Journey to the Stars

Ordinary buses to Suzhou run every half an hour, and the air-conditioned cabins are filled with all kinds of stuffy smells. Passengers come up and then go down along the way, repeating the cycle.During the first half of the month, Xing Yi wandered aimlessly, visited both natural places of interest and the cracks in the marketplace, and stopped and observed all kinds of people along the way.The salaryman who catches the subway in the morning, the proprietress who guards a small shop, the couple who quarrels endlessly during the trip, the street sleeper who wanders the streets late at night, everyone has their own story.Wei Chao said that he really wanted to see the landscape of Suzhou gardens, so everyone originally planned to travel together during the National Day holiday, but the plan that had not been implemented in time has now come to naught.

Walking and walking to a bar street.

Bar Street is in an ancient town. At the end of the straight alleyway there is a bar that supports indie music. Different bands perform every night.These underground singers may not have record company contracts and fixed distribution channels, and the music is not particularly catchy at first glance. Unlike canned commercial music, to fully appreciate it requires a process of inner fermentation.

Xing Yi had little money left, so he applied to be a waiter in this bar.Hang out during the day, work part-time at night, and listen to free music.

One day after closing time, a waiter named Su Ming and Xing Yi were in charge of cleaning up the stage.Although Su Ming came here occasionally to do part-time jobs, he has been here for a long time and knows everything about it like the back of his hand.He picked up the guitar on the ground and plucked a few times according to the score.

"How do you play this sound?"

"Strum the 5th and 3rd open strings together, then quickly strike the 3rd string at the 2nd fret."

Xingyi blurted out, and Su Ming's eyes seemed to light up after popping out as he said just now, asking, do you also play music?I can't sing anymore, Xingyi blocked Su Ming with one word.Why can't you sing?Su Ming asked persistently, Xing Yi had no choice but to take a deep breath and tell him that he was afraid of the stage.

"If you have fear, overcome it!"

"You don't know anything about me."

"Okay, let's not talk about you, I will talk about my own business." Su Ming said to himself, "Music is an indispensable part of my life. I won't say anything that makes people cry. When I open my eyes, I want to sing; when I brush my teeth and wash my face, I want to sing; when I walk alone, I want to sing; when I see the stage, I want to sing; I just want to sing; I still want to sing when my voice is hoarse, I want to sing anytime, anywhere... I was admitted to the best art school in our city with the fourth vocal score in the city, thinking that I am getting closer to the world of music One small step. As a result, one day, I couldn't control a single sound."

"Can't even control a single sound?"

Su Ming opened his throat to show him, Xing Yi frowned.

Did you see, the pimple-like bulges at the base of the tongue are called lymphoid follicles, which proliferate with chronic pharyngitis.

This is an extremely terrible disease!Pharynx is always uncomfortable, recurring, dry, itchy, painful, swollen, as if blocked by a foreign object, unable to swallow.The voice-changing stage is the most vulnerable stage, but he practiced day and night and didn't know how to take good care of it. After the vocal cord lesion was damaged, he thought it would heal itself after a while, but when he paid more attention to it, the doctor said that chronic pharyngitis is basically an "incurable disease".

"Is it really difficult to cure?"

"I didn't believe it like you at the beginning. I changed many doctors, including Chinese medicine and Western medicine. I came to the conclusion that my voice was damaged by excessive use of voice, and it was no longer suitable for singing. Let me ask, how can I feel pain when I open my mouth? Enjoy the joy of singing?"

His father also persuaded Su Ming to give up art school, and even enrolled him in another vocational school, and half-coaxed him to the train station.Su Ming knelt down in the waiting hall and begged his father to let him go.He will never forget his father's tears, saying that no one cares more about his son than he does, and is more eager for his son to become a talent.But he is even more afraid of seeing his son suffer setbacks. The path of life should be chosen as early as possible. If music is not enough, a father can help him find other paths.

My father probably wanted to get rid of Su Ming's obsession, but he couldn't make up his mind, so he went to a wandering singer who was singing and asked to borrow his guitar.There was a bet between their father and son that Su Ming needed to sing outside the waiting hall, even if one person stopped to appreciate and agree with his singing, it proved the value of persistence.

Su Ming watched the hustle and bustle of people, tears rolling in his eyes.In the past, it was easy to pull up the tune, but now the penetration of the breath is limited, and I always feel powerless. I either go out of tune frequently or go out of tune into a "small half tune". How can such a singing voice move people?

"Did anyone stop at the end?"

"There is one person."

"Really?"

"That person is our boss, Tang Lei." He smiled bitterly at the bewildered Xingyi, "It's not that he was moved by my singing."

Tang Lei, who happened to be in the waiting hall at that time, was because he witnessed the whole process of the bet between Su Ming and his father, and it was also because Su Ming's flying hair and stubborn expression when he strenuously played the guitar infected him, reminding him of himself when he was young.Tang Lei also said that people who regard their favorite things as their dreams can no longer regard them as hobbies, so he took the initiative to persuade his father to let Su Ming try to exercise in the bar.Later, Su Ming studied in the art school he was admitted to and worked part-time in bars, trying to figure out how the experienced resident singers could use their voices reasonably.

Tang Lei told him about the well-known Japanese singer Mika Nakajima, who suffered from abnormal opening of the Eustachian tube on the [-]th anniversary of her debut, which is similar to the feeling of bulging eardrums when flying on an airplane.It is difficult for her to distinguish external sounds, and she can only hear her own voice through the vibration of her vocal cords.This disease is also incurable.She began to break her voice frequently, out of tune, and unable to control the pitch, etc., and was criticized by the audience unsightly. Persuading her to retreat bravely is the most decent choice.However, Nakajima Mika insisted on returning to the music scene and sang "I once thought about it too".She wants to use her hard singing voice to soften the hearts of more people, as sung in the song:

Because of the birth of a man like you, I feel a little better about the world;

Because there are people like you living in this world, I have a little hope for the world.

After Su Ming's long-term treatment, his pharyngitis has initially improved.He is currently learning to be a warm-up DJ, and he said that if he really can't become a professional singer in the future, he can still try his best to do things related to music, such as stage execution and the like.It’s not bad to be able to run around the country with concerts every day and get close to stars, and to listen to free concerts.

"I understand that this is not a one-day or two-day struggle, but a hurdle that is destined for me!" Su Ming said.

After hearing this, Xingyi was deeply touched, and even a little ashamed. He encouraged Su Ming: "If you have a dream, go after it."

"You're right, I don't believe my stage is just a floor-to-ceiling mirror at home." Su Ming nodded happily, "Although I don't know about you, some people say that music is a good medicine that can heal even the soul. If you have a good Throat, don't disappoint this gift from heaven."

"Well! By the way, can I ask one thing?" Xingyi pointed to the table on the right in the first row below the stage, "I found that the boss always sat there every time he came over, and I often heard him Repeatedly humming a song, very warm and very sad lyrical style, do you know the name of the song?"

"I remember it was called... "Time Retrograde"! There is a demo on the Internet, I will find it out for you tomorrow!"

The next day, Su Ming mixed a light yellow cocktail at the bar, and asked Xing Yi, who was eager to listen to the song, to deliver it to Tang Lei, who was still sitting at the same seat.He also said that tonight there will be a girl band that has been very popular in this area recently, and he added at the end that the appearance fee is very high.

Before nine o'clock, there were only a few or two sparse kittens, and 15 minutes before the performance time, it was full of guests who came to join in the show.The dark beam of light fell on the black-haired red lips of the female lead singer, and there was a howl at the beginning, as if she had become a wild and unrestrained gypsy girl.With a graceful figure and amazing lung capacity, he was able to reach high altitudes with ease, and the atmosphere of the audience was turned upside down.

"Brother, please borrow a fire."

The woman sang and danced for 10 minutes without blushing and panting. During the intermission, she walked off the stage and asked someone to borrow a lighter.Xing Yi, who was being questioned, looked at her, but there was an unusually heavy makeup on her clear and innocent face.Her hand slid across the lighter's grinding wheel, and tiny flames jumped up, smoky and burning between her fingers.

Suddenly, a handsome man who was a little drunk at the next table came over and said that he wanted to buy the woman a drink, his hand was still on her back and wandering restlessly.Xing Yi couldn't get used to this kind of prodigal son, so he shook his hand and said, sorry for the guests, our lead singer doesn't know how to drink.Xing Yi, who has never been in a bar and lacks experience in dealing with it, decisively angered the handsome man. The other was about to get mad when the woman's slender hand rested on his chest, slowly moved it to his heart, and then almost stuck his whole body on the handsome man's ear to seduce him. The deep voice said, he will continue to perform in the second half, this is good, I allow you to order a song, and I will only sing to you later.After speaking, he patted his heart lightly, which made the handsome man ecstatic.

In a few words, he sent away.

"Thanks anyway."

"I'm afraid he's got something messed up in that glass of whiskey."

"Who eats who is not sure!"

"……forget it."

"I'm not teasing you. Hey, your little brother, when guests ask him, he always responds with gestures, dumb?"

Su Ming, who was accused, returned to Xingyi after helping the customer pay the bill. To be precise, he was attracted by the woman's eyes.The woman glanced at him lazily, and every time she glanced at him, she felt like she was casting a gu on him.She deliberately blew a puff of smoke into Su Ming's face, causing him to cough non-stop.Xingyi stopped the girl, don't make a fuss, she just has inflammation of her vocal cords.

"Look at you in a hurry." The woman smiled and said.

"Aren't you afraid of smoking and drinking?" Xingyi couldn't help but ask with concern after seeing her blow out the cigarette butt in her hand and immediately light another one.

"Are you a nerd? So boring."

"...when I didn't ask."

"Your accent is so familiar."

"I also seem to have seen you on some talent show."

When the conversation got to the point, Xingyi and the woman discovered to their great surprise that they were both from a small town, and it was very kind to meet fellow villagers when they went out.The woman said that she came to Shanghai to run around because of her twin sister's illness, and occasionally held events such as auto shows and opening ceremonies.Treatment requires a lot of money, a lot of money.So she came out before finishing the book, and worked as customer service, local push, filling staff, mobile hawker, exhibition security check, and even a foot-mass girl.She has iron-deficiency anemia and almost fainted at work several times. Every day when she returns home, her sensory nerves are completely dead. She really wants to chop off her hands and feet to enjoy herself.

She looks forward to the day when she can sing for whatever she wants, not just for a living.

Su Ming gave the earphones to Xingyi, but the woman snatched the other one and put it on. She said that the melody is so charming, and the female voice of the demo is full of stories. Every sentence is like a lover whispering. Is it a new song?

"This song is original, many years ago." Su Ming said.

"The boss did it?" Xingyi asked.

"The boss' girlfriend is this female voice." Su Ming said.

"Their love must be very deep and romantic?" the woman asked.

"It's a pity that his girlfriend has passed away, and no one in the bar has heard of the specifics." Su Ming said.

"Dead?" The woman was startled.

Xing Yi still had lingering fears about the stinging words about death, he gasped for air, and with each breath, he was greatly sucking out the surrounding oxygen.Until the head bartender interrupts their conversation to say that the boss has refilled another cocktail and send whoever will deliver it.

Xing Yi put the glass of pale yellow cocktail on Tang Lei's table and said that he would treat him to drink.Tang Lei found it very interesting. He was the only boss who invited people to drink, and it was the first time that an employee invited him instead.

"Conditionally, I would like to exchange the origin of a song."