Promotional material for The Coming One: Superband Photo: Courtesy of Tencent Video

A group of young talents appearing on the competition show The Coming One: Superband have turned to the small screen to show their love for music, as well as respect toward copyright. 

Recently, one of the mini bands on the show led by Yang Runze, one of the most popular contestants, made a special video to plead for the use of Bruno Mars's "Uptown Funk." 

One of the most popular music shows in China, the fourth season of the music talent show has a high 8.7/10 from nearly 18,000 audience reviews on Chinese media review platform Douban. On China's Twitter-like Sina Weibo, the hashtag for the show has billions of views as well as more than 130 million discussions. 

More like a music school, the survival show which airs on streaming giant Tencent Video aims to discover and develop competitors' potential and finally form a super band with help from mentors like pianist Lang Lang, musician Ouyang Nana and Zhou Zhennan from boy band R1SE. 

According to Long Danni, CEO of the show's production studio Wajijiwa Entertainment, The Coming One is an experiment at creating something "unique and cool that young people can do, like forming a superband." 

Appreciation of the beauty and status of young people has been the core ideas running through the show, which is something Long said she has always wanted to do since entering show business decades ago. 

The positive comments from netizens for these optimistic music enthusiasts have shown that these promising musicians carry people's hope for the future of Chinese pop. 

In the eyes of Dai Xin, an employee at the show's post-production company BKW Studio, how to remain fresh and creative in terms of content is a major challenge for any influential talent show.  

"People always question what the reality show is. Did we tell a true story or a make one up?" Dai said. 

"We gave up the routine way of thinking and discovering. Instead, we use new approaches to make the show."

Music is not something that only relies on strong personality, but also teamwork and cooperation. The competitors have interpreted Western pop music classics like "The Spectrum" with traditional Chinese instruments as well as performed Chinese folk music with pianos and violins. 

On the show, contests Zhao Ke and Kong Xiangyu gave up their own uniqueness to adhere to their team's overall style, which shows their respect for their teammates and the music.  


Newspaper headline: ‘The Coming One'