1990: Starting from Baojia Street

Before Zhou Yan and Wang Zuxian returned to China, they spent two days shopping in London.

Originally, they were worried about being recognized, but it turned out that they were just being smart. Let alone Europeans and Americans, they didn't recognize them even when they met some Asians.

Of course, they were not disguised at all. Both of them wore sunglasses.

Walking on the streets of London, no one would pay special attention to them.

When they got on the plane from London, the two took different flights. Zhou Yan returned to Yanjing, and Wang Zuxian flew directly to Xiangjiang.

When Zhou Yan got home, it was already night. He took a shower and went to bed.

The next morning, Zhou Yan first sent the score of the English version of "Meteor" to Zhang Youan, and then went to the studio.

I haven't been back for a few days, and the studio has accumulated a lot of things.

He first handled the work related to "Spring of the Cowherd Class". Now the preparatory work for the film has been basically completed and can be started at any time.

Zhou Yan originally wanted to put the start date in late April, but now he doesn't have to attend the launch of "Sense and Sensibility", and the weather in Yanjing has been good recently, and all conditions are met, so he decided to set the start time. On April 10th.

Different from the previous shootings, Zhou Yan is not planning to hold a opening ceremony this time.

Now that "Chidi" Middle School is running in an orderly manner, just like a real school, Zhou Yan is worried that holding the opening ceremony may affect the condition of the actors.

It would be better not to hold any opening ceremony and just go in to shoot. At worst, when the filming is finished, the wrapping party will be grander.

Of course, the director team supports this decision, mainly Xu Feng has to deal with it.

Xu Feng and the others actually paid more attention to these things and felt that Feng Shui and rituals were very important. However, after Zhou Yan communicated with her, she also expressed her support.

Nowadays, Xu Feng is less and less interested in Zhou Yan's movies, and rarely asks about them, because she knows that Zhou Yan can handle any problems.

In this regard, Zhou Yan is much more worry-free than Chen Kaige.

The movie "Feng Yue" made Xu Feng very anxious. The filming of "Feng Yue" has not ended yet, and the crew still has many things that she needs to deal with.

Not only Xu Feng, but the rest of the crew were also impatient. If the previous film "Farewell My Concubine" hadn't been so successful, Leslie Cheung and Gong Li might have given up.

At the end of last year, Gong Li went to film Zhang Yimou's "Shake, Shake, Shake to Grandma Bridge", and that movie ended long ago.

Now Xu Feng's thoughts are all on "Feng Yue" and he doesn't have much energy to take care of Zhou Yan.

Zhou Yan didn't care about this at all. As long as the money was in place, he didn't need Xu Feng to interfere with the filming of the movie. He could handle it himself.

After finishing the work on "Spring of the Cowherd Class", Zhou Yan went to the recording studio again.

The preparatory work for No. 43 Baojia Street's first album has been completed and recording is now underway.

The entire album has been recorded for a month, and the progress has just reached the halfway point. Wang Feng and the others record at a relatively slow speed. Fortunately, the studio has many resources, otherwise they may not be able to complete half of it in this month.

It's definitely not fast to record an album in two or three months, but it's also a normal speed.

When Zhou Yan arrived at the recording studio, they had just finished recording the harmony part of "Good Night, Yanjing" and were taking a rest.

It can be seen that the recording process went smoothly, and several people had smiles on their faces.

Seeing Zhou Yan coming, several people quickly stood up to say hello.

"Senior brother."

"Zhou Yan."

Zhou Yan smiled and said, "Sit down, I've been working hard on recording during this period."

Long Long said with a smile, "Why are you so hard? Recording your own album makes me feel energetic every day."

Zhou Yan nodded and went to the workbench to listen to a section. The recording today was indeed pretty good.

For their first album, the lyrics were written by Wang Feng alone, while Long Long assisted Wang Feng in writing the music.

The original plan for this album was to have ten songs, but Zhou Yan looked through their notebook and found that there were many good songs, so he increased the number of songs from ten to twelve.

There is a big difference between the production cost of ten songs and twelve songs, but Zhou Yan believes that since it is the first album, it should be done well by them, and it must keep up with both quality and quantity.

Most of them were songs that Zhou Yan had heard before, such as "Little Bird", "Good Night Yanjing", "I Hope" and other songs. There were also some songs that Zhou Yan had never heard in his previous life.

Zhou Yan's appearance still had a great impact on their band.

The most obvious one is the creation of the song "Grown Up".

"Grown Up" is a song that Wang Feng wrote out of emotion after collaborating with Mr. Lu. The style of this song is a bit like "I Love You, China", but the lyrics are completely different, and it is not about the love for the motherland. Mother's praise is a memory and reflection on the past.

"Grown Up" echoes the song "Little Bird". The latter is about young people's desire for freedom and confusion about the future, while the former is about having a better understanding of life after experiencing some things. There is also more relief.

If Zhou Yan hadn't introduced Wang Feng to Senior Lu and asked him to be responsible for the soundtrack of "Grown Up", the song of the same name as "Grown Up" would never have appeared.

After listening to their recording in the morning, Zhou Yan gave them another thumbs up, "Work hard. If the album gets a good response, we will arrange a concert for you at the Workers' Stadium this time next year."

Hearing the pie drawn by Zhou Yan, several members of the band became excited. Long Long even stood up and asked, "Is it true, senior?"

Wang Feng smiled beside him and said, "Long Zi, look at what you said. When did senior brother lie to us?"

"Yes, yes, senior brother always does what he says. I'm just too excited."

"If you want to hold a concert, the twelve songs from this album will definitely not be enough. In the meantime, you should prepare some other songs, at least twenty, if not, then sing other people's songs. Bar."

Wang Feng immediately said, "There is no need to sing other people's songs, just sing our own."

His tone is firm and confident. As a creator, he definitely doesn't want to sing other people's songs in his concerts.

In fact, their band has a lot of songs. In addition to the twelve songs on the album, there are many others, but they have not been recorded yet.

And now that Wang Feng is very creative, there is no problem in writing another ten songs in this year.

After chatting with Wang Feng and the others for a while, Zhou Yan returned to his office. As soon as he sat down, his pager rang.

It was from Huo Siqi. He didn't say anything and just left his number.

Zhou Yan dialed back the number, and the call was quickly picked up.

"Brother Siqi, what do you want from me?"

"I have already negotiated with Director Zhang and the others about the Tai Chi movie."

Zhou Yan said in surprise, "Did you talk to them?"

He didn't expect Huo Siqi to go directly to Zhang Xinyan and the others to talk about it.

"Yes, after the second brother told me about this, I inquired and found out that Zhang Xinyan and the others were in Yanjing, so I invited them to have dinner with them."

"What a coincidence."

"They went to the sports school to find the leading actor. They have been in Yanjing for a while."

Hearing Zhang Xinyan that they were looking for the leading actor, Zhou Yan couldn't help but asked curiously, "Have they found him?"

"Well, I also saw that he was a pretty handsome young man, but..."

"what happened?"

"But it doesn't look as eye-catching as Jet Li."

"What's your name?" "I know your surname is Wu."

Zhou Yan smiled, he should be looking for Wu Jing. It couldn't be such a coincidence. Zhang Xinyan and the others didn't find Wu Jing when they went to the sports school, but found a young man with the same surname Wu. The probability was too small.

Huo Siqi's vision is really high. Wu Jing's appearance should have been very eye-catching when he was young, and there is no need to compare with Jet Li. After all, Jet Li is already a big star.

"Director Zhang and his team's choice must be reasonable," Zhou Yan said.

"It doesn't matter whether it makes sense or not. Anyway, I don't have high expectations for this project. I just need to be able to take over with Zhang Xinyan and the others. We can still afford a loss of two million."

"Two million?" Zhou Yan was stunned. "Is this how much you want to invest? Does my second brother want to invest?"

When he had a phone call with Zhou Hong before, he said that he could invest, but it was best to only invest a little.

But these two million are not a small amount.

Two million thrown into the mainland is enough to make a movie.

"It's not the second one, it's me who wants to vote for it. Director Zhang and the others happened to be short of two million, so I gave them the first one to make up for it. I only invested three to five million, which was half a million. After all the money was spent, I still couldn't get enough." I will definitely win the favor of Director Zhang and others. If you don’t want to let go of the child, you can’t trap the wolf.”

Zhou Yan couldn't help but sigh, Huo Siqi was so generous.

In fact, if Huo Siqi wants to make friends with Zhang Xinyan and the others, there are many ways. As long as he reveals his family background, Zhang Xinyan and the others will take the initiative to come over.

With Huo Siqi's relationship, he could make it difficult for them to get along at any time.

However, Huo Siqi is still very clear-headed. Although the power of the family is easy to use, it is not as safe and trouble-free as throwing money at it. As a common saying goes, if money can solve a problem, it is not a problem.

Two million is nothing to the current Qizhi Company.

Zhou Yan felt that he would not be able to recover much of the two million, but as Huo Siqi said, it was only two million, so if you lose, you will lose.

"Are they still in Yanjing now?"

"Yes, but we are about to leave. If you come back early, we can still have dinner together. Forget it this time, we will have another dinner together when they come next time. "Tai Chi" will be filming in the mainland, so we will They will all come by then.”

"Well, okay. I'll make arrangements next time when they come over."

"Actually, I've read a few TV drama scripts recently. I'll talk to you later when I have time."

"no problem."

Zhou Yan knew that Huo Siqi was very active in filming TV series.

The key point is that Huo Siqi is quite free now. Qizhi Company's business is mainly brought in by him, but he doesn't usually need to do a lot of things. He only needs to go to some company leaders for dinner occasionally.

In the remaining time, he also wanted to find something to do for himself.

Zhou Yan understands his thoughts, so it's okay to find something for him to do. Although Zhou Yan didn't think Huo Siqi could get any good scripts, it was still uncertain.

It would be great if he could get it, but if he couldn't, it would be nice to let him pass the time.

……

After Jeff Brown received the score, he left the office and prepared to go find the Backstreet Boys.

However, he met Alisson Hawken on the way. Seeing Jeff Brown in a hurry, Alisson Hawken asked with a smile, "Why haven't you started recording the Backstreet Boys' single? It can't be out of date." What's the problem?"

Alisson Hawken was previously transferred from their parent company rca. Although jive's parent company has now become BMG, Alisson Hawken has stayed.

The two have always been at odds with each other. In Jeff Brown's view, Alisson Hawken is a complete villain and short-sighted.

Alisson Hawken has said in public more than once that Jeff Brown's vision is too outdated and he lacks keen insight into what is popular nowadays.

Alison Hawken previously believed that it was a mistake for the company to change its strategy. Now that hip-pop is gaining momentum, it should be managed well and there is no need to focus on other sectors.

However, after the company's strategy was finalized, Alisson Hawken's attitude changed again. He believed that since he wanted to enter the youth market, he should sign more energetic girls. If he had to sign a male singer, he must also find one. Better looking.

Except for the fifteen-year-old Nick, the other members of the Backstreet Boys group all look too ordinary.

Alisson Hawken believes that Nick should be singled out and given a few youthful "sugar songs" to attract the attention of female fans.

The fifteen-year-old beautiful boy singer has a very wide audience and can basically kill female fans of all ages, and the spending power of these female fans is also considerable.

But Jeff Brown believes that since they are a music company, they must focus on music, whether it is a group or an individual. If the work is not good enough, it will not last long just by selling looks.

In fact, if it were just a different philosophy, Jeff Brown wouldn't be very annoyed by Alisson Hawken. The main reason is that Alisson Hawken is a mean-mouthed person. He not only speaks ill of him behind his back, but also criticizes him in person.

At this moment, facing Alisson Hawken's eccentric attitude, Jeff Brown said expressionlessly, "Now that the Backstreet Boys are under my control, you don't need to worry about these things."

"No matter who is in charge, the Backstreet Boys are a group signed by the company. I am concerned about the development of the company."

Jeff Brown glanced at Alisson Hawken and walked past him without saying anything else.

The members of the Backstreet Boys were all in the practice room at the moment. When Jeff Brown went there, they were practicing a song they had written before.

Entering the practice room, Jeff Brown first stopped their practice, then held up the music sheet in his hand and said, "Don't worry about other things for these two days, just sing this song well and record a demo. "

"Is it the song "Meteor"?" Brian asked.

Jeff Brown nodded, "Yes, Kevin, come and get the score."

Captain Kevin Richardson walked over and took the score into his hand.

They have all heard the song "Meteor", and they have also seen the commercials on Panasonic TVs and saw Zhou Yan's playing.

After Jeff Brown asked them to sing this song, they took out the score of the song and usually hummed it or sang it with some messy words.

Therefore, Kevin is very familiar with this song.

However, after getting the score, Kevin discovered that it was somewhat different from what Zhou Yan played. The chords in the intro were the same, but there were many differences in the melody.

And this song is not called "Meteor", but "yellow".

The lyrics are very simple, that is, "I" like a girl who is as bright as a yellow star, and I wrote this song and named it "yellow".

After roughly looking at the lyrics and score, Kevin smiled and said, "Brothers, come to work."

Then several people gathered around the score and began to study the song.

Jeff Brown did not leave, but moved a chair to watch them.

Jeff Brown was very pleasantly surprised when he got this song. Although the lyrics of this song are simple, it is very suitable for the Backstreet Boys. It is a straightforward love confession song, which accurately fits the needs of the Backstreet Boys. market to enter.

He didn't read the score carefully, because he couldn't see the effect just by looking at the score. It was better to let the boys in the group sing it and listen to it.

The song was not difficult in the first place, and they had already practiced the original version before, so they got started quickly.

When Brian finished singing the first few lines to the lyrics, Jeff Brown slapped his thigh and his eyes showed surprise. He understood that there was absolutely no problem with this song!

Compared with pure music, after this piece of music was turned into a song, it became even more charming, especially when paired with Brian's heavenly voice, which made this song particularly moving.

The boys in the group also looked delighted. The song was even better than they imagined.

The melody is simple, the emotion is sincere, and paired with the magical accompaniment, the whole song is very catchy. It can conquer the audience with just the first line, but if you listen to the melody of pure music, the first line is not so exaggerated. magic.

Several people were excited at the thought that this song would be their first officially released single. (End of chapter)