Shuimu Nianhua vs. Jars of Clay: you decide!

水木年华: A folk-rock band goes classical.

Earlier this week I picked up a copy of The Rhapsody of Life (生命狂想曲), the new album by Beijing folk-rock duo Shuimu Nianhua (wipe that smirk off your face). Much, much better than last year’s 70·80. And it has cause to be – the band brought in a backing orchestra to give it a more “classically European” flavor. The album’s first full song, “Forever Young,” reminded me of “Liquid,” a song by the American band Jars of Clay.

Take a listen for yourself. Here’s a short comparison of the intros to the two songs in MP3 format. (1:57 min, 459k). The two song’s vocal melodies and lyrics (not included in that comparison) bear no resemblance to each other, however. The “Forever Young” music video is linked below if you’d like to hear the whole thing.

The music and lyrics on “Forever Young” are credited to Shuimu Nianhua founder Lu Gengxu; the arrangement is credited to Lu Xiaoxu (aka Curepunk), with “arrangement ideas” by Lu Gengxu. The new album was released early this month to much fanfare after the group inked a 2-million-yuan distribution contract with Jinghuang Records. Album release notes wax lyrical about the fusion of classical music, acoustic guitars, and rock percussion – you know, what people said about Adrian Belew’s production on “Liquid” back in 1995.

Jars of Clay’s eponymous debut LP, incidentally, released a version in Taiwan, and made it to VeryCD’s P2P downloads in late 2004. The Rhapsody of Life recently passed the 200,000-copy sales mark.