A Song a day

Monday, July 7, 2014

7th July 2014 (把悲傷看透時 – Priscilla Chan)

The song that I chose for today is “把悲傷看透時” by Priscilla Chan. Priscilla is one of my favourite singers. She recently had a concert in Hong Kong, but sadly I was not in Hong Kong during that time so I missed it. This song was from 2003, from one of her lesser known album “情意結”. When that album first came out in 2003, I wasn’t really a fans of Priscilla’s song, so I didn’t bought it. A few years down the track, one day, I suddenly wanted to listened to the songs that I grow up with and realised that so many of the songs that I liked were sung by Priscilla. That’s started my collection of Priscilla’s albums. Currently I am only a few albums away from collecting all her albums (but they are ultra hard to find….). This album “情意結” were one of them as it was produced at a time when she wasn’t too popular, so hard core fans will probably wouldn’t sell it and others who doesn’t like her too much wouldn’t bought it in the first place. Lucky, late last year, the music company decided to reissue the album. Although it is selling at a higher price as they now turn it into 24 Gold version for better sound quality, I bought it when I first saw it as it was so hard to find the original version. So after all these years I finally manage to own an actual CD copy of this album 3 weeks ago. Listening to the whole album today, this album is now one of my favourite, I love every song in the album. Anyway, back to the song for today, the direct English translation of the title is “when we can see through sadness”.

The lyrics of the song are the protagonist looking through her feeling after breaking up from a third person perspective. The lyrics said “it is not odd that that night it started to snow, so that it could stop the blood from her wound. That made her remembers the cruellest moment of her life. That night, he analysed his action in the past few months, all of a sudden he doesn’t want to continue their relationship. Coming back, the view from the train is now reversing. She forgot why she was in the city. The tears that she remembers for life is trapped in her eyes like the water in a lake. But sadly, no matter how much she cries, these tears would get her love one retune to her side. Who said that there was so much work to do? In the busy world, sadness is not allowed. The thing that she worried the most is that she forgets how she managed to fallen to sleep in the past. Don’t mention who she was waking up for. Then she started to not care about him. She even let him know about this. The thing that she remembers for life, at the end is just so dull; just like it would be fine to live without feeling. The saying that she still doesn’t understand is “when seeing through sadness”. In the future, she no longer care who she will spent the rest of her life with.” Hope you will like this song as much as I do.

21st Nov 2013 (奇妙旅程 – Priscilla Chan)

16th Nov 2013 (痴情夢醒 – Priscilla Chan)

14th Nov 2013 (情意結 – Priscilla Chan)

19th Oct 2012 (無名指 – Priscilla Chan/Ne lui parlez plus d'elle - Lara Fabien)

16th Oct 2012 (明日有明天 – Priscilla Chan)

27th Sep 2012 (貪,貪,貪 – Priscilla Chan)

24th Jun 2012 (夜機 –Priscilla Chan)

11th May 2012 (千千闕歌 –Priscilla Chan)

把悲傷看透時 – Priscilla Chan

Sunday, July 6, 2014

6th July 2014 (下靶 – C AllStar)

The song for today is “下靶” by C AllStar. This song was requested by a fellow reader a while ago. It is a bit hard to translate the title of this song. In Chinese it means someone that is always taking the role of being inferior, generally acting thought as the situations require someone to play that role. The closest that I could think of is “Underdog”, but it doesn’t quite capture the full meaning.

The lyrics of the song are about love. The protagonist said perhaps he said too much and perhaps he need to kneel down to admit his wrong, please tell him where he got wrong. If you asked him, he prefers to make up for his wrong. If he tried and got wrong, he wouldn’t mind to get told off. Maybe his problem is that he thinks too much. What could he relay on to say jokes? If getting too excited would turn into hate; swear that you will destroy too much, putting out his lit cigarette; this movement taught him a lesson. Please put away your mouth as it tends to react too quickly. Even in normal conservation, they could start arguing. He is not worry that he will own her, but worry that he can’t hold himself back. Is it good to be bowing to her like normal? He felt that it is a shame to be a mute, so perhaps disappearing is better. He wanted to keep this sadness to end the relationship. He can’t stand to accept all the unreasonable arguing. He hold himself up, to be an underdog, perhaps this is good enough. From now on he hold his laughter, just let others to laugh. He wanted to calm himself down. He is not dare to give order as he got used to matching her movements. If he keep holding himself up, to be an underdog, would she be happy? Why they have to argue? Could she hold it back? Perhaps they could understand each other. But he doesn’t want to lie. It is sad that she doesn’t listen and doesn’t responds. Thinking about that hard working summer, he was not worry that he will own her, but worried that he can’t hold himself back. He holds himself up, to be an underdog. Is it good enough now that he accepted his fate? Is she thinking of him now? He felt that they are so far apart. He is being himself at low places so he doesn’t have much energy left. He now took all the bad consequences that he deserved, and no one is looking up to him. He tried to be himself, but there isn’t much he could do now, he can only get drunk and try to express all his feeling. Hope you will like the song.

2nd Apr 2014 (我們的電車上 – C AllStar)

30th Jan 2014 (放下 – C AllStar)

13th Jun 2013 (時間囊 – C AllStar)

17th Apr 2012 (天梯 – C AllStar)

下靶 – C AllStar

Saturday, July 5, 2014

5th July 2014 (沉默是金 – Sam Hui and Leslie Cheung)

The song that I chose for today is “沉默是金” by Sam Hui and Leslie Cheung. This is a true classic. The melody of the song was written by Leslie while the lyrics of the song were written by Sam. I think this song was originally sung by Sam along, but personally I like the version that both Sam and Leslie sing together. The direct English translation of the title is “Silence is gold”.

The lyrics of the song are about life. The lyrics uses complex words, so hopefully my translation could still capture its meaning fully. It said, at a windy night, the protagonist thinking about the past alone. Perhaps he was fully of anger in the past, false accusations and blame filled his stomach. He care so much about rumours. Now he learned his lessons and pointed to the right directions by books, he can now see it through and not trapped anymore. He feels that he understand now not like before; he rub off his tears and moved forward. Fate determined whether you are rich or poor. Wrongs will never be right and real will always be real. No matter what you said, he will just focus on his work as he believes that silence is gold. The society will judge, so watch your words and try not to attack others with words. When you bump into cold wind and rain, don’t be too serious. You should be confidence about yourself, ignore others attack and judging. Just let others laugh and yell at you, as you can just ignore it. We are young, so we can keep being ourselves. Keep going, and be ourselves. Hope you will like the song. I have also linked to Sam solo version for comparison.

17th Sep 2013 (急流勇退 – Sam Hui)

13th May 2013 (天才白痴夢 – Sam Hui)

11th Apr 2013 (心裡日記 – Sam Hui)

8th Aug 2012 (尖沙咀Susie – Sam Hui)

3rd Mar 2014 (風繼續吹 – Leslie Cheung)

8th Jan 2014 (童年時 – Leslie Cheung)

25th Apr 2013 (只怕不再遇上 – Leslie Cheung and Elisa Chan)

2nd Apr 2013 (Monica – Leslie Cheung/モニカ – Kikkawa Koji (吉川晃司))

24th Feb 2013 (大熱 – Leslie Cheung)

22nd Feb 2013 (小明星 – Robynn & Kendy/Leslie Cheung)

11th Feb 2013 (由零開始 – Leslie Cheung)

8th July 2012 (風再起時 – Leslie Cheung)

20th Jun 2012 (寂寞夜晚 – LeslieCheung/Eason Chan/ To You – Leslie Cheung)

5th May 2012 (春夏秋冬 – KellyChan/Leslie Cheung)

6th Apr 2012 (最冷一天 - Eason Chan/Leslie Cheung)

沉默是金 – Sam Hui and Leslie Cheung

沉默是金 – Sam Hui

Friday, July 4, 2014

4th July 2014 (抱擁這分鐘 – Eason Chan)

The song for today is “抱擁這分鐘” by Eason chan. This song is requested by a fellow reader of this blog during my vocation. This song was very old, from 1997. It was popular back then and I loved it. But a few years ago when Eason sing this song in his Duo concert, they got a new arrangement for this song. This new version catches my ears once again and become one of the most played songs of my music collection. The direct English translation of the title is “Hugging this minute”.

The lyrics of the song are about love. The protagonist said to forget about the world for this minute and fall into the cracks of love. Light up the candle and only worry about hugging. Come and take over the starry sky and catch the moment of agreement. The dreamy future; even thought we might not know anything. Understand that this is complete indulgence, but we can only believe in this moment. In the future we might worry that we might end up with nothing. She is his happiness, but she is also the thing that cause him the most pain; loving at a loss. She is the person that he wishes the most, but also the person that he couldn’t predict; who else could compromise these. He once fallen in love with her, and there were too many similarity in their past. Who’s in their heart, how could he guess correctly. Fallen into the fire of love that night, he felt that everything could be shared, but still he wouldn’t dare to dream to be deeply in love for another minute. Understand that this is complete indulgence, but we can only believe in this moment. In the future we might worry that we might end up with nothing. She is his happiness, but she is also the thing that cause him the most pain; loving at a loss. She is the person that he wishes the most, but also the person that he couldn’t predict; who else could compromise these. Wanted to say love forever, but he is worry that it wouldn’t be believable and could never see it through. He wanted to leave it as that for that night, but love have already gone out of control and all they wanted is to keep hugging. Oh, hugging…… hurt……

I hope you will love this song as much as I do. In the process of finding the lyrics of the song, I found this blog (http://cantonpopblog.blogspot.com.au/2012/04/blog-post_1320.html). This blog post explains the meaning of the song in Chinese, so if you can read Chinese and you wanted to know more about the song I strongly suggested you to go to this blog. That blog seems to be written by a group of teachers and students from Hong Kong Open University for the purpose of promoting, recording and explaining Hong Kong’s literature and culture through Cantonese songs. They don’t seems to post on a regular bases, but I think it is a blog that worth supporting. Anyways, for this song, I have linked to two versions below. The first one is the original version, the second one is the version in the Duo Concert. Note that in the second version, Eason didn’t seems to remember the lyrics too well as it was more of a spontaneous act requested by the guitarist of the concert (Jun Kung 恭碩良, he is also a singer himself). Enjoy!!

2nd July 2014 (一絲不掛 – Eason Chan)

31st May 2014 (垃圾 – Eason Chan/Candy Lo)

12th Apr 2014 (天下無雙 – Eason Chan)

21st Feb 2014 (大開眼戒 (A.K.A. 打回原形) – Eason Chan)

4th Feb 2014 (每一個明天 – Eason Chan)

31st Dec 2013 (新生活 – Eason Chan)

19th Nov 2013 (今日 – Eason Chan)

6th Aug 2013 (大激想 – Eason Chan, Edmond Leung and Miriam Yeung)

1st Aug 2013 (任我行 – Eason Chan)

30th Jun 2013 (黑擇明 – Eason Chan)

27th May 2013 (月球上的人 – Eason Chan)

16th Apr 2013 (開不了心 – Eason Chan)

17th Mar 2013 (幸福摩天輪 – Eason Chan)

24th Jan 2013 (阿牛 – Eason Chan)

27th Dec 2012 (天使的禮物 – Eason Chan)

23rd Dec 2012 (因為愛情 – Eason Chan & Faye Wong)

8th Nov 2012 (愈想愈無謂 – Eason Chan/ Mr. Lonely - Koji Tamaki 玉置浩二)

9th Oct 2012 (1874 – Eason Chan)

7th Oct 2012 (完 – Eason Chan/夢想天空分外藍 – Eason Chan)

13th Aug 2012 (非禮 – Eason Chan)

13th Jun 2012 (重口味 – EasonChan)

29th Apr 2012 (七百年後 – EasonChan)

21st Apr 2012 (路...一直都在 –Eason Chan)

6th Apr 2012 (最冷一天 - Eason Chan/Leslie Cheung)

3rd Apr 2012 (夕陽無限好 – EasonChan)

29th Mar 2012 (單車- Eason Chan)

27th Mar 2012 (What a wonderful world - Eason Chan)

25th Mar 2012 (Shall We Talk - Eason Chan)

抱擁這分鐘 – Eason Chan (Original version)

抱擁這分鐘 – Eason Chan (Duo Concert version)

3rd July 2014 (遙望 – Beyond)

The song that I chose for today is “遙望” by Beyond. The direct English translation of the title is “Look into the distance”.

The lyrics of the song are about love. It is still a rainy day and the protagonist is still looking out the window. Silence night, he wanted to ask the sky whether it knows the feeling in his heart. As he gets old, his unlimited love will hold in his heart like a freeze eye that lost direction. Let the rain come down lightly to cover up the depression; just like how the twinkling star in the sky is calling you. Looking in a distance, he wishes that he could be like wind, to accompany her to float away, to let his lonely arm to hold her once again. Thinking about the past, it is like a foggy dream; helplessly sigh, her laughter is like wind that just slowly went by. Every day he wanted it, forever hugging with her, forget the pain and sadness in the world. No matter how far they are separated, he will hear her call, he looks forward to see her again in this life. Hope you will like the song.

9th June 2014 (喜歡你 – Beyond)

24th Feb 2014 (海闊天空 – Beyond)

29th Dec 2013 (情人 – Beyond)

29th Aug 2013 (高溫派對 - Beyond)

23rd Aug 2013 (亞拉伯跳舞女郎 - Beyond)

6th Jul 2013 (長城 - Beyond)

2nd Jan 2013 (真的愛妳 - Beyond)
2nd Dec 2012 (爸爸媽媽 – Beyond)

29th Nov 2012 (我是憤怒 – Beyond)

15th Oct 2012 (長空 – Beyond)

11th Oct 2012 (Amani - Beyond)

7th Aug 2012 (大地 – Beyond)

7th Jun 2012 (Can’t bring me down – Paul Wong)

遙望 – Beyond

Wednesday, July 2, 2014

2nd July 2014 (一絲不掛 – Eason Chan)

While my post for yesterday was to show support for Hong Kong people, to put in my effort to support the freedom fight, this blog post is dedicated to all of you who visited my blog during my vocation. I was very surprise that so many people like my blog. A number of you had made some requests of songs that you would like me to translate and to repay your support, I will try to translate all of your requests in the coming weeks. First one that I chose from the request list is “一絲不掛” by Eason Chan. This song is also one of my favourites. The direct English translation of the title is “Not wearing a single silk wire” (i.e. meaning “Naked” in Chinese).

The lyrics of the song are about love. The protagonist said that when he broke up with his girlfriend, she turned around feeling regret, wishing that in the future there wouldn’t be any tie between them. When he work, sleep, pray, entertain, so systematically to go one with his time, who would have thought that she wishes to see each other again when she is lose from his hand. Who was the person that wanted to be free, then that person was controlled at the end of the world. The control rope was so tight that she started to choke, then she realised that she become a puppet. Who is actually in control of that rope? Not getting together and not breaking up, only wait until she is catch by another hand. That time the silk is not measured by life. But when he dragging along the outer shell, he found happiness. Tighten her around her shoulder or is she waiting for him to cut the rope, then the kite with the broken wire will fly toward heaven. These years, he wishes to see her hugging another person to appear in front of him. What is left there for him to worry that they would be tangle up again. Let him find a partner, find the footprint that she left behind for him to start a relationship with, all because her shadow forcing him to move forward. It is like a silk wire leading his way, and it tangle up in his through that make him itch sometime. To make her feel good, he smiles, wanted to say it but hold back. He wanted her to be happy with her partner so he become strong and tried to heal his wound. Not getting together and not breaking up, only wait until she is catch by another hand. That time the silk is not measured by life. But when he dragging along the outer shell, he found happiness. Tighten her around her shoulder or is she waiting for him to cut the rope, then the kite with the broken wire will fly toward heaven. All these times he didn’t noticed that even he tight himself up, he wasn’t able to tie up with promise. His head is full of silk wire, and they all turned white yet too lazy to fall off. She was pulling him emotionally, but who would want this to continue until they reach heaven? Then his broken body, wanted to cut the wire but yet not reconciled to cut it. Perhaps the lovely part of love is about getting tied up? Sadly he and her had once holed hand, but there were no rope. Hope you will like the song.

31st May 2014 (垃圾 – Eason Chan/Candy Lo)

12th Apr 2014 (天下無雙 – Eason Chan)

21st Feb 2014 (大開眼戒 (A.K.A. 打回原形) – Eason Chan)

4th Feb 2014 (每一個明天 – Eason Chan)

31st Dec 2013 (新生活 – Eason Chan)

19th Nov 2013 (今日 – Eason Chan)

6th Aug 2013 (大激想 – Eason Chan, Edmond Leung and Miriam Yeung)

1st Aug 2013 (任我行 – Eason Chan)

30th Jun 2013 (黑擇明 – Eason Chan)

27th May 2013 (月球上的人 – Eason Chan)

16th Apr 2013 (開不了心 – Eason Chan)

17th Mar 2013 (幸福摩天輪 – Eason Chan)

24th Jan 2013 (阿牛 – Eason Chan)

27th Dec 2012 (天使的禮物 – Eason Chan)

23rd Dec 2012 (因為愛情 – Eason Chan & Faye Wong)

8th Nov 2012 (愈想愈無謂 – Eason Chan/ Mr. Lonely - Koji Tamaki 玉置浩二)

9th Oct 2012 (1874 – Eason Chan)

7th Oct 2012 (完 – Eason Chan/夢想天空分外藍 – Eason Chan)

13th Aug 2012 (非禮 – Eason Chan)

13th Jun 2012 (重口味 – EasonChan)

29th Apr 2012 (七百年後 – EasonChan)

21st Apr 2012 (路...一直都在 –Eason Chan)

6th Apr 2012 (最冷一天 - Eason Chan/Leslie Cheung)

3rd Apr 2012 (夕陽無限好 – EasonChan)

29th Mar 2012 (單車- Eason Chan)

27th Mar 2012 (What a wonderful world - Eason Chan)

25th Mar 2012 (Shall We Talk - Eason Chan)

一絲不掛 – Eason Chan

1st July 2014 (雞蛋與羔羊 – Kay Tse)

Hi everyone, I am finally back home, so now this blog will finally go back to normal. I sort of promise to write a post in the last few days, but a few unexpected things happened and so I had to sort them out and got no time to write a post. So I will write two post today, one for yesterday (this one) and one for today.

For yesterday, I chose the song “雞蛋與羔羊” by Kay Tse. This is a new song. The direct English translation of the title is “Egg and lamb”. According to the writer, the song was inspired by the movie “12 Years a Slave”. I chose this song because it somewhat express the feeling of Hong Kong people right now and yesterday (1st July) was the day when Hong Kong returned to China, so it got a historical meaning. In recent years this day has become an important day for Hong Kong people to express their opinions to the government. I wasn’t able to go there to show my support so I will show my support here on the internet to let more people know about the current status of Hong Kong, and hence why I have chosen this song for yesterday.

The lyrics of the song are about freedom. It said the smell of the flower in the sleeping room; the looks of my wife; every good memory came up in his mind in his dream. The window of his cell; the sounds of the chain; told him that he will never return to his past. After being drunk, he still believe that his life will go back to normal, but he would never thought he had been tricked; became a slave, bad things will happened, so bad that he couldn’t imagined. Meal A, egg crashing into the wall. It would end heroically, and will not give in. Meal B, chose to become a lamb. Stay in the ranch for the rest of his life. How to choose become these options? We have already got to the time where we have to choose, keep dragging on and we will die. Pretend to be sleeping, and we will be waiting for others to pay tribute to us in our dream. The alarm is raining, and it sounds tenses. Everywhere around us is quickly changing, getting rid of the old colour and style. Knives and guns are holding up high so arrogantly, wanting all the old value to become trash. Being so peaceful for a long time make us think that peaceful and happiness will last forever. Who would have thought that the things that we have got yesterday would disappeared instantly; just like tones of snow fallen onto our head. Meal A, egg crashing into the wall. It would end heroically, and will not give in. Meal B, chose to become a lamb. Stay in the ranch for the rest of his life. How to choose become these options? We have already got to the time where we have to choose, keep dragging on and we will die. Forget about dreaming. An egg hitting a wall, it will definitely break, so how could it challenge? But if a pile of egg look at the wall, it could become a force field and it will grow. Today, the egg chose to hit the wall and not worry to die heroically, and it will not give in. Otherwise, become a lamb and stay in the ranch for the rest of your life. Which one is more ideal, you better think fast. We have already got to the time where we have to choose, keep dragging on and we will die. Pretend to be sleeping, and we will be waiting for others to pay tribute to us in our dream. If we could dream, beautiful. Hope you will love this song as much as I do.