About a year ago, Leehom Wang mesmerized the music world with his very own blend of Asian and western music（Shangri-La）. Now he invites everybody to another unique-style album—Heroes of Earth. The album continues Wang's original“chinked-out”style, which forms a new school of hip-hop. Leehom explained,“The term‘chinked-out’comes from‘Chink,’which was used to put down Chinese people.‘Chinked-out’turns the negative meaning of‘Chink’upside-down, so I use it as the name of hip-hop with Chinese style.” According to Leehom himself, he loved Hip-hop. He said that was a music style he grew up listening to. Leehom watched the movie Farewell My Concubine (starring the late great Leslie Cheung) 20 times! He got the inspiration from it for his best-selling album Shangri-la, mixing stylish hip-hop, R&B and Peking opera elements all together. This time the traditional Chinese opera can not only be heard via Leehom's special vocal treatment and compositions. He also adds even more eastern flavor to his new tunes! In an interview, Leehom had commented that traditional Chinese opera could be made accessible to the younger generation. He said,“I think we need to add new things to traditional opera or present them in new ways, so that young people will like them.” Many people are making efforts to revive Chinese opera. Taiwan's noted writer Bai Xianyong has made a “youth version”of the Kunqu opera“Peony Pavilion,”which has been acclaimed throughout China. This opera also inspired Leehom in writing “Beside the Plum,”the first song of the new album. He even combined classical Chinese poems with hip-hop, which is unusual but gives the song great rhyme. “Chinese pop music does not have a strong enough feature,” Leehom said. “Instead of imitating other countries' popular songs, we can focus on developing our own sound, drawing from the rich resources that abound in Chinese culture. This is how the concep of ‘chinked-out’music came about.”
