1985 was more of a ground zero than a turning point in pop culture. Live Aid, Bob Geldof’s monumental “global jukebox”, was announced in July of that year, and the music community now recognized its power and quickly rallied to promote change for the better, but it was never the same.
1985 ushered in the era of post-punk, new wave, and synthpop. The future was U2, Bon Jovi, and even bigger hair than before.
And in April of a historic year for music, WHAM’s George Michael and Andrew Ridgeley embarked on a journey to China that no pop artist had ever taken before. The story of that visit is included in the upcoming documentary “WHAM!” 10 Days In China is set to hit theaters on July 28th, and a new trailer has been teased. You can watch the full story below.
The feature film is like a time capsule, featuring never-before-seen footage of WHAM interacting with fans, authorities, and the media, as well as performances from Beijing and Guangzhou, and fresh interviews.
This is both a fish out of water film and a glimpse through the bamboo curtain, a study of two young British men who find a connection with local youth through music and sport. Highlights include Michael encouraging young women to dance, young people playing soccer with locals and visiting the Great Wall of China. Forty years later, Ridgeley returns to the scene.
It turns out that the two men had a lot of cultural and economic importance and served as ambassadors to the West. A major figure in the pop world.
In a 2017 interview with Billboard, former WHAM manager Simon Napier-Bell explained that at the time, authorities were “afraid of youth culture. A repressive society knows at any moment it’s going to take hold, it’s going to take over, and there’s no going back. They’re deathly afraid of it.”
To promote the show, commemorative cassette tapes were distributed to the audience. One side featured the original recording, and the other side featured the Mandarin cover of “WHAM!” The song was sung by Chinese singer Chen Fanyuan and features altered socialist lyrics.
“We handed out two cassette tapes to each person who bought a ticket. You could keep one and sell the other to pay for the ticket,” Napier-Bell told reporters. “Then word will spread. The Chinese couldn’t keep it as secret as they thought.”
A few years later, travel writer Colin Toubron visited China. “He said he heard Wham songs being played everywhere he went in China,” Napier-Bell said. “I think I did a very good job of being disruptive.”
Wham! Although they officially disbanded in 1986, the pop artist’s music has not declined. The group’s holiday classic “Last Christmas” finally reached No. 1 in the UK in January 2021, nearly 36 years after its release. Almost two years later, the single secured the coveted UK Christmas No. 1 for the first time, ending its longest journey to the top spot (39 years). One year later, Wham! ‘Last Christmas’ once again made history by becoming the first song to top the UK Christmas charts for multiple years in a row.
Michael, who passed away on Christmas Day 2016 at the age of 53, was posthumously inducted into the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame in 2023. In the same year, Netflix released the original documentary WHAM! The story of the groundbreaking concert in China was retold in the 1986 film Wham! China: foreign skies.
The new documentary features never-before-seen archival footage that has been meticulously restored and newly digitized, a rep said.
Sony Music Vision is the distributor of WHAM! 10 Days In China is being distributed theatrically in partnership with Trafalgar Releasing, with the film in partnership with Sony Music Entertainment UK and the BBC.
Tickets are available at wham10daysinchina.com. Later this summer, the doc will be broadcast on BBC Two and BBC iPlayer in partnership with the BBC.
Wham! 10 Days in China is produced by Supercollider (Zinc Media Company), directed by Mike Christie, and executive produced by Christa Wegener, Ian Sharp (Sony Music Vision), and Tanya Shaw (Supercollider).
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