Push Back

One Ok Rock (OOR) is a Japanese rock group. The lead vocal Taka has a natural R&.B voice but sings shocking rock songs. Taka actively participates in the writing and songwriting of each album. The lyrics often reveal a stubbornness against the world, which resonates throughout the sky for me in Hong Kong in those years.

When the album "Eye Of The Storm" was released in early 2019, I went to the Xinhe Center in Mong Kok to buy the album. It should have been 22 years since I bought the album to support the creation. My partial love for OOR is evident. . My favorite song on the album is Push Back, and Taka also revealed in an English interview that he chose the same as me. Hong Kong in 2019 is described with the most nasty swear words, and the words are too gentle. I watched the blood and tears and all kinds of heartbeats in the live media live for countless days. "We'll get up and push back", when I shared the lyrics with my husband in Taiwan, he replied, "Isn't it written in Hong Kong?"

 Push Back (Lyric Excerpt)
They call it revolution But nothing's changed They call it medication We're still in pain Now we're back in the fight / Now we're back in the fight Never losing your strength / We've tried too many times, just waiting patiently patiently / It's like their holding the Gun to our heads / This is Like they're holding guns to our heads They're trying to tell us what to think We're stuck on the edge So go ahead and push us Give up and push yourself We'll get up and push back / Stand up against them You're precious reputation Goes up in flames You're empty information / You are pale Powerless words We know it's all fake

On May 22, 2020, the Hong Kong stop of the "Eye Of The Storm" world tour was originally held at the Asia-Expo, but it was cancelled due to the epidemic, and this was the day when the National People's Congress announced the establishment of the Hong Kong version of the National Security Law. I thought at the time, if there was no epidemic, it would be very exciting if Taka could sing Push Back at Yabo this night, but I am afraid that OOR will not be able to hold a concert in Hong Kong after that. The lyrics are really full of incitement. ......

Tokyo Governor Election will be held on July 5, 2020. Taka called on fans in Tokyo to vote on IG, saying: "Let's vote together. Under the influence of the new coronavirus, things that used to be taken for granted are no longer the same as before. No matter what era, the most powerful are the most powerful people. The worry is about the influence of you young people. If we continue to think that we have nothing to do with ourselves, one day these people will deprive us of our future. Now the environment is more accessible to politics than when I was young. So , please understand for yourself, think about it, and face it. We all have the right to choose.”

His IG news has been reposted by me everywhere, because there was also an election in Hong Kong on the 11th and 12th of the same month, and this election was the Hong Kong pro-democracy primary election that later evolved into the 47-person case—the 2020 Legislative Council members were elected by private vote Elected Democratic candidate. What Taka said is completely applicable to Hong Kong at that time. I hope all my friends will stand up and vote, and vote for their favorite candidates through this vote and cast a vote of no confidence in the government. I just didn't expect that this vote would be the last vote I was willing to stand up for, and the last vote with a choice.

October 31, 2021 is the day Japan will re-elect the House of Representatives. Before the vote, Taka, together with 13 other well-known entertainers, made a film appealing to young voters not to give up their sacred vote. This action is not a government advertisement, nor does it represent any group, it is purely an artist's spontaneous stand-up. Taka said in the short video: "In the past, I never cared about politics. Now I realize that I can vote is a very happy thing. I want to know if my vote will bring about change. Voting is an important right granted to me." On December 19 of the same year, Hong Kong held the general election of the Legislative Council under the "new electoral system", and the turnout rate was only a record low of 30.1%. And this time, my friends in Hong Kong and I are all silent on the sidelines. After the power is cut, and then you will vote for you with hypocrisy, knowing that casting a vote will not bring any change, so why vote?

Recently, I started listening to Push Back frantically again. I saw Hong Kong, which was already in the abyss early in the morning, was dragged into a deeper dark quagmire again. I thought that my relatives and friends were about to be forcibly checked in the cold wind. The "overwhelming" puppet, my heart seems to be on fire after being poured with spicy oil, burning with anger on this side of the sea. Looking at the fellow travelers who stayed behind, I could only digest all the suffering and anger by myself. I was powerless and only sad. I could only rely on the song to encourage myself to live a rotten life.

Whether a public figure can get my preference depends to a large extent on whether he cares about society, is not out of touch with the times, and most importantly, he does not kneel on his knees at will. Even though I'm more than a year older than Taka, I've become a big fan of his. I can’t even run without OOR’s songs. Their rhythm is a perfect match for my running pace. Even the PB, which is becoming more and more difficult to find, occasionally gets OOR’s credit. I will try my best to run forward, let's meet at the end!

 Postscript: When I was writing the above words, the dictator was unscrupulously invading Ukraine, and there were many voices on the Internet discussing the situation in the Taiwan Strait. At this moment, I think of another OOR song "Break My Strings" that I also like very much, one of the lines is You'll never reach out to my soul, yes, even if one day you point your head at my head, you And never touch my soul!