Born in 1978, Li Zhi is a singer-songwriter who began his career singing and writing about politics. He has enjoyed commercial success in recent years, but has maintained an honest self-awareness and commitment to the independent music scene
Li is also known for his outspoken views on Chinese politics. In 2010, just after Google announced its decision to move out of China, Li wrote a blog post on his frustration over the curtailment of expression in China. “We’re like pigs, just sitting around and fighting with each other in the pen they put us in. Ignorant and unable to think for ourselves, we are clubbed down a narrow channel of nationalism, becoming mere tools at our rulers’ disposal.”
As Li has gone more mainstream, his work has become less political. Two of his earlier songs, “Goddess” and “The Square,” elegize the 1989 protests and their violent suppression around June 4 of that year.