Source: Material Life Reference (ID: wzshck)
Forty years ago, in 1980, in Building 3, Lane 290, Guangfu South Road, Da ‘an District, Taipei, Chung-Tan Duann, who had just finished military service, and his second brother, Duan Zhongyi, set up a small company called Rolling Stone Audio Publishing House.
This is not their first "rolling stone". Four years ago, two brothers who love music started a magazine introducing western rock music, called Rolling Stone, to pay tribute to the British rock band Rolling Stone.
Even though they were interested in the Chinese music scene, the two brothers, who were only in their thirties at that time, probably didn’t expect that this company would be open for forty years.
"Rolling stone can become a symbol of this era, completely exceeding the initial expectations." In an interview in 2010, Duan Zhongyi said this.
"In Rolling Stone, every name is a classic."
Bright yellow background, black and white round target and an arrow. Even if you can’t know the stars of the rolling stone, this logo is sealed in many people’s memories in various forms, either vaguely or clearly.
Let’s talk about the past. In 1981, in Rolling Stone’s first album "Three-person Exhibition", the three main stars were: Pan Yueyun, Wu Chuchu and Li Lifen.
Among them, Pan Yueyun is the first signing singer of Rolling Stone, and the most well-known title song is "Am I Your Favorite Person"; As for Li Lifen, his masterpiece "bold and the beautiful", even people passing by in the 1990s can hum a few words;
Wu Chuchu, the only male on the cover, is a veteran who joined the Rolling Stones during the magazine period. Two years later, he ran away and founded a UFO record. In the following ten years, he competed with Rolling Stone. There were once all-powerful figures such as Cai Qin, Wang Jie, Jiang Yuheng, Jimmy Lin and Little Tiger, and most of them were idols. It is worth mentioning that Sandy Lam was later cornered by Jonathan Lee.
In April, 1982, Rolling Stone released Tayu Lo’s first album, "What is it?". Many years later, some people still remember this album lying among the cassettes: the black cover, four big red characters, and Dr. Luo wearing a black shirt and sunglasses, with the words "I am not happy" written all over his face.
Tayu Lo, then a radiologist, pointed X-rays at the society and people’s hearts, and deeply reflected and criticized the development of Taiwan Province society. "Lugang Town" sings about the sense of loss in the transition from the countryside to the city, and "What is it?" mercilessly attacks the blind pursuit of modernization.
Tayu Lo is on fire. One album after another, one classic after another, has made him and a rolling stone full of humanistic spirit. "Nothing can be abandoned, and nothing can be forgotten". Today, nearly 40 years later, Dr. Luo’s songs are still played and sung repeatedly by various voices on the street at dusk and in the empty underground passage.
Then Jonathan Lee. He is a singer and the top producer of Rolling Stone. After joining the Rolling Stones in 1985, Jonathan Lee’s first record was Zhang Aijia’s Busy and Blind. In 1989, he created "Tell You and Listen to You" for Chan Sarah, which became the first album in Taiwan Province to break a million sales. The Chinese music scene has truly entered the era of record industry, and the Rolling Stone has since entered its heyday.
In this period, which may be regarded as the best time of Taiwan Province’s music scene, many names were "touched the stone into gold" by Jonathan Lee, and the infighting between Rolling Stone and UFO was raging. At the same time, Rolling Stone also expanded its market. In addition to setting up its own sub-brands and music studios with different personalities in Taiwan Province, it also set up a music factory led by Tayu Lo in Hong Kong, and established a magic rock culture in the mainland. Apart from the Tang Dynasty, Black Panther band and Ai Jing, it also made it "magic rock".
Walkman after 70′ s and 80′ s, CD player and mp3 player after 90′ s, such as the years when the green leather train rumbled by, on the playground runway, in the bustling streets and lanes, at the moment when lovers held hands and shared an earphone, these names and the melody connected with them are the background sounds of youth, and they are memories that need not be deliberately remembered and will be hard to erase.
"Because the Rolling Stone provided memorable songs to people when they were growing up, which became a very important memory in life." Duan Zhongyi once interpreted the "symbol of the times" attribute of rolling stones in this way.
It was the golden age when rolling stones could not be copied, and it was also the golden age when Chinese pop music was difficult to be copied.
The humanistic atmosphere and the trend of freedom began at the beginning of the founding of Rolling Stone. In Duan Zhongyi’s memory, at that time, everyone had no experience, no complicated process, and simply relied on intuition and inspiration, judgment and courage to do things.
Freedom has no limit, which has become the characteristic of rolling stones to some extent; The story of many people in the rolling stone also happened like a bridge.
Tayu Lo is naturally one of them. Born in a medical family, Dr. Luo is hesitant about being a singer or a doctor. The environment is not friendly to him: the vigorous folk song movement has been attributed to the plainness of campus songs, the concept of Singer-songwriter has not yet been formed, the authorities are extremely strict in ideological control, and Dr. Luo’s songs are just untimely full of irony and anger.
Every record company rejected Tayu Lo for a legitimate reason, but Rolling Stone made a different choice, even though a reporter in the newspaper predicted that "Even the Man" could only sell 2,000 copies. "No matter how many copies we sell, this is the music we are going to make." Duan’s brothers said this to Tayu Lo.
"Xiao Li" Jonathan Lee got off to a more bumpy start. Young Xiao Li is an out-and-out academic scum. He was sent to the most famous cram school by his mother who was a teacher, and eventually became one of the only two losers. The other student was slightly mentally retarded. When I went to a technical college, I took more than 50 credits after studying for five years, but I was still more than 200 points short. In the end, I had to drop out of school and make a living by sending gas.
But in Rolling Stone, Xiao Li is very bright. Busy and Blind started the so-called "concept album" trend that has been popular in Taiwan Province’s music world so far, and his solo album "The Genie in Life" laid a foundation for his expressive music style in the narration of emotions.
This is the rolling stone. It can be grand or delicate, magnificent or tossing and turning. In the small building on Guangfu South Road, anything can happen.
For example, there are many stories from assistants to stars. Huang Yunling entered the Rolling Stone in 1986, and worked as an unpaid assistant for the first two years. It was not until 1988 that he wrote harmony for "Dream Field" sung by Chyi Yu and Pan Yueyun that he earned money for the first time.
Emil Wakin Chau was also an assistant. He was "picked up" by Jonathan Lee in the folk song restaurant. Before that, because he took too many classes, he sang that his throat was inflamed, and the doctor put a needle into his upper jaw to draw blood, which made him "dying". Many years later, he recalled the Rolling Stones and remembered the out-of-print records of Chyi Yu and Li Jianfu on the record cabinet that entered the door. Every day after work, he copied them one by one, just like absorbing nutrients.
At one time, he was very dissatisfied with his boss: he wrote songs for him, but he always turned to magazines. It was a long time before Chung-Tan Duann explained to Emil Wakin Chau: Many people listen to the radio while flipping through magazines, so it is not unusual to catch people while meditating, and it is only when others flip through magazines that such music can be successful.
Rene Liu was Bobby Chen’s assistant. She said she was "too nervous to walk" when she first entered the rolling stone. She was greeted by a poster of Su Huilun, and there were two big words: "I am on a rolling stone, and I am very important".
At noon one day not long after, Jonathan Lee invited the production department to dinner, clamoring that there would be a recording in the evening, but the lyrics could not be written, and asked her and another colleague to write them. After sitting in the cafe for two hours, Li Manting handed in a draft of Laughing at the World of Red Dust.
Xu Huaiyu signed a rolling stone, which was heard by producer Weng Xiaoliang when he was drying clothes on the balcony;
"Mayday" was excavated. Jonathan Lee listened to the demo that Martha and A Xin sent to the front desk and personally called the head monster;
Duan Zhongyi once interpreted the slogan of Rolling Stone Record "I am in Rolling Stone, I am very important". In his view, this is a halo and a responsibility. "Let every employee know that Rolling Stone belongs to everyone and is responsible for all works and all people who listen to music."
"Rolling Stone loves you forever."
During the magazine period, the slogan of Rolling Stone was "Rolling Stone loves you forever". Duan Zhongyi said that this means taking readers as lifelong companions and lovers to love.
Since the end of last century, the appearance of the music industry has changed forever under the embrace of Ipod and download. Rolling Stone, which signed more than 100 singers in its heyday and opened many branches in Malaysia, Indonesia, South Korea and other places, fell into a sharp shrinking trend irreversibly.
At the turn of the century, Rolling Stone Records suffered from both inside and outside: challenging international record companies as independent companies consumed a lot of marketing and advertising costs in the competition; The expansion front in the mainland, Hong Kong and overseas has been stretched too long; In the process of commercialization, the original powerful and humanistic music image has also been invisibly broken …
In 2001, Rolling Stone Hong Kong and Magic Rock Records closed down, and international companies gradually recovered the distribution rights of Rolling Stone’s records in Taiwan Province, and their singers Chen Qizhen, Yang Naiwen, Wu Bai and Zhang Zhenyue left one after another, which made Rolling Stone even worse. In 2005, Wan Fang, Richie Jen, Bug, Huang Pinyuan, Guang Liang were added to the runaway list … The following year, Mayday and Fish Leong joined them.
Falling down, the rolling stone is still looking for a grip and struggling to support it.
In 2008, the Vertical Line Band was established. Tayu Lo, Jonathan Lee, Emil Wakin Chau and Zhang Zhenyue toured for two years, creating two albums to awaken the collective memory with music;
The core of the rolling stone for forty years is music itself, and music is also the foundation for the rolling stone to survive in such a dangerous environment.
In an interview ten years ago, Duan Zhongyi said in retrospect that he would not talk about the rolling stone by its rise and fall. Rolling stone is a process, not an ending.
"The Rolling Stones will continue to fight." He said.
Running water takes away ten years in a hurry. The forty-year-old rolling stone is still fighting today.
1. "Rolling Stone Records for 30 Years: Time Washes, Leaving a Rolling Stone", Author: Xu Pingke, Source: Netease Entertainment feature,
March 3, 2010;
2. "Looking back at the Three Turning Points of Rolling Stone Records from Prosperity to Decline", author: Park Fang, source: rhinoceros entertainment official, April 3, 2020;
3. The Story of Jonathan Lee’s Failure and Greatness, Source: Music Recommendation, April 18, 2020;
4. "Emil Wakin Chau: I survived by Jonathan Lee’s motto", source: Daily News, September 25, 2011;
5. Duan Zhongyi, founder of Rolling Stone Records: Rolling Stone is not noble and has not declined. Source: Beijing News, May 12, 2010;
6. A Brief History of China Pop Music, written by You Jingbo and edited by Li Gang;
7. Duan Zhongyu, Chairman of Rolling Stone Group: The content is the core value of the music industry. Source: Sichuan Daily Watch, June 17, 2019.
* The header picture and the text picture are screenshots of the network.