This TVC was created in 1984 by Miao Haizhong (苗海忠), the boy who appears in the video above. Thanks to collectors of the unusual, we can still find these ancient videos which would have been buried six feet under the CCTV tower.

Back then, Miao was an 18 year old high school student selected from 2,000 candidates. His tone was filled by passion: “Yanwu, Yanwu! A song with great affection!” (燕舞，燕舞！一曲歌来一片情！) For those of you who have been in China for less than 20 years: Yanwu (燕舞) is a radio recorder brand which has been the most popular in mainland families for a decade.

Yancheng Radio Factory, the maker of Yanwu radio recorders, paid Miao Haizhong RMB 200 for the TVC, and CCTV RMB 400,000 per year as placement fees. In a market with no competition at all, Yanwu overwhelmed the nation with the TVC in one night.

In the days before Karaoke or Super Girls, radio recorders helped Chinese people enjoy their own voices and realize the dreams of being a superstar. In the booming years, Yancheng Radio Factory had more than 5,000 workers who are even richer than the local government officials.

You can guess what happened next if you’ve read some stories about Chinese state-owned enterprises. In 1993, VCD players started occupying Chinese people’s living rooms and everything changed way too fast for Yanwu. Three years later, the factory went completely broke.