Golden Melody Awards 2020 – Best Mandarin Album

There are six nominees for Best Mandarin Album this year. Five are from female singers showcasing once again the dominance of female singers in Mandopop. The nominees are:

吳青峰 Wu Tsing-fong -《太空人》“Spaceman”

王若琳 Joanna Wang -《愛的呼唤》“Love is Calling Me”

鄧紫棋 G.E.M -《摩天動物園》“City Zoo”

許哲佩 Peggy Hsu -《失物之城》“Hypnocity”

魏如萱 Waa Wei -《藏著並不等於遺忘》“Hidden, Not Forgotten”

陳珊妮 Sandee Chan – “Juvenile A”

My thoughts on the first five albums are expressed in my reviews of the nominees for Best Male Mandarin Singer and Best Female Mandarin Singer. Let’s look at the remaining nominee: Sandee Chan’s sublime “Juvenile A” album.

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陈珊妮 (Sandee Chan) – “Juvenile A”

Sandee Chen’s Juvenile A @ KKBox

After more than 25 years in the music industry, Sandee Chan released her twelfth studio album “Juvenile A” in 2019. Chan is no stranger to the Golden Melody Awards—she won both Best Album and Best Album Producer in 2005 for《後來我們都哭了》(“Then, We All Wept”), and Best Mandarin Female Singer in 2008 for《如果有一件事是重要的》(“What If It Matters”). What’s impressive about Chan’s decades-spanning career is how she manages to keep her works relevant with the times and continually challenges the boundaries of what her music can achieve.

I only started listening to Chan after her 2013 album《低調人生》(“A Low Key Life”), but have been pleasantly surprised with every album she has since released. Perhaps it takes listeners of a certain age and experience to fully comprehend the meaning she aims to express in her songs.

“Juvenile A” examines the ills of modern technology in our highly digitized world, and ponders how the future will view our present condition. If a future archaeologist were to unearth artifacts from 2019, what would she say? Will our descendants look back at this period of history and be shocked by the warped nature of humanity?

Chan has an innate ability to capture the zeitgeist of the time with her lyrics. Aficionados might choose to listen to “Juvenile A” with the booklet of lyrics open: there is such intelligence and depth to the lyrics that their meaning might go over the heads of casual listeners. Chan manages to address complicated societal issues with a few well-chosen words and analogies. For example,《漢娜怎麼說》(“What Would Hannah Say?”) expertly references German political theorist Hannah Arendt’s views on Nazi Germany to address online bullying. The powerful 《成為一個厲害的普通人》(“Be An Extraordinary Ordinary Person”) , written after Chan spent time talking to Taiwanese youth, wonderfully encapsulates the fears and dejection of the younger generation in 2019 following the overwhelming rejection of marriage equality by older voters and the suicide of popular singer-songwriter Ellen Loo 盧凱彤. It’s no wonder one comment online simply states, “I am 25 years old, but 50-year old Sandee Chan understands me better than I do myself.”

What’s even more remarkable is that Chan produced, wrote, and performed the entire album. It features a few collaborations with artists that might seem incongruent at the outset, but end up fitting superbly. Up-and-coming indie rapper Trout Fresh 呂士軒  lends his voice to the gentle 《成為一個厲害的普通人》(“Be An Extraordinary Ordinary Person”), while the thumping 《你要去哪裏》（“Where Are You Headed?”) features underground rocker Hsu Cheng-Tai 許正泰.  The most ingenious song on the album《玉女穿梭》(“Fair Lady Works Shuttle”) blends the pipa-playing of acclaimed Taiwanese pipa player Chung Yufeng 鍾玉鳳 with a pointed criticism of Instagram and hashtag culture. Chan’s lyrics in Chinese operatic style soar over this track, before merging into a recitation of common, overused hashtags.

The collaboration with Taiwanese actor Kai Ko 柯震東  on “35” is harder to fathom; Ko adds little value to the song, although at a time when the entire Mandarin media industry was shunning him because of a drug scandal, it is not surprising Chan would be one of the few to give him a chance.

Only the singles on this album are found on Youtube. Listeners will need to tap official music streaming platforms (such as Spotify or KKBox) to listen to the whole album. Playing the album from the first song to the last is the best way to savour it. I leave you with one of my favourite set of lyrics taken from “Be An Extraordinary Ordinary Person,” though I won’t translate these lines, because I can’t do them justice.

「用三個詞 描述一下你現在的生活」
他想了很久 比從前在意别人怎麼說
原來孤獨不過是 來自一點點與眾不同
記憶正疊加淡出舊愛摯友
生死病痛
提醒我抓緊什麼

那些過去的知音
像嘴邊淡去的煙霧
逐漸冷卻的赤子心
也大幅降低情緒的限度

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Predictions

Who Will Win: 吳青峰 Wu Tsing-fong -《太空人》“Spaceman”

Many are impressed by this debut solo work, which managed to achieve both critical and commercial acclaim. Since Tsing-fong isn’t going to release another solo album anytime soon, the GMA will likely reward him, both for the strength of this work and for his contributions to Mandopop. It’s also hard to beat this song in terms of its production value.

Who Should Win: 陳珊妮 Sandee Chan – “Juvenile A”

A well-rounded, thematically strong album that managed to surpass her previous works. It captures a poignant snapshot of Taiwanese society at this moment in time. Her chances seem slim, as she was not even nominated for the singing awards. She also chaired the jury of last year’s awards, so it’s unclear if the GMA would be willing to honor her the very next year.

Who I Want to Win: 魏如萱 Waa Wei -《藏着并不等于遗忘》“Hidden, Not Forgotten”

Only if the Best Mandarin Female Singer goes to Fish Leong, then this award can go to Waa Wei, so all these long-suffering nominees can each get something.

Notable Exclusions:

告五人 Accusefive  -《我肯定在幾百年前就說過愛你》“Somewhere in Time, I Said I Love You”

Accusefive’s Somewhere in Time, I Said I Love You @ KKBox

I am surprised this strong debut album from indie Taiwanese band Accusefive was not nominated for Best Mandarin Album, though they were nominated in the Best Band category. The album is packed with soul-stirring hits like the thumping 《法蘭西多士》“Pain Toast”, the stirring ballad 《紅》(“Love”, accompanied by a tear-jerking music video), and 《披星戴月的想你》(“Miss you day and night”), which starts out intimately but expands to a cathartic climax.

舒米恩 Suming – “Bondada”

Suming’s Bondada @ KKBox

Suming’s fifth studio album continues his fusion of Taiwanese Aboriginal music with more mainstream Mandopop. This time he uses different parts of the human face to talk about Aboriginal life. The album contains the playful 《善良的味道》“The Scent of  Kindness”, 《下巴》“Chin” that tells Aboriginal youths to keep their chins up, and the 《我想做個夢》“I Want to Dream”, which sheds light on marginalised persons in society. It might not be award-winning material, but it should at least earn a nomination or two in either the Mandarin Album or Aboriginal Album category, depending on which one the record label applied for. Alas, it was completely shut out from the Golden Melody Awards this year.

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A Spotify playlist of the songs mentioned in this post can be found here. View Yttrium’s coverage of Best Male Mandarin Singer and Best Female Mandarin Singer awards.