Taiwan Pop Stars Are Hot in Asia
Taiwan has overtaken Hong Kong as the capital of Asia’s pop culture, giving fans an endless array of pop stars backed by sleek packaging, kitsch and a smattering of talent.
Being a pop star these days means you have to be a singer, actor, product endorser, director. In short, you have to do everything and be everywhere from music billboards to TV and silver screens.
Taiwan stars fit this bill perfectly and one very good example is Jay Chou. Starting out as a composer for popular singers, he produced his own album in 2000 and never looked back. In the last eight years, he became Asia’s biggest music star selling out albums and concerts before moving on to star in big-budget films including Curse of the Golden Flower directed by Zhang Yimou and co-starring Chow Yun Fat and Gong Li, and Secret, which he himself wrote, directed and acted in. The only thing that Chou hasn’t done is the so-called idol dramas that Taiwan popularised.
But there are enough stars to fill that void and capture the short attention span of Asian fans. The names Jerry Yan, Vanness Wu, Vic Chou and Ken Zhu—collectively known as F4—became household names through Meteor Garden, perhaps the first idol drama that conquered language barriers and cultural differences. The F4 fever swept across the region from Hong Kong to Malaysia and the rest of Southeast Asia, up to mainland China.
The famous quartet of pretty boys are perhaps Taiwan’s biggest entertainment exports, so popular across the region that the country’s tourism ministry even tapped them as tourism ambassadors for the Japanese and Korean markets. They have become big in Japan, where the pop culture is just as thriving; the 30,000 tickets for the group’s three-night concert in Japan this month were all sold out in only half an hour.
Like Chou, the F4 members have also branched out to other areas in the entertainment industry from music to films.
To be sure, Chou and F4 are not the only Taiwanese artistes who have brought attention to the small island in Southeast Asia. Taiwan’s pop culture is so alive and kicking that the popularity of its singers and actors have extended beyond the island’s limited shores in ways that Hong Kong—Taiwan’s closest neighbour and rival in pop culture—never quite achieved.
Aside from Chou and F4, artistes like Show Luo, Jolin Tsai, Rainie Yang, S.H.E. Wang Lee Hom and many more have become household names. Gone are the days when Hong Kong stars like Andy Lau, Jacky Cheung and Faye Wong lorded it over.
Being a pop star these days means you have to be a singer, actor, product endorser, director. In short, you have to do everything and be everywhere from music billboards to TV and silver screens.
Taiwan stars fit this bill perfectly and one very good example is Jay Chou. Starting out as a composer for popular singers, he produced his own album in 2000 and never looked back. In the last eight years, he became Asia’s biggest music star selling out albums and concerts before moving on to star in big-budget films including Curse of the Golden Flower directed by Zhang Yimou and co-starring Chow Yun Fat and Gong Li, and Secret, which he himself wrote, directed and acted in. The only thing that Chou hasn’t done is the so-called idol dramas that Taiwan popularised.
But there are enough stars to fill that void and capture the short attention span of Asian fans. The names Jerry Yan, Vanness Wu, Vic Chou and Ken Zhu—collectively known as F4—became household names through Meteor Garden, perhaps the first idol drama that conquered language barriers and cultural differences. The F4 fever swept across the region from Hong Kong to Malaysia and the rest of Southeast Asia, up to mainland China.
The famous quartet of pretty boys are perhaps Taiwan’s biggest entertainment exports, so popular across the region that the country’s tourism ministry even tapped them as tourism ambassadors for the Japanese and Korean markets. They have become big in Japan, where the pop culture is just as thriving; the 30,000 tickets for the group’s three-night concert in Japan this month were all sold out in only half an hour.
Like Chou, the F4 members have also branched out to other areas in the entertainment industry from music to films.
To be sure, Chou and F4 are not the only Taiwanese artistes who have brought attention to the small island in Southeast Asia. Taiwan’s pop culture is so alive and kicking that the popularity of its singers and actors have extended beyond the island’s limited shores in ways that Hong Kong—Taiwan’s closest neighbour and rival in pop culture—never quite achieved.
Aside from Chou and F4, artistes like Show Luo, Jolin Tsai, Rainie Yang, S.H.E. Wang Lee Hom and many more have become household names. Gone are the days when Hong Kong stars like Andy Lau, Jacky Cheung and Faye Wong lorded it over.
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