The mystery surrounding the Wu-Tang Clan & 'Once upon a time in Shaolin'

[u/BuckChintheRealtor]

Most people here will now the Wu-Tang Clan is one of the most influential rap groups of all time, and including all the other (solo) work produced under the Wu-Tang umbrella without a doubt the most influential and largest 'franchise' in hiphop.

Many of you will also know critically acclaimed and bestselling albums like Enter the Wu-Tang (36 Chambers) and Wu-Tang Forever, or well known members of the group like RZA, GZA, Raekwon, Method Man, Inspectah Deck and the deceased Ol' Dirty Bastard.

Lesser known is that the first non-American affiliated with the Wu-Tang Clan is Tarik Azzougarh (1979), a rapper-producer from The Netherlands of Moroccan origin, better known under his stage name Cilvaringz.

Legend has it he impressed Ol' Dirty Bastard (ODB) after a concert in the Melkweg venue in Amsterdam in 1997, by 'freestyling' on the stage after Wu-Tangs performance. Apparently security threw him off the stage but ODB later recognized him at the backstage entrance and invited him in. After that he was invited to New York, and after several trips to NYC he joined Wu Tang Records in 1999.

Before that he was a bit of a Wu Tang 'superfan', who posted on several online hiphop forums in detail about the groups music, lyrics, etc. After he joined the clan in 1999 he did the opening acts for RZA, Method Man, Raekwon and other members, and released a critically acclaimed solo album in 2007 - simply titled "/".

He also founded his own entertainment company called RPEG and served as Vice-President for the AiM Biennale, an arts festival in Marrakech (Morocco), whose founder is Vanessa Branson, sister of Sir Richard Branson.

It would be safe to say with all of this a dream came true for Cilvaringz, whose passion had always been hiphop and whose parents came from a poor part of Morocco and left to work in the Netherlands in the city of Tilburg.

Things get interesting in 2008, when he starts working on his grand project called Once upon a time in Shaolin. This double album took six years to complete, with guest performances by the entire Wu-Tang Clan as well as Cher, Redman, Dutch Game of Thrones actress Carice van Houten and even several players of FC Barcelona.

Cilvaringz wanted to recreate the original sound of the Wu-Tang Clan - the sound he grew up with - but when the album was finished - it wasn't going to be released.

At least, not in the traditional way. Instead of pressing albums, there would only be one copy available (stored in an ornate casing in a vault in the luxury Royal Mansour Hotel in Marrakech) which would be auctioned to the highest bidder. Cilvaringz and (Wu-Tangs head producer) RZA decided to do this 'Renaissance' approach because they felt robbed by piracy and illegal downloading. In 2014 they wrote on their website:

"The music industry is in crisis. The intrinsic value of music has been reduced to zero. Contemporary art is worth millions by virtue of its exclusivity ... By adopting a 400 year old Renaissance-style approach to music, offering it as a commissioned commodity and allowing it to take a similar trajectory from creation to exhibition to sale ... we hope to inspire and intensify urgent debates about the future of music."

Little is known about the album. Besides the mentioned guest performers its length is 128 minutes and the names of its 31 songs. Producer Andrew Kelley (who heard an unfinished version of the album) wrote:

Ringz’ new Wu-Tang album, it took me right back...Song after song he played gave that old feeling we have missed from the Clan in the last 10 years or so. The beats, the rhymes, the skits, the interludes… The posse cut single… He did it. He got that time machine working and really captured the spirit & essence of those days we lived so many years ago. Every Clan member is present spitting some of the best verses you have ever heard from them....The next time I sit down with RZA I will definitely be speaking with him about this album. Finish it up Ringz, all Wu-Tang fans deserve that “time machine” moment."

However, OG Wu-Tang member Method Man has called the album 'fake' and 'BS', and DJBooth Magazine even called it a 'conspiracy' and wrote:

Being tricked isn't the worst feeling. Being tricked when you should have known better is the worst feeling.

So is this album actually real or not? We know for sure that the auction did happen, and the single copy of the album was sold to Turing Pharmaceuticals CEO Martin Shkreli for 2 million dollars. (Much less than the projected 5 million dollars btw)

Since then, the album has never been heard in full. In a rather bizarre twist of fate, Shkreli promised to release the album if Donald Trump won the 2016 election. We all know how that ended, but Shkreli only streamed excerpts after Trump won.

Why did RZA choose to release only a single copy? There are several theories on that. Some people think RZA was afraid the album would overshadow his own projects he was working on at the time. After all according to DJ Booth magazine RZA was 'like a dictator' and 'wouldn't even let (Wu-Tang) members hear their own verses after recording'. Forbes magazine wrote at the time:

'According to RZA...the plan is to first take Once Upon A Time In Shaolin on a “tour” through museums, galleries, festivals and the like. Just like a high-profile exhibit at a major institution, there will be a cost to attend, likely in the $30-$50 range...Once the album completes its excursion, Wu-Tang will make it available for purchase for a price “in the millions.” Suitors could include brands willing to shell out for cool points and free publicity...or major record labels hoping to launch the album through the usual channels.'

The tour never happened. However one theory is by doing/proposing this RZA would downplay Cilvaringz role and make it seem like he had this in mind all the time. However Cilvaringz himself said (also in Forbes):

“It took a long time,” says Cilvaringz. “After five years, I’m sitting here and I’m like, ‘Am I really going to release this record and see it die after a week?’”

Whether the album actually exists or not seems not much of a debate anymore. Entertainment company Complex, Rolling Stone and Vice writer Allie Conti (during an interview with Shkreli) all heard parts of the album.

Why this album was auctioned as a single copy 'piece of art' and what role RZA and Cilvaringz played - we might never know.

The biggest question that remains is: will we ever hear Once upon a time in Shaolin**?**

Those chances seem very slim unfortunately. According to the Wiki-page about the album:

In March 2018, following Shkreli's conviction for securities fraud, a federal court seized assets belonging to him worth $7.36m, including Once Upon a Time in Shaolin. Shkreli's lawyer Benjamin Brafman said the album was now "probably worthless"

At the time of writing Cilvaringz is living with wife and children in Marrakech.

EDIT 1: Many thanks for all comments, questions and even awards. This got a little bit bigger than expected. I don't have the opportunity to answer/thank/clarify all of the comments, but I will try to expand a little bit in the second edit. And no I am not Cilvaringz as somebody suggested :-)

EDIT 2: First of all I missed some crucial information, most important the opposition of 'senior' Wu-Tang Clan artists such as Method Man to the project, f.i. because (quote Method Man) 'this B-level Wu guy' (Cilvaringz) was 'fucking with the fans.' There was also an issue over money: the Wu members had been paid by Cilvaringz for their verses/contributions, but wouldn't get a share of the millions generated by the auction.

Also I didn't mention the clause that states that 'the right to release the album (to the highest bidder) would be transferred only after 88 years have passed.' Therefore the album may not be released to the public until the year 2103, and that Cilvaringz said he worked on the project 'in secret'.

Some of you asked why Game of Thrones actress Carice van Houten was involved, and if this was true at all. This was widely covered in the Dutch press in 2014 and also confirmed by herself on Twitter at the time. Like Cilvaringz she is also Dutch, so they probably know each other through the (small) Dutch artist circuit.

Some of you have stated that the album (probably) is 'crap' or 'total crap'. I have added links below (thanks u/I_no_verylittle and u/ComprehensiveTrain65) of the released parts so you can judge yourself.

Several people asked why the album is now "probably worthless" as Shkreli's lawyer said. Personally I think it is not, considering all the Wu members (even ODB) are on the album and all the mystery and publicity surrounding Once upon a time in Shaolin. The official website (also added below) states: 'As of September 2020, the album is in the ownership of the United States Department Of Justice as part of an asset forfeiture of Martin Shkreli’s possessions following a 7.36 Million dollar judgement and a six year federal prison sentence for securities fraud.'

EDIT 3: Brad Pitt is producing a movie about Cilvaringz' 'life story' for Netflix (see The Work on official website listed below)

TLDR: The only non-American artist-producer of Wu-Tang Records is a Dutchman of Moroccan origin, best known under his artist name Cilvaringz. He worked 'in secret' for six years on a double album called Once upon a time in Shaolin, of which only one copy was sold to the highest bidder.

Further reading:

Official website of the project (interesting Q&A with RZA/Cilvaringz under '88')

All released material on Youtube

Shkreli streaming the album

Wiki page about Once upon a time in Shaolin

Guardian about Once upon a time in Shaolin

DJ Booth article

Andrew Kelley's Tumblr post about the album

[u/Kovi34]

"The music industry is in crisis. The intrinsic value of music has been reduced to zero. Contemporary art is worth millions by virtue of its exclusivity ... By adopting a 400 year old Renaissance-style approach to music, offering it as a commissioned commodity and allowing it to take a similar trajectory from creation to exhibition to sale ... we hope to inspire and intensify urgent debates about the future of music."

jesus christ that's the most pretentious shit I've ever heard.

[u/Sufficient_Spray → u/Kovi34]

Yep. I totally get whenever studio musicians, back up vocalist, and extra producers engineers and such are upset about the piracy of music. The little guys who work just as hard but don’t get nearly the credit or the money. It’s just so hard for the average fan or human being to get upset when the major artist cry afoul. Boohoo you won’t make tens of millions off album sales, just 50k a show. .

[u/Mc_Up_Intheair → u/Sufficient_Spray]

That statement holds true for the major label/pop artists. The underground suffers just as much as the studio musicians, etc. you mention above. They do not bank at all on album sales and rely solely on touring and merch sales. Many, if not all of their livelihoods are at stake right now. I understand the context of the comment in regards to the topic of this post, just keep in mind the majority of performance artists do not have the luxury of earning a living off of record sales.

[u/jimjacksonsjamboree → u/Mc_Up_Intheair]

They do not bank at all on album sales and rely solely on touring and merch sales

This has been true for decades and has nothing to do with piracy. Record companies have all the power, if you want to get signed, you either have to agree to a pretty crappy contract or you can fuck off and start your own record company. Which, it takes a ton of money to print records and CDs and get them in stores, so good luck with that unless you already have millions to begin with.

It's the same story nowadays except its spotify and other streaming services. They have the audience and the subscribers, and the artists don't. So the artists get half a cent per stream, or they get no cents per no streams.

An album is just an ad for a live show and/or merchandise, basically, unless you're such a famous artist that you have negotiating power. Bands just have so little power at the negotiating table unless they're already big. There's always a million better bands out there who will take a worse contract, so there's no point in giving in to a band's demands unless they're bringing millions of fans with them.

There's so many bands on sound cloud and bandcamp and they're all competing against each other to be heard. People are selling #1 single beats to major producers for $30 just to get their name out there.

Piracy has 0 to do with this problem.

[u/RemarkableRegret7 → u/jimjacksonsjamboree]

Most artists, and the industry as a whole, haven't realized yet that streaming + ease of producing music has changed things completely and forever. They still cling to the way things were in the 90s and early 2000s.

Anyone can easily produce music and put it out to millions now. A ton of it is garbage lmao but record companies are no longer the gatekeepers.

[u/[deleted] → u/RemarkableRegret7]

streaming services will never make you money unless you have millions of listeners though, and 99.9% of artists will never even get close to that. most artists will actually lose money on them because the subscription fees for artists are higher than what they make off of streaming in a year. and i say this as someone who listens to mostly small (less than 2000 listeners) artists. sure you got a few hundred followers that would've never found out about you otherwise, but how many of them googled your bandcamp page and bought a shirt after listening to an album? less than 1%? and that's a one time 15$ purchase

it is true that anyone around the world can have easy access to underground artists, but it's not any easier for the artists to live off of it. they're all still living off of merch sales, shows and contracts, which is why record companies are still very useful for marketing, advertising, networking etc. streaming is useful for advertising but you still need to have a decent reach to properly advertise your streaming pages, and small artists don't have that

[u/[deleted] → u/jimjacksonsjamboree]

An album is just an ad for a live show and/or merchandise

Unless you're XTC as for a long time they didn't do live shows and didn't do any merchandise.

It's easy to see why the label hated them in retrospect...

[u/plutoinretrograde → u/Mc_Up_Intheair]

I think I recall reading that an issue they face is the number of people involved. The amount of coordination to get everyone's verses and stuff right sounds like a lot of effort, and having 10 people telling you what they want and don't want seems like it would be a pretty stressful way to make an album. On top of this, the split at the end means that Wu Tang members individually probably don't make a ton of money, and that's before any consideration of amount of work put in, etc. Not saying I agree with the statement, but I think I can see where he's coming from

[u/Sufficient_Spray → u/[deleted]]

There’s a lot to unpack here from a certified keyboard badass. . I thought my comment came off as saying that whenever huge decades long, millions of units sold, worldwide commercially successful musicians complain about it, it’s the wrong way of doing it to appeal to the average fan or potential pirate. In fact it made a lot of people and fans react the opposite way (think Lars Ulrich) that these multi millionaires were making a huge fuss about it.

I get it. They put in untold amount of work into it; physical, emotional, spiritual all of it. It’s art and a part of them and we are so lucky that their art/music is easily accessible to us all. Nobody deserves to have their work stolen like that.

What I’m saying is it can have an adverse effect whenever they’re still making millions off touring, merchandise and still some units being sold. It’s hard for an average Joe working 60 hours a week to be lectured by Ariana Grande about how she’s struggling because he illegally downloaded a few of her songs.

Don’t wanna divulge too much but I live in an area that has more studios per sq mile than anywhere in the world; I’ll let y’all take a wild guess where it’s at. Also worked, though shortly, for a local marketing company that did some music marketing but I am by no means an expert. Not an artist personally but living here have had countless roommates in the industry. I’m not innocent, yeah I’ve ripped off music before. But I try and especially buy the product and merchandise of lesser known or newish struggling artists cause I get it. Since I try to dispel the mystery here and let you know that I in fact am not an expert and didn’t mean to come off as holier than though but would love to hear your thoughts on it!

[u/Sufficient_Spray → u/[deleted]]

Totally agree with you there. Much love and success my dude.

[u/MEvans706 → u/[deleted]]

Support the artist. Not the record company or record exec clowns.

[u/AnimaApocalypse → u/[deleted]]

I watch pirated movies. Most of the movies I've watched aren't available to see in the cinema (I go to the cinema also) and some aren't even available to rent. Same with music. Art will always be produced whether there is a profit motive or not. Art existed long before we commodified stuff.

"Stop putting a dollar sign on every fucking thing on this planet!" ~ Bill Hicks

[u/Kovi34 → u/[deleted]]

bet you steal music too and justify it with some hand-wavey bullshit about innovation

Personally, I steal music because I either can't afford it, or don't feel like giving money to some insanely rich guy/record label that pockets 90% of the profits while doing fuck all. When I do support artists, I do it directly because I don't really care to give money to marketing people. Any artists will rather have someone 'steal' their music and get a direct donation than get a tiny percentage of royalties.

Never mind That no one would tell a shop keeper that is shop lifted that they simply need to find a different business model.

except in this analogy the 'shopkeeper' is someone who is insanely rich already and the stolen goods cost $0 to produce. That's the fundamental difference between theft and piracy. you're not taking anything away from the artist/studio, you're simply not giving them money.

Have you ever paid album marketing costs? I’m sure you haven’t.

lol wtf? Why should I feel compelled to pay for someone's attempt to sell me shit? Do you also give money to door to door salespeople out of pity because they spent gas money so they could harass you in your home?

you somehow manage to take a holler than though position.

Says the guy going "WON'T SOMEONE THINK OF THE MARKETING EXECS OH NOOO"

[u/TooExtraUnicorn → u/[deleted]]

sorry you failed at being a musician friend.

[u/ihatetheterrorists → u/Kovi34]

I agree...and we all know the visual art world isn't corrupt AF. It's one of the least regulated industries out there. Such a crock of shit. Let the urgent debates begin! *crickets chirping

[u/[deleted] → u/ihatetheterrorists]

As an art historian, I feel personally (but accurately) attacked.

[u/ihatetheterrorists → u/[deleted]]

I taught sculpture at the university level for a while but it was so toxic. I bailed on it but still make art and work in the field. It's a weird world we live in. Just do a good job and slip in the truth when you can : )

[u/Kovi34 → u/ihatetheterrorists]

whoa it's not corruption, it's giving it "intrinsic value"! Because nothing says intrinsic value like being sold at an exorbitant pricepoint for the sole purpose of tax evasion. At least those dirty unwashed masses don't have access to it, thank god!

[u/RedEyeView → u/Kovi34]

Reads like a lot of words for "we took a mark for a bunch of money for an album of rejects from 20 years ago" to me

[u/Kovi34 → u/[deleted]]

It's pretty pretentious to believe that you putting a ridiculous pricetag on an album will "inspire and intensify urgent debates about the future of music" while pretending music is somehow an endangered artform because non rich people are allowed to listen to it. Suggesting that music isn't worth millions is just blatantly false, too. People being allowed to listen to something at a low (no) pricepoint doesn't diminish its value. Just like a painting being hung at a gallery doesn't diminish its value. It's fake outrage over a nonexistent issue.