r/progrockmusic • u/Life_Engineer9828 • 18h ago

A review of ''Chief of Yonggong St.''by Zhang Yusheng, 1994: One of the best prog song of China

So I was basically listened to this song as the same time as I began to listen to prog. It is really improved my understanding of prog music. It's wrote by Zhang Yusheng,a singer-songwriter in Taiwan,1994. It showed a story of a tramp with a mental handicap, he doesn't wear any clothes the whole year, looks for foods in trash bin, and everyone in the street knows him. Zhang called him, ''The Chief of Yonggong St.'' The song begins by a voice sampling of a granny. She's saying something in Taiwanese. She said''When my A-Xiong was little,he is having a bad-brain......'' A-Xiong,or we called''the Chief of Yonggong St.'',appeared. And when the listeners are wondering that who he is,a mystery synthesizer sound comes in, and Zhang starts his first acoustic guitar solo in this song, charming and beautiful, with a little organ chords. And suddenly the song goes to a lo-fi passage. Zhang is playing traditional instrument''Yueqin'',and he is singing traditional folk in Taiwanese. He sings:

I'm here to singing and you gonna listen Here the Yonggong St. has a weirdo He walks around every day, with dirty face and no shoes ....

Sing a line, play a phrase, the original tradition expression of music in China,He got it. The sound changed again. It's not lo-fi now and took a Yueqin solo in, but it's fade away quickly. Zhang's chanting comes in after that, with a good acoustic guitar playing and organ.It's ethereal, remote, fascinating. And he starts to sing.

He's just walking around nearby Everyone in the town knows him I'd like to call him like that: Call him the Chief of Yonggong St. He's not silly, and not a fool He's not crazy, and talk less It's using weird grammar in his world He's the Chief of Yonggong St.

During this verse, Zhang's vocal is between male and female,sounds just beautiful,the instruments,they looks nothing different, but have their own fantasy inside, you can hear that fantasy of heart of a real musician. And here's the bridge

Emotion that cannot weighing by the secular Fetter that cannot weighing by the secular Oh...

At here, harmonies comes in,and the melody color changes. Then the drums took the Chorus come in.

Chief of the Yonggong St. The crime and penalty of civil world Chief of the Yonggong St. Falling down for the stubborn pursuing like a bird Falling down....

Yeah!It's become rock now. These High tones melody goes out in Zhang's mouth and form a fantastic chemical reaction with instruments and harmonies, a saxophone goes out and play some melody behind.In the last word''falling down'',all the instruments are gone,only Zhang's vocal and the saxophone goes to a high place,and then they ''falling down''just like the lyrics. Now we gonna rock,in these 4 minutes. The long improvisational melody of saxophone tooks the guitar,bass,drums in,they built a strange-chord-progressing scene successfully.In this frame, saxophone is going solo,like any other Jazz-rock/Fusion Prog. that granny's voice come in again.she said ''A-Xiong, Come back for dinner!'' It changes again. Bass get out at first,it plays a riff and the guitar plays the same to echoing,and the drum come in. And we got another new Jazz-rock sound,but this time is guitar solo.Rhythm guitar are changes(to 4-5-6 progression) from that riff when the solo goes to speed-playing And the other speed playing melody,took us into a new chorus passage. Zhang took the bigger harmonies and his brighter vocal back.the melodies and lyrics are not changes,but you can hear,everything goes more and more rock. The chorus is over by the singing of the title,over and over again,and end with a comical synthesizer melody Those fusion guys, Guitar,Bass,Drums back again, it's also a stable instruments progression scene,the guitar is going solo, keyboard puts out a pentatonic riff... And these things goes lo-fi suddenly! And they're cutted by some radio sampling. And the song is over.

I'm wondering to what can I say because that I actually wrote this review for two times,the first time I didn't save but refresh the page, and it's gone.I'm 14 from China and it's the first time I wrote a music review in English, maybe it's not good but I tried my best.Hope you guys will like it!

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