2020 Wrapped: Chinese Music That Helped Us Through a Crazy Year

At the top of the year, we were quietly hoping that 2020 would be a watershed time for some of China’s best musicians in breaking through internationally.

Artists such as Hiperson and 33EMYBW had booked slots at international music festivals, and it felt like it wasn’t a matter of if these acts would enrapture a wider audience but when.

Then Covid-19 hit and the country went into lockdown, with music shows within and outside of China put on hold for months. The shock of the sudden closure hit the music industry hard, but local scenes rallied, creating new communities and solidifying existing ones.

One of the most inspiring stories of the year was the month-long fundraising drive that integral Shanghai club ALL put on through May. Needing to dig themselves out of a financial hole left by the pandemic, the club surpassed their aim and have remained open, persevering as a hub for all the weird and wonderful creativity that China’s underground offers.

Speaking optimistically, 2020 was a year of community. It was also a year of variety shows — so many variety shows. There was a brief hip hop variety show war between iQIYI’s The Rap of China, Mango TV’s Rap Star and Bilibili’s Rap for Youth, with the latter seemingly coming out on top despite an inauspicious censorship scandal to end the show.

2020 was also a watershed year for virtual idols in the music industry. Rising star Lexie Liu got on this wave, joining Kpop group K/DA as their fifth member in October, just in time for performances at The League of Legends World Championships. Around the same time, iQIYI’s utterly weird, yet intriguing virtual idol variety show Dimension Nova hit the airwaves.

Overall, it’s certainly been an interesting year for music in China. Here are some of our highlights from 2020.

Breakthrough Band of the Year: Wutiaoren

While 2020 didn't lack for intriguing new bands, it was also a big year for groups breaking through to the mainstream after years of slogging away.

Case in point: Guangdong indie folk band Wutiaoren have been making excellent music for over a decade. The group came into this year’s season of Chinese rock variety show The Big Band as resounding underdogs, but their humor, laidback personalities and overall sound captured the imagination of viewers and the country at large.

Their impromptu performance of the awesome “道山靓仔” (“Handsome Daoshan Boy”), which baffled judges and wowed viewers, set the tone for their appearances on an otherwise formulaic TV show. The act were kicked off and voted back in multiple times before eventually finishing as one of the top 5 bands on the show and securing plenty of media coverage to boot.

Album of the Year: Bildungsroman by Hiperson

In a year of viral singles, a strong, cohesive album continues to be the best means of absorbing a musician or band’s essence. This category might have been a list all on its own, with endless recommendations from the various strata of Chinese music in 2020 (hit "Read more" at the bottom of this piece for a bunch of honorable mentions in this category).

However, sitting atop the pile of our favorite records of the year is the third album from Chengdu rock band Hiperson. Bildungsroman saw the band rise to new heights, with an epic story of love, maturation and society in China.

Speaking about the record to us back in July, the group said, “The effort we put into this album is unprecedented. We have been looking very carefully at what we have been doing well and how to amplify these things.” That unprecedented effort is obvious, with the album standing as the best thing we’ve heard from the group, as well as the best album we’ve heard all year. 

Song of the Year: “Wuhan 2020” by Hardcore Raver in Tears

Songs went viral for a variety of different reasons in 2020. Be it the return of some of the world’s biggest Mandopop stars or tracks that tapped into the public mood amid a pandemic, there were a lot of excellent singles for us to unpack over the past 12 months.

Our song of the year came from Hardcore Raver in Tears, the Wuhan band formed from the ashes of legendary indie group AV Okubo. “Wuhan 2020,” is a gasping, slow-moving ode to the Hubei city that was the epicenter of Covid-19, and which was forced into a strict lockdown for 76 days. Singer Lu Yan spoke to us about the record earlier this year, saying, “After we’ve been through this pandemic, I don’t think either a tour or the new record matters. World peace is the most important thing.”

Defining Genre of the Year: Ambient

What a year it was for new genres, insurgent genres and genres that just held us together through some of the most trying times of the year. But with all the madness going on across the globe, we were grateful for ambient music having a strong 2020.

As Will Griffith wrote for RADII back in April, “The world is louder than ever, which means that there hasn’t been a more opportune time to switch off and slip into the comforting world of ambient music in China.”

We had the excellent Blanc Live 01 from Modern Sky sub label Sound Blanc, we had the ambient leaning stylings of Boiled Hippo via Beijing label Space Fruity Records, and we had the intriguing blending of modern electronic beats and classical Chinese instrumentation from Wang Meng and Yu Miao on Merrie Records, to name just a few.

While electronic party sounds crept into hip hop and pop music in the aftermath of the Covid-19 outbreak, 2020 was a time for quiet reflection, and nothing suited that better than the ambient sounds that we were treated to this year.

Moment of the Year: Livestreaming Through Covid-19

There were many transformative moments in the music industry in 2020. Too many to count. But, the standout moment of the year came in the form of artists and organizations banding together to livestream their music during Covid-19, setting a template that would ultimately be replicated across the globe following the virus’ devastating spread.

As the pandemic shut down livehouses and clubs and kept people in their homes in China, music venues and festival brands across the country banded together to stay sane and active, while also supporting their audiences and fans around the country. The initiative behind these streams felt transformative at the time, and still does, with the country’s music scene having been able to rebound with vigor once venues started opening up again in late spring.

No matter what happened in 2020, it’s heart-warming that we were able to see such togetherness within the music community.

For a full run-down of the year in music, please hit "Read more" at the bottom of this message.

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