, and Best R&B Album — easily the most dazzling new artist on last year's global music scene.

On the Billboard chart, her single also took the runner-up spot for the year, and it still hangs in the top five to this day.

If Zhou Yi's single wants to climb higher, it has to go head-to-head with hers sooner or later.

"Hi, Spike, I really love your music." Alicia amiably extended her hand and proactively offered to exchange contact info with Zhou Yi.

As a songwriter, when Zhou Yi had burst onto the scene she had already been paying attention to his singles, even analyzing them carefully, and her conclusion was that this Chinese singer was different from all the previous Chinese singers—

He understood the American music scene very well, and was even willing to adapt his work to the styles popular there.

Selling well isn't scary, but when someone whose culture and upbringing are completely different from America's can, after thoroughly digesting the popular foundation of the American music scene, write a pop song aimed squarely at the English-language market — that is scary.

The other musicians in the room had all reached the same realization.

Zhu Tianming group member Beyoncé, who had already decided to go solo next year, even took the initiative to walk over with a wine glass in hand and say hello.

The next moment, all the female members of Zhu Tianming came over, and counting Xia Qila and Alicia who were already there, Zhou Yi felt at that moment as if he were a piece of Tang Seng's flesh—

The only pity was that, among them, the only one he was half-willing to have a deeper conversation with was Xia Qila — the tallest among the short.

If "Pea Princess" Kylie Minogue were a few years younger, he supposed he wouldn't say no either.

(End of chapter)