Sci-fi inspired singer praises her roots

Clad in flame-red techwear, adorned with ornaments of various sizes, singer-songwriter Zhu Jingxi announced her presence with the stage visuals embodying cyberpunk aesthetics and her intoxicating voice imbued with a certain ethereal beauty.

The Dai performer, born in Pu'er, Southwest China's Yunnan province, successfully brought the inner diva out of her at the 88rising "Head in the Clouds" music festival held in Manila, the Philippines, on Dec 10.

Resolving to maintain cyberpunk style in her music and stage persona, Zhu enjoys being a storyteller of her futuristic fantasies through a portfolio that ranges from electronic music, pop to rock and folk.

But without a doubt, electronic music is her bedrock.

She knew that she wanted to be a singer from childhood.

And she remembers clearly when that magical moment came that changed her life.

In 2002, when she was 14, she heard Teardrop by Bristol's trip-hop legend Massive Attack.

The start resonates like a pulse, similar to a heartbeat. As the melodic line jumps in, metallic and enigmatic, followed by slow notes, she felt like "being pulled into a dreamlike universe".

"I was shocked and then became obsessed with music with similar psychedelic accents," she says.

Being a sci-fi fanatic, she found that many of those novels, animations and films in the field would discuss topics including how to explore one's inner world.

Within the frame of cyberpunk aesthetics, she is able to delve into a wide variety of topics both in the virtual world and reality.

"In this era of high tech, how can we cope with our limitations and find a new way out?" she exemplifies.

Zhu reinvented herself as cyborg persona Akini Jing in 2019.

The next year, she released a concept album titled Plastic Heaven by which she uses 10 songs to tell a complete story of how Akini Jing was created as a robotic body, then gradually turned into a cyborg, after experiencing some feelings of human beings, and in the end awakened to be a real human.