74 Secondary School Planning
The final voting statistics of "Codename: Heart Dance Stage" are out. The audience ranked Blaze first, SKY Girls Group second, and Stary third. The live voting outside the venue ranked Stary first, SKY Girls Group and Blaze ranked second and third with a slight disadvantage. Finally, the first and second half were combined, Blaze won the championship of this season, Stary was the runner-up, and SKY finally got third place because of its unsatisfactory performance in the first half.
In addition to the rankings, the program team also gave each group an award, such as Stary's Popularity Award, SKY's Most Anticipated Award, Prism's Best Persistence Award, etc. It is not just for this season's program, but more like an award for all their previous experiences.
Afterwards, Stary reflected on the reason for his low ranking in the venue and checked with Yuan Xiao and Gu Yuchen. They thought it might be because the music was too loud and the rhythm was too strong, which made it too noisy. Therefore, Stary's in-venue voting ranking in the first half was higher than that outside the venue, while the opposite was true in the second half. This was caused by his stage style.
Yuan Xiao told them not to worry too much about this, as the styles that are more acceptable online and offline are inherently different, not just for singing and dancing, but other forms of performance as well.
The five members themselves accepted it well, and the second place was not bad either. Except for a small number of fans who were still not satisfied, most of the audience, including those within Yuanxin Company, agreed that this was a relatively reasonable and fair data.
Acceptance does not mean submission. Behind closed doors, the five boys still strongly suggested to Yuan Xiao that the program should continue next year and that these people should be invited back to continue participating. It doesn't matter for the time being whether other groups come back or not, but Blaze must be invited.
Yuan Xiao: ...Okay, you can really find something for me to do.
When we flew back to Beijing, both airports were crowded. For the safety of both parties, Yuan Xiao asked the staff and Stary to take the VIP ticket together.
Although he felt a little sorry for the fans who had been waiting for a long time, looking at the crowded scene outside the window, Yuan Xiao decided to put safety first.
The show just ended, and Stary is at the peak of his popularity right now. Yuan Xin said that airport pick-ups are not encouraged, and she means it absolutely does not encourage it. She will not soften her heart and let people go out to meet fans just because of fans' temporary dissatisfaction.
Yuan Xiao’s group doesn’t need those individual crowded pictures to show how popular it is. With their own stable hot search positions and album battle reports, Stary’s popularity is real.
This time after Stary returns, he will hold the last signing session for the first album. After that, his schedule will only include three music festivals and two variety show appearances until summer vacation. The rehearsals for the music festivals do not require as long preparation time as the recording of "Heart Dancing Stage", so the usual time will be reserved for the production of the second album.
As usual, after returning to the company, Stary was given a day to rest, and the next morning there was a regular meeting for the second technical school.
Just like the first album, the difference is that this time Stary was fully involved from the album concept meeting, instead of being completely managed by the company.
Yuan Xiao is not worried about starving herself to death after teaching her apprentice. If she can produce the first Stary, she can also produce the second and third groups.
Relatively speaking, the concept of the first album is relatively easy to determine. As a debut album, the concept of the first album just needs to be consistent with the group concept, and it is a direct interpretation of the group concept. The second album will have to be extended and further expanded. Yuan Xiao specifically asked Pei Zijin and Jin Zeyu to bring along the demos they wrote during this period, so that the concept can be determined according to their songwriting style.
Anyway, there is no need to consider Teacher Gu's half for the time being. Teacher Gu can write about anything, there is only a difference between being very good at something and being just averagely good at it.
At nine o'clock in the morning, all the Stary staff came out in a daze. Pei Zijin urgently washed his face and turned on the computer before the meeting. When he returned to the meeting room, water was still dripping from his hair. He wore black-framed glasses and his hair was messy and unkempt. These people are paying less and less attention to their image in the company.
Jin Zeyu slapped Yuan Xiao on the face a few times before he entered the room, then connected their laptops to the big screen.
Assistant Liu nodded and reported to Yuan Xiao that everyone was present.
"Stary speaks first." Yuan Xiao called out.
"We divided the work a bit. Zeyu and Fanfan focused on writing lyrics. Chen and I wrote some music. Lele helped out on both sides. We have made five demos since the end of the recording of the first album. I'll show you some."
These are also the versions they urgently sorted out and revised yesterday. Although it was called a rest day, in fact there was no rest at all. How could anyone rest peacefully before the regular group meeting?
Yuan Xiao frowned. Five songs? That's a bit too few.
It was said that there were five demo songs, but she didn't know whether one of them could be used in the end. She didn't discourage the enthusiasm of the brothers in advance, but nodded to signal Pei Zijin to play it first.
"The first two songs were made earlier and are more complete. We simply mixed a few tracks ourselves. The two in the middle were not mixed. This one only has the music but no lyrics."
Pei Zijin also composed his own music in college, but he hadn't studied it systematically at that time. Looking back now, they are so simple and crude that it's a bit embarrassing. The ones he brought out this time were all newly made after his first album.
He used to write folk songs and R&B, but since joining Stary, his aesthetic has been assimilated into pop music.
However, it can be heard from Pei Zijin's writing style that he prefers songs with a sense of rhythm and atmosphere. What he learned from Teacher Gu were mainly citypop, dreampop, etc. On the contrary, Yan Fan and Su Chen prefer hardcore music styles such as rock and trap.
So Stary's daily routine is Pei Zijin and Jin Zeyu working together, Su Chen and Yan Fan studying together, and his younger brother running back and forth with his percussion pad, providing accompaniment for each demo.
Yuan Xiao listened to all five songs and did not comment. Instead, he asked them, "If you were asked to choose a hit song from these, which one would you choose as the hit song for your second album?"
Pei Zijin and Yan Fan looked at each other, neither of them wanted to admit that their writing was worse than the other's. As the official spokesperson of the group, Pei Zijin's words became very appropriate after a circle: "We both feel that the two songs are better. They may be in two different styles. If we choose one, we will continue to revise it according to this style."
Gu Yuchen, who had been silent since entering the room, sighed beside Yuan Xiao, "Your sister Xiaoxiao means that these songs are not good."
The five people were stunned. How could...
Yuan Xiao didn't explain why, but said to Pei Zijin: "Anything else?"
"You should have brought your usual notes, even a snippet or a sentence. Show them all."
This is very fragmented. Pei Zijin sorted out a part of it, and the rest was scattered in everyone's mobile phones and tablets. At Yuan Xiao's order, the remaining four people were hurriedly passing it to Pei Zijin.
Yuan Xiao listened to six or seven clips, raised his hand to ask Pei Zijin to pause, and then replayed the previous one, and looked at Gu Yuchen.
Gu Yuchen understood and nodded: "I think this is fine too, let's keep it."
The two of them went through all the stock of Stary's five members and picked out a few usable pieces of music. Gu Yuchen sighed, feeling that the satisfaction and motivation he had felt from Stary's achievements had vanished at this moment, leaving only exhaustion.
It's a workload that is visible to the naked eye.
Yuan Xiao asked Pei Zijin to play all the clips they wrote. After a moment's hesitation, he said, "Based on your current expertise, the main style of our second album can be lyrical rock. If Teacher Gu has no problem with this, I will tell you some points to pay attention to when creating."
Gu Yuchen raised his hand and made a gesture of "completely OK". He had no problem with lyrical rock.
“It’s not that your writing is bad, but it’s not enough.”
"How do you think the quality of the demo you gave at the beginning compares to the first album?"
The five people could only shake their heads. They had only studied for one year. Even though music creation was a profession that required a lot of talent, it was impossible for them to surpass Gu Yuchen's years of accumulation in such a short time, not even if Yuan Xiao lent them the system.
"I did ask you to make the second album 50% original, but that doesn't mean the quality of the second album can be worse than the first. In the market, only fans are willing to pay for your growth. For most ordinary listeners, they only care about whether the songs sound good or not. So the songs you made at the beginning are pretty good, but not great songs."
"If you guys collect songs yourself or I ask you to write songs, you definitely won't ask for such simple melodies. Originality is not a reason to relax the requirements. You are still a new band, and the quality of your albums can only get better with each passing day."
Pei Zijin nodded. He completely understood what Sister Xiaoxiao meant, but how to implement it was still a problem: "But it may still be difficult for us to fully guarantee the quality of the creation now."
"The melodies I've chosen for you are all different from the popular songs on the market. You should first complete the lyrics and music according to these, and then write."
The current situation is not the worst that Yuan Xiao expected, of course, it is still some distance away from the best.
"All five of you must write as many melodies as possible, and then listen to the songs together to make sure there are no repetitions. Now we can only win by quantity, and then choose the better ones and keep revising them until we are done."
"Creation is very hard, but it will help you improve quickly. If you can do this, things will go much more smoothly in the future."
Yuan Xiao looked at them and said calmly, "For this album, you should still make at least five songs, just like we said before. Try to have each of you create one song as the main author. You can discuss whether you can collaborate or come up with one on your own. Next week, your teacher Gu and I will listen to the demo again. We should review all the songs you have written, no matter whether they are complete or not."
It was another heavy pressure. Stary nodded one after another. Yuan Xiao was right. Sooner or later, they would complete the transformation from a boy band to an original band, and an excellent original band. Every song was the foundation of the band and could not be sloppy.
I am committed to holding a concert in the future where the whole place is full of excitement and no one is given the chance to go to the bathroom.
"As for the concept theme for the second album, I have thought of one."
Yuan Xiao stood up. On the whiteboard in the conference room, there was still a discussion about the concept of "exploration" from the first album. She opened the pen cap and wrote another word at the end: "Meet."
In interstellar exploration, encountering different planets is just the right way to carry forward the concept of specialization.
Gu Yuchen smiled and was the first to support her: "I think it's great. When the time comes, the concept theme of their third album will be 'reunion', and the third album will be full of love songs."
Yuan Xiao raised his eyebrows, glanced at him, and said in a teasing tone: "Maybe the third album will be 'Conquer', and then I'll ask you to help write all death rock."
Yan Fan's eyes lit up quietly:
Death rock? Is that okay?
Pei Zijin held him under the table without even turning his head. They discussed with the staff in the conference room and all of them agreed that "encounter" was indeed a good theme.
It connects the past and the future, and covers a wide range of concepts, including love songs, fast songs and slow songs, which reduces the difficulty of Stary's creative work.
After the meeting, the music department and Stary went back to create, the art department began to design a series of related materials, and Yuan Xiao had to move on to the next meeting. The planning of the second season of "Idol Unnamed" had already been put on the agenda. After the meeting ended today, the second-phase female trainees would officially begin learning and rehearsing the theme song.
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