Growing Pain (Part V)

你說這叫長大 我說多麼的費解

One year after she immaculately reinvented herself from Shirley Wong but another year away from becoming 王菲, Faye Wong could do no wrong in 1993. Following up to the success of 容易受傷的女人 with 執迷不悔 at the beginning of the year, Faye proved herself to be not just a flash in the pan. Handpicked by Wong Kar Wai later that year to star in his groundbreaking cult hit, 《重慶森林》 did to Faye what “A bout de soufflé” did to Jean Seberg in the sixties - as the figurehead of La Nouvelle Vague. In between Faye released 十萬個為什麼？in that late summer which confirmed she had caught up with, if not knocked out, reigning Hong Kong divas Sandy Lam and Sally Yeh.

What is significance about 十萬個為什麼？ is that it is a transitional phase in Faye’s singing career, from the straight R&B flavor to the more European influence. To bring the gap, producers Alvin Leong and Stanley Leung cooked up a theme of a child’s inquisitiveness in order the milk the most out of Faye’s ethereal voice. Surprisingly, even with a duel version (Chinese and English), what appeared to be the cornerstone of the album 長大 actually didn’t receive at much attention as the more showy 冷戰, 流非飛 or the mainstream ballad如風.

It might just as well because the melody of 長大 had left much to be desired. It is not helping matter that for a song about growing up, the lyric of 長大 is competent but not terribly remarkable and the lyric of the English version “Do We Really Care?” is so corny that it borders being pretentious. Still, by contrasting “天空永恆幻變　多麼奧妙” at childhood with “猜想以後　不改只有遠遠的星宿” at adulthood, 陳少琪 did at least manage to inject a sense of irony into the song.