Words » In Tune
Ah Mei vs Coco
If you’ve been watching TV lately, you’ve probably seen Ah-Mei’s or Coco’s latest video. For those who don’t know who these two Taiwan divas are, then it’s time to catch up on the local pop scene gossip.
Ah-Mei is a powerful throaty voiced singer with deep aboriginal roots. She’s had some serious big hit coverage the past few years, and has bought a lot of new parking spots and a lot of new German sports cars for the people in her record company. Just to think that a few years ago Forward Records was going to call it quits after tossing nearly fifty million down the promotion drain, when the boss said, “Well, what the hell, let’s at least release this aboriginal girl’s record before we go belly up. What can we lose?”
600,000 copies later, Ah-Mei was on her road to success, and one less business-related heart attack had to check into the hospital. She hasn’t looked back since, picking up steam, and a loyal following of fans, who have fallen in love with her wide open smile and sexy Mariah Carey shoulder moves, not to mention tons of great songs. She’s a local girl with a local audience, and even with an unanticipated switch in musical direction on her latest release, she’s enjoying the limelight like never before.
Coco is also a phenomenal success story. Back about five years ago, after graduating high school, she went to visit her sisters in Hong Kong, and her mother signed her up for a local talent contest. The contest drew applicants from across Asia, and Coco took second place. Capital Artists in Hong Kong immediately signed her to a vocal group with eight other singers, but it took Capital's distributor in Taiwan, a small label called Fancy Pie, to see her full potential, and they signed her as a solo artist, introducing her to the Taiwan market. From this point on, things started to really take off, and in the record industry that usually makes for an interesting story, so here we go.
Part One: A Japanese record executive, who had just finished negotiating a local record company buyout by BMG, speaks to Coco and her mother about possibly looking towards greener pastures. He knew her deal with Fancy Pie was expiring, and tells her that he has a management team set up for her to be the first Chinese artist to crossover to the Western market. A bigwig entertainment lawyer is flown in from Hollywood, producers are introduced and the talks began. A verbal commitment is reached with Mother, and a major label brought to the table. An LA team is established, and contracts are drawn up. Suddenly it turns out that Coco has mysteriously signed to a different company, Sony Taiwan. Mother just pulled a quick double whammy head slam on the LA/Japan team, tag teaming their connections as leverage to build up Coco’s quick buck clout in Taiwan. Ouch.
Part Two: Coco settles into the local market, and starts selling zillions of records. Eventually with the help of Sony’s international machinery, Coco goes on to become the first Chinese artist to crossover to the Western market. She’s placed with Mariah Carey’s team (“Yeah, they have me working with some producer guy named Walter Something-or-another…”), sings a duo with Julio Inglesias, and gets a track on the new Pretty Woman II soundtrack.
Part Three: Coco goes international. Eventually though, Sony Taiwan reels in the ropes, and Coco has to come back to Taiwan to do her thing. But this time things have changed. The attitude becomes, “Hi Taiwan. I’m international now. Let’s do lunch…ciao.” Her tried and trued old promotion team is fed up with the “important international star” routine, and refuses to work with her and Mother, so Sony scrambles her off to a new department. A new team is set up, and the record is released. Mother is in the back seat driving all the way, “You can’t print that! No we can’t do that!” and becomes involved on many aspects including press promotion, which is usually the sacred domain of the record company. The result? The reporters pick up on the, “You’re beautiful, I love you Taiwan…(now get me out of here)” VIP schpiel, and now Coco is in some deep chocolate pudding. As every recording artist knows, the pen is mightier than the sword.
Taiwan people are very sensitive to this elevated mentality, and the Coco/Mother/Hollywood star combination hasn’t gone over very well here. The audience and the press both like to feel close to their star, and Coco is undeniably MIT. Now that she’s gone snobby, there’s sort of general Coco backlash going on which is giving Sony Taiwan a major headache. It becomes obvious in the newspapers: Ah-Mei and Coco both have concerts on the same day, and it is announced that Coco won’t be going to southern Taiwan. The vibe sent out is that southern Taiwan is not cosmopolitan enough for “The Star.” Meanwhile Ah-Mei starts her concert tour in the south and the result? Three huge front page color photos and write ups on Ah-Mei while Coco manages to get a small caption in the corner.
The moral of this story? a) No one likes to feel inferior, especially the audience, and b) verbal deals are not worth the air they are written on.
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I've never figured out whether it's pronounced "Moe's (like owned by one of three stooges) or Moss (like that guy out of Bonanza), but the one down the hill from me is open until 2am most days, which means that if I get out of the club early enough, I can catch the best burger in town, the muo si la bao or the Spicy Mos Burger. They have lots of jalapenos and 
