Conquer America, Start with a Boxing Champion

I walked around the MJ memorial service and watched a concert in memory of MJ. Mariah Carey, Lionel Richie and others performed. In the end, dozens of singers came on stage to sing MJ's "Save". world".

In the evening, Link drove Taylor home.

"How's it going? Do you have any inspiration?"

On Santa Monica Boulevard, Link looked at Taylor in the passenger seat and smiled.

Taylor was wearing a blue dress, curled up in her seat, her brows knitted together, her hands scratching her head, and her long blond curly hair was messy, like a pile of instant noodles.

"Why? Why can you find inspiration at the memorial service, but I can't?"

Tyler blinked his blue fox eyes and looked at him with jealousy.

Link smiled softly, "I have told you before that you and MJ had no friendship. His death cannot touch you, and it will naturally not inspire you to create."

"You mean you need someone close to you?"

Taylor propped up his chin, blinked his long eyelashes, and slowly turned his eyes to him again.

"Hey, don't look around!"

Link pushed her forehead away with his fingers, "I have given you too much inspiration. You can't dedicate me to God just to write songs."

"I didn't think so!"

Taylor rolled her eyes at him, "I was just thinking about the relatives who passed away around me. My grandfather passed away too early. I was only eight or nine years old at the time, so I didn't have a deep impression. My grandma, you know, she is also a singer from Tennessee. , was very beautiful when she was young, and I was most influenced by her. Unfortunately, she passed away in 2003."

"Feel sorry!"

Link said politely.

Taylor ignored him, held her face in her hands and said, "Maybe I can write a song for my grandma."

Link nodded and said yes, not only her grandmother wrote songs, but also her grandfather, Mrs. Andrea, etc. Link thought again that Mrs. Andrea seemed to have a tumor, and he didn’t know if it had been found out now, but he could do it next time. Take them for a physical exam.

"When will you release your third album?"

"Next year, or the year after, there are no plans yet."

"It's so slow. I debuted two years later than you. I will release my second album next week and my third album next year."

Link raised the corner of his mouth and smiled.

Taylor clenched his fist and knocked on his shoulder: "Don't be happy. Everyone in the industry knows that it's best to release an album once a year. If you release it too frequently, fans won't pay for it, and you may not be able to sell it."

Link smiled, and what she said made sense. The album was released too fast, and the promotion and distribution could not keep up. The singer was too little famous, which would also cause the album to be unsaleable. This was one of the reasons why the release of his second album was delayed by a month. one.

But he's not too worried. The songs on his second album are all of high quality, and the company is willing to spend money on promotion, so he doesn't have to worry about not selling.

In addition, after the release of the second album, Ivaca asked him to go on tour around the world to promote the songs from the first and second albums.

"Do you have enough songs in your third album? Do you want my help?"

"No! I have hundreds of songs in my songbook. The three albums are already enough. I just want to write better songs and give them to my fans. Unlike some people who just write a few songs and release them. There is no sincerity.”

Taylor glanced at him from the corner of his eyes and said with the corners of his mouth raised.

Link smiled and shook his head, not wanting to argue with her.

Taylor snorted softly, straightened his messy hair in the mirror, and said, "The news said that Link Music is a mom-and-pop store. One person is responsible for the operation and management, and the other is responsible for the creation. It sounds really good."

Link has also seen this kind of article to hype up his relationship with Ivaca.

Some say he is Ivaca's lover, and the two often secretly date on the top floor of the TP Building.

Some say that the Tom family are the backers and financial backers of Link Music. There is also news that he and Ivaca have secretly obtained their licenses in Las Vegas. There are more news that he has two boats, one is Taylor. and Iwaka, calling him a big scumbag.

Especially after he had a feud with the East Coast rap gang, the amount of negative news reports increased day by day.

But those tabloids have no actual evidence and can only report some speculative tidbits, which are harmless.

"I don't have a special relationship with Ivaca, I'm definitely not lying to you about that."

"I know."

Taylor pursed her lips, turned to look at him with blue eyes and said, "I just want to tell you that the Tom family are businessmen and focus on profits. She keeps urging you to release records, two or three a year. It’s not good if you use it as a tool to make money. It will waste your talent and potential in music.

If you want to be a good singer, you should not pay too much attention to your income, but your works. Although your last album had six singles on the list, which was a very good result, if you can be patient in creating, your first album will be ten Both songs have a chance to be on the list. "

Link nodded, Taylor was right.

If artists are too profit-seeking, their works will become philistine. In order to cater to the market, they have to lower the quality of their works. However, good works are very niche, such as spring and snow, and some good works will take decades or hundreds of years to develop. Be accepted.

But that doesn't apply to Link.

Although he learned piano, guitar, and music composition from Taylor, at his current level, he has not been able to write a piece of original music that will impress people. At this stage, he can only draw on the hundreds of future songs in his mind. Music, hanging out in the music scene.

Because the music was time-sensitive, he had to speed up the release of the album.

There are also projects in his mind that are worthy of investment, which are also time-sensitive, so he needs to make money quickly.

So Evaka urged him to release an album, and making money in this way was in line with his plan.

"I understand what you mean, but don't worry, this is my peak creative period, and two albums a year can handle it."

Link pinched her cheek and smiled.

Taylor slapped his hand away and snorted: "Don't make excuses, you just can't bear to part with that big-breasted and big-butt woman, I want to touch that butt when I see it, don't tell me you don't want to."

"Uh, dear, we are discussing music creation, can we not go so far? You just said that I believe I don't have a special relationship with Evaka."

Link said helplessly.

"But you must have cheated on me mentally, the movie is right, men are fickle animals who are fickle and will never be satisfied."

As he was talking, Taylor suddenly stopped, took out a notebook and pen from his bag, put them on his knees, and started writing and drawing.

Link knew she had an inspiration, but he didn't dare to disturb her. He slowed down the car and drove along the West Coast Road with tall palm trees, slowly heading towards the sunny beach villa area.

On Wednesday, the second album "Keep On Movin'" released the second promotional single "Believer". The first one was "Give Me Reason" released in May.

The second song is also a rock song, released by the Imagine Dragons in 2017.

The style of this song is tough and fierce, like Link's boxing style, accompanied by heavy drums, with a strong rhythm, coupled with Link's impassioned voice, and a strong rap-like rhythm, making it like a battle song to overcome difficulties and break through difficulties.

Whether in terms of theme, style, or background story, it fits Link's identity and experience very well.

"Believer" once won the fourth place on the Billboard Singles Chart and the champion of the Rock Singles Chart, with extremely high quality.

On the first day of release, the digital music platform received 126,000 downloads, and became the download champion of iTunes Music Store within 12 hours, and the download champion of Amazon Digital Music Mall and Billboard Digital Music Download Chart within 16 hours.

Many musicians in the industry also gave good reviews to this song. In Amazon Digital Music Store, 23,049 people gave it a score of 9.1 out of 10.

Rolling Stone magazine gave a five-star recommendation on its official website.

"Believer" received a good response, and the pre-sale volume of the second album online and offline surged. As of 12:00 noon on Friday, the cumulative pre-sale exceeded 100,000 copies. According to expectations, the first week sales of this album will not be less than 300,000 copies.

But on Friday, Jay-Z also released the second promotional single of the 11th album, "Empire State of Mind".

This song is about New York and is Jay-Z's masterpiece. It is also of high quality. On the first day, it was downloaded 164,000 copies on major digital music platforms, directly snatching the top spot of the digital music download chart of "Believer".

After the release of "Empire State of Mind", entertainment media also shifted their attention to the music scene and focused on Link and Jay-Z's new songs.

After two or three months of dissemination, the news of Link's discord with East Coast rappers such as Jay-Z has been a hot topic in the entertainment circle, becoming the most popular news in June and July except for the death of MJ.

Media reports said that since April, the two sides have begun to compete for the charts, first for the first place on the Billboard Rap Chart, and then for the first place on the Billboard Hot 100 Singles Chart.

The participants from Link Music are Link, Wiz Khalifa, Atlantic Records' rapper Little Bobby, and Link Music's new singer Bruno Mars. Among these five people, except for Link and Wiz, who each have an album, the other two are considered newcomers.

The participants of the East Coast rap competition include: Jay-Z, Kanye West, Eminem, Lil Wayne, T.I., Drake, 50 Cent, etc. In the rap music circle, their album sales and influence are all in the top 20.

Comparing the fame and number of participants on both sides, the East Coast rappers have the strength to crush Link Music.

But surprisingly, after the competition began, Link Music was not crushed.

Link's "I'm The One" and "Give me reason" defeated Jay-Z's "D.O.A. (Death of Auto-Tune)", Kanye's "Monster", and T.I.'s "Dead and Gone" on the rap chart and the top 100 singles chart, winning the double championship.

The only failure was the rap song "Lighters" released in mid-June, which was suppressed by "Forever" co-written by Kanye, Eminem, Lil Wayne and Drake, and ranked second on the rap chart, and never reached the first place.

But this song was sung by two new singers, and was suppressed by three top singers, which was a glorious defeat.

Now the two sides are competing for the charts again, not only for the singles chart, but also for the album sales chart.

Link's new album "Go Forward" will be released next Monday, and Jay-Z's 11th album "The Blueprint 3" is scheduled to be released next Tuesday.

The release dates of the two records are only one day apart.

Judging from the current situation, both albums are very competitive.

The first promotional singles of "Go Forward" and "The Blueprint 3" both topped the Billboard Hot 100.

The second promotional single also topped the digital music download chart.

From the album itself, it is hard to tell which one is better.

In terms of the fame and influence of the two, Jay-Z, who has been in the music industry for more than 20 years and has a deep foundation in the music industry and many loyal fans, is better.

"But we can't underestimate Link, he is a very amazing guy, his debut album won double platinum in the United States, in May, when "I'm The One" and "Monster" competed for the charts, everyone thought Kanye would win, but Link suddenly won eight swimming gold medals at the World University Games, which is amazing.

This news also made his song top the rap charts. I heard that Link has signed up for the Berlin World Swimming Championships next week. If he can defeat Phelps and other world champions and win eight more gold medals, "Go Forward" may not have no chance of winning. Yes, "Go Forward" is the name of Link's second album. From the two singles that have been released before, we can also hear that this album tells the story of a struggler, and the theme is very positive.

So it is still uncertain who will win and who will lose between the two albums."

John Ferrero, a famous music critic of the Los Angeles Times, wrote in an article.

In addition to the Los Angeles Times, other major newspapers, TV stations, and radio stations in the United States have recently talked about the topic of Link and Jay-Z's new albums preparing to compete for the charts. They are all discussing which of their albums will win and which will lose, whose album has more songs on the charts, and whose single will top the charts.

For this reason, some bookmakers have opened new betting projects, using the sales of the two albums in the first week, first month, and March to bet. According to the odds offered by many bookmakers, Link's new album has a weekly sales of 1:1.8, and Jay-Z's album has a sales of 1:1.2, so Jay-Z has a greater chance of winning.