ECG -Chapter 54 This Guy Is Really Looking for Trouble

Bai Zhitao rested her chin on the table, looking utterly dejected.

“Ugh, I already talked everything over with my family. I thought I’d be able to keep this job for a long time. Who would’ve thought I’d be unemployed as soon as summer vacation started?”

Lin Hao tried to comfort her.

“Don’t worry too much. Most bands are short on female vocalists. What if this new band just happens to need one?”

Bai Zhitao shook her head.

“What are the chances of that? Besides, if they leave tomorrow and I stay behind, I’ll end up offending everyone in the band. Sigh…”

Lin Hao nodded. The girl wasn’t foolish at all.

Just as he was about to say something, he suddenly froze.

The song playing through the speakers had an incredibly familiar intro.

Listening carefully, he realized it was the opening of “Father.”

He shot to his feet in surprise.

Sure enough, the singing followed:

“Always taking from you, yet never once saying thank you…”

“Holy shit!”

Lin Hao cursed and immediately headed toward the sound booth.

He recognized that voice instantly—it belonged to the long-haired guitarist who used to perform at the Chunhe barbecue stand.

The guy had actually released an album?

The sound engineer handed him the CD case.

The moment Lin Hao looked at it, his anger flared.

On the cover, Sun Xiaowei—the same long-haired performer from the barbecue stand—sat on the hood of a dark green Jeep, dressed in a black leather jacket. His long hair hung straight down, a guitar resting in his arms as he gazed into the distance with a melancholic expression.

Across the cover were two bold, flamboyant characters:

Father

Below them, in smaller print:

Lyrics, Composition, and Vocals: Sun Xiaowei

After opening the case, Lin Hao discovered that it wasn’t a full album but an EP, a so-called single record.

He felt momentarily dazed.

In his previous life, EP releases didn’t become popular until around 2006 and only truly flourished in the internet era of the twenty-first century.

Back in the cassette-recorder days, artists released full albums.

But once computers and mobile phones allowed people to listen to music anytime and anywhere, releasing singles one by one became just as effective for generating attention and traffic.

Putting out three to five singles a year was often better than spending all that effort producing a full album annually.

He glanced at the publisher:

Yanjing Fenghua Fashion Audio-Visual Media Co., Ltd.

The EP was beautifully produced.

Inside was even a glossy insert containing Sun Xiaowei’s biography and a heartfelt explanation of the emotional journey that had inspired the song.

Thinking back to Sun Xiaowei’s humble smile that night, Lin Hao couldn’t help chuckling.

The smile on his face was somewhat sinister.

The website he’d been planning was still under construction. To avoid unnecessary trouble, he rarely performed original songs after joining Ferry Bar.

Even so, he still possessed the original handwritten drafts of every song.

This guy was truly asking for trouble.

Holding the CD case, he asked the sound engineer, “Brother Liu, could you sell me this album?”

The sound engineer, Liu, was short and skinny. Hearing that, he laughed.

“Buy it? No need. The CD’s almost finished playing. I’ll take it out and you can just keep it. Fourth Sister dropped off a whole pile of new CDs today. She’ll never notice if one or two are missing.”

Lin Hao quickly thanked him.

“I’ll listen to it and bring it back.”

Liu waved dismissively.

Just then the music ended, and he removed the disc and handed it over.

Lin Hao slipped it back into the case and walked away.

The band had already gone onstage.

Bai Zhitao looked somewhat downcast as she got up and headed toward the stage as well.

Smack!

Lin Hao tossed the CD case onto the table in front of Wu Xiaozhou.

“What’s this?”

Wu Xiaozhou picked it up and looked at it.

“Holy shit! Isn’t this that long-haired guy from the barbecue stand? He actually released an album? And it says he wrote both the lyrics and music himself?”

Lin Hao laughed angrily.

The irony was that Wu Xiaozhou’s own hair had become pretty long too. It was only after Lin Hao said he looked like a lion that he started tying it back into a ponytail with a leather band.

“No wonder the song sounded so familiar. Isn’t this the one you sang at the barbecue stand? The one that made that annoying girl run off crying?”

Lin Hao rolled his eyes.

“You only figured that out now?”

Wu Xiaozhou scratched his head awkwardly.

“I was too busy chatting with Taozi.”

“Wait!”

Lin Hao suddenly thought of something.

“What did you just say?”

“‘Taozi’?”

“All you think about is Taozi! Not that part—the sentence before that.”

Wu Xiaozhou thought for a moment.

“What? The barbecue stand?”

Lin Hao shook his head again.

“Did that little girl get scared off by your singing?”

“Exactly!” Lin Hao slapped his thigh. The footage of that girl running away from the barbecue stand had actually been broadcast on TV—on Chu Yu’s program, Ordinary People’s Stories. It also included clips of him singing, along with his voice.

As he recalled, Sun Xiaowei had appeared in the footage too, standing not far from him.

The TV station would definitely have archived copies of the recording. With that, he would have even stronger evidence.

Heh heh!

“Let’s go!” Lin Hao said, grabbing the CD and heading for the door.

Wu Xiaozhou quickly pulled him back.

“I already promised Taozi we’d go back to school together. Wait a bit!”

“Damn it!” Lin Hao rarely swore, but this time he couldn’t help it. After thinking for a moment, he nodded. “Fine. You stay here. I’m going outside to make a call.”

Standing outside the bar, he noticed two girls nearby. One was hugging a roadside tree and vomiting, while the other patted her back.

Lin Hao walked farther away, took out his phone, thought for a moment, and called Chu Yu.

“Haozi, what made you finally think of calling your big sister?” Chu Yu joked as soon as she picked up. She sounded to be in a very good mood.

“Come on, Sis. I’ve just been missing you and Brother Zhou.”

“Cut the nonsense. What’s up?”

Lin Hao chuckled. He really liked Chu Yu’s straightforward personality. Xia Yumeng was sometimes a lot like her.

“There actually is something.”

He then explained the entire situation from beginning to end.

After hearing it, Chu Yu became angry as well.

“What kind of person is this? How can he do something like that?”

Lin Hao felt somewhat helpless too.

He had never expected that a guy who sang at a roadside barbecue stand could pull something like this off. In just a single year, relying on a song that had been old and overplayed in his previous life, the man had actually released an EP.

Back then, when Sun Xiaowei had asked whether he could sing the song, Lin Hao had readily agreed. He had figured that the man was just a struggling street performer trying to make a living.

But now the situation was completely different.

Sun Xiaowei was claiming the song as his own and was commercially profiting from it.

How could Lin Hao possibly let that slide?

“I’m going to need your help with this, Sis,” he said.

“Tell me. As long as I can help, I will.”

Lin Hao then explained about the recording from that day.

“No problem. We archive all of our footage. I can make a copy for you. What’s next?”

“I’m going to file a lawsuit.”

“Against him?”

Lin Hao nodded, as though Chu Yu could somehow see him through the phone.

“Yeah. I’m suing him.”

“Hold on a second.”

After saying that, Chu Yu went silent. There was no sound from the other end for quite some time.

A while later, Zhou Dongbing’s voice came through.

“Haozi.”

“Brother Zhou.”

Lin Hao sighed inwardly. Everyone seemed to have picked up Wu Xiaozhou’s habit of calling him that.

“I don’t know much about the entertainment industry,” Zhou Dongbing said, “but I think there are two possibilities here.”

“I’m listening.”

“First, this guy hid the truth, and the company that signed him has no idea the song was plagiarized.”

“Second, the company knows he plagiarized it and may choose to settle out of court.”

“I understand.”

Lin Hao had already considered both possibilities.

“If it’s the first case, then things are simple. Our evidence is solid, and the lawsuit shouldn’t be difficult,” Zhou Dongbing continued. “But if it’s the second case, you need to think carefully about how you want to proceed.”

Lin Hao responded with a quiet “Mm.”

After a moment of thought, Zhou Dongbing continued:

“I’m not an expert in this field, but logically speaking, for a new singer, the most important thing is building a reputation. Is it possible that the company knows he plagiarized the song but still wants to fight the lawsuit?”

Lin Hao laughed.

“Brother Zhou, whether it’s a singer or a writer, once the word plagiarism gets attached to them, it’s like getting smeared with mud from a cesspit. Even if it isn’t crap, everyone will think it is. Recovering from that kind of reputation is incredibly difficult.”

“So no company with any sense would ever use plagiarism as a publicity stunt for one of its artists.”

“Because they can’t win.”