Chapter Eighty-Nine: Waiting Only for Tomorrow!

After the launch concert ended, Yi Da hosted a banquet for every reporter and musician who had attended that day, as well as all the staff who had rushed about behind the scenes.

After leaving the venue, Jiang Lun got into the company’s minivan.

Chen Yingying had come along today as well, acting as an assistant, helping carry clothes and hand out water. Anything too demanding was not asked of her.

In the driver’s seat up front, Mai Le was happily reporting on the online buzz.

This was only a small wave of publicity, yet with just the live broadcast of the launch concert, Jiang Lun’s album had already stirred up quite a commotion online. In particular, that song called "Dual Chopsticks"—the more peculiar and incomprehensible it seemed, the more it drew people in.

“It’s exploding! Alan, everyone online is talking about your songs. My guess is tomorrow’s front page will be nothing but your name!”

“No need to guess! Absolutely!” Wu Zhaoyang, in the passenger seat, said with a smile. “We invited so many media outlets; they ought to give us some face, right?”

“Every new song performed today was fantastic!” Liu Nan, also in the car, praised. “Alan, when your album goes on sale tomorrow, I’ll buy a hundred copies and post a celebratory update!”

“Thank you, Brother Nan!” Jiang Lun hurriedly waved it off. “No need to spend so much. I appreciate the thought!”

“What do you mean, spend so much? That’s pocket change. If you write me another song, I’d have no problem buying a thousand copies!” Liu Nan said with a sly smile.

“Uh...”

Jiang Lun laughed helplessly, instantly understanding Liu Nan’s meaning, and said at once, “All right! Brother Nan, just for the fact that you came today to support me, I have to write you one!”

“That was just a joke!”

Liu Nan repeatedly waved his hands. “Don’t take me for a bandit. I was only speaking off the cuff!”

“That won’t do! Since you’ve said it, I have to write you another one no matter what—and I’ll write it right now!” As he spoke, Jiang Lun turned to Chen Yingying beside him. “Yingying, bring me paper and a pen!”

Chen Yingying searched the back seat for quite a while before finding a notebook and a pen.

Jiang Lun took them, and in a flurry of strokes began writing the lyrics onto the page.

In less than five minutes, he was done. He reached back for the guitar, then said to Liu Nan, “Brother Nan, turn on voice recording on your phone!”

“Huh?” Liu Nan was completely dumbfounded. Seeing that Jiang Lun had written the lyrics in no time at all, could he really be composing the melody on the spot too?

“I’ll sing and play it. Just record it on your phone and make the demo yourself later.”

Jiang Lun tested the strings, his fingers unconsciously picking out single notes to tune the instrument, purely out of habit.

Half in disbelief, Liu Nan turned on the recorder with his phone, unable to tell whether Jiang Lun was serious or joking. The lyrics didn’t look fake, but if this was for real... it was still hard to believe.

Jiang Lun glanced at the phone screen and began at once:

“Under the lamps, on the glittering street,
Suddenly came a frigid chill.
A distant tenderness cannot ease today’s sorrow—
Am I merely drifting with the tide...”

Liu Nan held his breath, staring at Jiang Lun with delight and astonishment. There was an indescribable feeling in his chest. Such effortless creation was no longer something that could be called mere genius.

Beside him, Chen Yingying clasped her small hands tightly and listened with complete focus. Wu Zhaoyang and Mai Le in the front were the same.

The car was very quiet. Only the song moved slowly through the air.

When the whole song was finished, Jiang Lun stopped, handed the guitar to Chen Yingying, tore the page with the lyrics from the notebook, and passed it to Liu Nan. Then he asked casually, “Brother Nan, what do you think of the song?”

“Good! Good! Good!”

Liu Nan was so excited he repeated himself over and over. Then, suddenly remembering something, he pushed the lyric sheet back at him. “I can’t take this song. It’s too good. You should keep it and sing it yourself!”

“Hey!” Jiang Lun couldn’t help but laugh. “Good songs are everywhere. If I can write this one, I can write plenty more. No need to worry. Good songs can’t be sung out!”

By the standards of the classic songs in his second-hand notebook, Jiang Lun could sing for two lifetimes and still never run out. As for this song, "Rescue," he had learned it because he liked it, but when choosing the album tracks, it had never occurred to him to include it.

Today it was purely chance that the song had come to mind, and he trusted that with Liu Nan’s ability, it would shine even brighter in his hands.

“Brother! Thank you so much!”

Liu Nan truly loved the song. “How about this: I’ll buy it from you at ten times the market price. Don’t bargain with me. If you try to bargain, I won’t sing it!”

Jiang Lun was once again at a loss whether to laugh or cry. Brother Nan was far too amusing; he had never even heard of such a rule. He said offhandedly, “All right! If the market price is a thousand, just give me ten thousand.”

“That won’t do!” Liu Nan waved him off. “The last song, ‘The Winding Moon,’ I bought for seventy thousand. We’ll use the same price this time, and I’ll give you ten times that—seven hundred thousand, settled!”

“Ha...”

Jiang Lun was utterly speechless. But then he thought: in the near future, the songs he took out might not even be worth seventy thousand a word. Besides, with Liu Nan’s status, this money was nothing to him anyway, so he stopped dragging it out. “Fine, then. However you want to handle it is fine. Whenever you’re ready to pay is okay.”

“Great!” Liu Nan turned to Wu Zhaoyang. “Old Wu, you heard him! Later we’ll go to your company and sign the contract, and I’ll transfer the money to you right away!”

“Hmph, hmph.”

Wu Zhaoyang smiled. “Let’s eat first. We’ll talk after dinner.”

The car sped up and headed toward their destination.

At a club in the south of the city, one of the Liu family’s properties, Liu Xiahui had not attended Jiang Lun’s launch concert today, but he had personally arranged a celebratory banquet for him. Other than the people in Jiang Lun’s car, the only other guest was Liu Xiahui himself.

Liu Xiayu had gone to attend the appreciation banquet organized for the reporters, so she wasn’t there.

Before the meal began, Liu Xiahui personally announced a piece of news: Jiang Lun’s debut album had already surpassed forty-nine thousand copies in online presales by eight o’clock tonight, and before the pre-order deadline at midnight, it was expected to break the fifty-thousand mark.

The first two days had seen a fierce surge in presales, and by the third day the pace had declined somewhat, though it still held steady at four to five thousand copies a day.

There were still four hours until presales ended, so whether it could break through was anyone’s guess. But no matter what, this result was already very good.

This year’s best presale performance belonged to TFEX, an underage idol group that debuted last year. Their first-day presales broke twenty thousand; by the third day they had surpassed fifty thousand, and their final presale total reached more than one hundred twenty-five thousand copies.

Jiang Lun could not compare with that group, because they had a fervent army of obsessive fans: from mothers in their sixties to little girls barely in their teens, all of them staunch supporters. Their fans wrapped them in a saintly halo and pushed their final presale total more than forty thousand copies above the runner-up.

This year’s best presale record for a solo album belonged to a female singer from the island, whose final presale total reached more than eighty-two thousand copies. But nearly seventy thousand of those came from the island itself, while the mainland sold only a little over ten thousand in presales. The result was excellent, yet the mainland market remained far from optimistic.

As a newcomer, Jiang Lun breaking fifty thousand was already a very good result. By that logic, if the market remained stable and his next album maintained the same heat and quality, it would certainly do even better than his debut.

“Alan! Come, to celebrate the complete success of your launch concert, and to wish your album great sales when it goes on sale tomorrow—cheers!” Liu Xiahui took a glass of red wine and walked over to Jiang Lun, offering a toast.

Jiang Lun quickly stood and returned it. “Everything I’ve achieved today is thanks to Mr. Liu!”

“Hey, listen to you!”

Liu Xiahui put an arm around his shoulder. “To tell you the truth, you’re the artist who has surprised me the most out of everyone I’ve ever met!”

Jiang Lun smiled, thanked him again, and drained the red wine in one go.

After several rounds of drinks, everyone loosened up and began chatting freely. Liu Xiahui, after all, was a businessman, and wherever he went, he never forgot the cause of his enterprise. In the middle of the meal he even approached Liu Nan, hoping he would join Rainy Day Music.

Although Liu Nan had been drinking, he was not at all careless. At present he was what one might call a freelance musician: he had his own team to produce records, then found a music company to distribute them on a revenue-sharing basis.

As for the split with a company on a new album, though he still had no clear direction, there was no shortage of executives like Liu Xiahui coming to woo him.

That was the reality of a top star in the music world. Even if he lacked the wealth and power of those great bosses, they still had to come in person to discuss collaboration with him.

When the gathering broke up, Liu Nan was slightly tipsy. Pulling at Jiang Lun, he said with emotion, “I’m really hoping tomorrow comes quickly! There are still three new songs in your album I haven’t heard yet, and I’m dying of curiosity!”

He was not the only one. The live broadcast of the launch concert that afternoon had not included all the new songs on the album, and many fans were just as impatient.

“You’ll hear them tomorrow.”

Jiang Lun let out a breath, carrying a trace of alcohol, and murmured almost to himself, “Everything depends on tomorrow.”

The club had arranged cars to send everyone home to rest.

When Jiang Lun and Chen Yingying got home, they both collapsed onto the sofa from exhaustion.

Sitting in silence for a while, Chen Yingying suddenly asked, “Your debut album goes on sale tomorrow. Are you worried?”

“Am I?” Jiang Lun feigned surprise.

In truth, he was, but he did not want to say it out loud.

Although the reviews had been overwhelmingly positive, the real answer would have to come from sales figures and the major charts. The songs on this album all came from another world. Jiang Lun was not from that world, and he did not know much about how popular these songs had been there.

But in this world, many of the musical styles on the album were innovative, and whether the public here would accept them was very important.

It absolutely could not be the kind of record that won praise but failed to sell.

“Well...”

Looking at Chen Yingying, Jiang Lun gave a faint, mischievous smile. “Go take a bath. Tonight... let’s wish in advance that tomorrow will be a complete victory.”

“You’re awful!”

Chen Yingying shot him a glare, her face blushing bright red. She got up, went upstairs to change into her home clothes, and poured him a cup of tea. “You sober up first. I’ll bathe, and you can bathe after I’m done!”

“Of course!” Jiang Lun chuckled.

“Hmph.”

Chen Yingying turned her head away and dawdled off to bathe.

When she came back out, still blushing shyly, she walked to the sofa—only to see that Jiang Lun had already fallen asleep.