九九 Sophie Chen: Shifting Harmonies
Learning the art of balance and crossing cultural barriers through her humor, grit, and introspection.
Many of us only dream of speaking in one other language let alone three. 九九 Sophie Chen grew up between different cultures and languages – from growing up in Montreal, Canada, attending university in Massachusetts, USA, to her current residence in Taipei, Taiwan. She brings a fresh multifaceted approach and perspective to her songwriting that evokes memories of your first love to hard goodbyes.
I’ve always thought about what it would be like to grow up somewhere else. Did you have similar thoughts when choosing to move to Taiwan?
Sophie: I ended up in Taiwan because I was on the Voice of China in Shanghai and the first record label I signed with was based in Taiwan. The Voice of China actually scouted my friend, but she still had two years left of school so she recommended me because I was graduating.
Did you ever visit Taiwan before moving there?
Sophie: I'm not Taiwanese at all and only went for a visit for 2 days a couple of months before. But I said fuck it, I’m going to move to Taiwan. The day I was supposed to fly back to Canada from Shanghai, I called my mom and told her I was moving to Taipei. I was only 20, so young and fearless! I didn’t know what I was going to do, I didn’t have a job, so I figured I might as well try and move to Taiwan.
Wow, that is a bold choice.
Sophie: Yeah, haha. I signed a seven-year contract with the record label, but after a couple of years, due to a lot of conflicts, I decided to move back to Canada and didn't even try to get out of my contract.
It must’ve been hard moving to a totally new country without any back up plan along with a language and culture barrier.
Sophie: It was difficult because I’m so bad at Chinese and I moved to Taiwan alone. I understand 90% of a conversation, but if it gets too deep or personal or rich in color, I get confused.
Has moving to Taiwan shaped the way you write?
Sophie: It’s less about the action of moving to Taiwan and more about the language itself and how fluent I am. I have limited Chinese knowledge and at the end of the day I have to simplify my songs. Some writers are amazed at how simple my lyrics are, haha. Somebody can write these beautiful, poetic lyrics, but if the word is too complex then I won’t feel comfortable – it’s important to me to feel good when I sing it.
Is it the way that the language sounds or the level of vocabulary that makes it difficult?
Sophie: It’s a little bit of both. Some words are harder for me to say and there’s vocabulary that I’m not as familiar with. Chinese feels more pointy as a language than French. In Mandarin, there are some words that sound awkward to sing on certain notes because of the tones. Whenever I’m writing lyrics in Chinese and the tone starts clashing with the melody, I have to either change the melody or change the words. But I don't have that issue with French or English.
That’s true, although in some Chinese songs it's hard to tell the tones, because the singer is emphasizing or focusing on the melody instead.
Sophie: I think the most successful songs are when you can match the tones with the direction of the melody!
Does the subject matter of your songs differ depending on the language you’re writing in?
Sophie: Definitely, there’s more nuance when I’m writing French music because I’m more fluent in French and can be more expressive. They also tend to be more diary-like indie style, which is why my Mandarin and French songs are so different.
That’s really interesting. What about music do you enjoy so much?
Sophie: The simple, boring answer is that I love music. I had a rideshare with this guy from Montreal to Boston and we were talking about what we do. I was telling him I make music and so on. He said that he didn’t like music and wasn’t really into it, and it shocked me. I was like, “Yeah, I guess some people are just not into something.” For me, perhaps I’m a little more into music than the average person. Sometimes I feel like I'm constantly on Broadway and singing brings me joy, so I figured I’ll try and make it my career. Although, I don't think there is such a thing as “making it” nowadays. There are no more superstars like Beyoncé. Everyone can be famous now with a whole lot of followers, so ‘fame’ in itself doesn’t mean much anymore if you think about it. At the end of day you want to leave a legacy that changes someone's life.
You mentioned there isn’t such a thing as “making it." What is your idea of success?
Sophie: I still struggle with it. It feels like I still haven't made it, even though some people would say I’ve had very good results. But I still feel like I'm grinding and I'm still trying really hard, I want to be like the next Celine. I try to reframe my idea of success by asking if I’m pleased with myself. Currently, I'm more at peace in the sense that I can never say I didn't work my ass off. I felt like an outsider for a long time when I moved to Taiwan and finally met people I really want to make music with. I challenged myself by performing at college shows where people don't know you and don't really care. Or when your voice isn't feeling well and you still have to fucking perform. I'm aware that I should be more proud than I am, but it's hard to feel that way sometimes.
Yeah, that makes sense. It's important to take a moment and celebrate those wins and congratulate yourself. But there's still something inside of you that's like, “Oh, I can do better. I can be better than this.”
Sophie: Yeah, I wonder if that's a cultural thing of being Asian: the idea that you're never good enough. But also, I try to juggle that with my gut feeling that I’ve tried hard and I’m not done trying. I have more in me. But, I don't know. I'm a big question mark right now. I feel like we're all NPCs (non-player characters). We all have main character syndrome, everyone thinks they're so important. I know it sounds fucking pessimistic and every self-help book is like: You are beautiful, you're so good, you need to love yourself. But you also have to juggle the fact that you're just fucking not important. And that's the truth. And it's okay. But how do you balance both of these extremes? Because they are equally as important.
Yeah, and it feels like you have to talk about yourself and pretend that you're important so that other people think you're important. But then at the same time, you're nobody. Nobody really cares about what you ate today, or what you’re wearing. But as a creative, how do you balance that with your desire to share something you're proud of making? Something I’ve been trying to focus on with my art is the notion that if I’m happy with it and I did my best then maybe that’s enough.
Sophie: Yeah, that’s really the most important because you do it for yourself at the end of the day, right? The concept of “you shouldn't care about other people’s journey” is utopian and we all strive for that. But unfortunately, you can't help but compare numbers. It's sad. However, at the end of the day, you have to remember that you're not that important, but also make sure you love what you're doing. We're constantly bombarded with so much that of course, everyone's freaking out.
We're all fine here haha. Naturally we want people’s validation, but I don’t want that to be my source of happiness, because ultimately that isn’t going to make me happy. But it's hard to not want that at the same time. It’s definitely a balance.
Sophie: That's why I've been obsessed with Doja Cat recently. I remember playing her first single over 10 years ago. I remember thinking, she has a hilarious name, she’s singing about weed and stuff, it's great. And to see how she’s exploded and made all this money. Now she can make whatever she wants. I think it's courageous where at the end of the day when you take away the superficial fans, she’s making music for herself and producing things she’s proud of.
What do you think about the recent controversy with Doja Cat? She’s been saying she doesn’t need or want fans anymore and bashing her fan base. But a lot of her fans are saying they’re the ones that help artists become famous. There’s almost an air of entitlement that fans have over the artist.
Sophie: I had a moment of popularity and am already dropping. Experiencing that gave me the perspective that I don’t owe anybody anything. And she’s on a fucking huge mega-star scale. She doesn’t owe anyone anything. I think she’s been plenty grateful, where she has acknowledged her fans and thanked them for listening. But that doesn’t mean she has to act like they are the ones that made her and can’t live without them. There’s a balance that you have to keep. I think what she’s saying is extreme, but it’s also extreme for her fans to feel that they are the ones that made her. If she wasn’t talented, if she wasn’t a fucking killer performer, she wouldn’t have made it.
That's very true. People tend to build an image in their mind of what this famous person is like. They lack the perspective that they’re still people. Do you think people have tried to put you in a box or how you’re being perceived is in line with how you think you’re presenting yourself?
Sophie: Everyone has their own vision of how they want to present themselves. Even when it feels like it's like the most authentic non-filtered shit, I'm still probably going to pick an angle that is more flattering. No one is going to ever know everything about who I am — unless you live with me and you've seen me take a shit. I think as much as anyone tries to be authentic, even when you step out the door, you put up some sort of front. I want to say that I'm super real, super true, blah blah, but truth be told, there’s still an element of me that cares about how people think about me. And I think that’s human, because if nobody cared the world would explode. Can you imagine?
Where do you think you are as a musician now and what kind of musician/person do you want to be in the future?
Sophie: I just want to make myself happy. It sounds very simple, but it’s very difficult to navigate. I think about how to juggle filtering myself while still presenting my best side. And how much of that truly makes you happy? I feel like no matter what you do, you always sacrifice a little bit. I want to find the balance of how much sacrifice is something I'm okay with. I want to keep making good music and live off of being an artist. I want to be proud of what I've done.
Simple is always the hardest.
Sophie: Exactly, it's difficult to find the balance between the extremes.