A KTV room for one sounds like a lonely idea. But if you love singing—humming to yourself, occasionally belting a line—and you are not trained or especially good, singing with a group can feel awkward. You worry about being laughed at, and at home you don’t have the space or equipment. In that situation, going to KTV alone is not a punishment. It’s a treat.
I’ve always enjoyed listening to music and singing. Jay Chou has been the one constant in my Chinese playlist—my “white moonlight”—since primary school, and he is still the artist I loop most. Beyond him, I listen to Western pop, electronic music, and folk. Each style has its own flavor, and switching between them changes my mood.
The deskmate who sang along
In the third year of middle school I had a deskmate I clicked with immediately. Our taste in music was almost identical: Jay Chou first, and our English-song preferences overlapped almost completely. For a while, morning reading became our private concert. We did duets. He had a good voice; I just sang along however I could. One day our homeroom teacher caught us on the monitor and stormed over during break to ask what we thought we were doing. We got a proper scolding.
One English song we both liked was “Señorita.” He used to sing the line ‘I love it when you call me Señorita’ at me. Looking back now, I think, wait—that lyric doesn’t quite fit.
New Year’s party, and the first KTV
In my first year of high school, our class held a New Year’s party. I was young, not especially self-aware, and had plenty of nerve. I joined two friends for “Qilixiang” and “Laonanhai,” purely for the fun of it. None of us had learned to sing. Afterward I realized how embarrassing it must have been; friends occasionally brought it up as a joke. Still, it left a vivid memory from that part of my youth.
The first time I actually went to a KTV was during the summer after the college entrance exam, at a class reunion. Before that, I’d been told that KTV was not a place for “decent” people, and I was a fairly obedient kid, so I never went in high school. A close friend from middle school invited me a few times, but something always got in the way—I lived in the countryside and transport was inconvenient, or I didn’t have time. At the reunion there were plenty of people, all familiar, but I still couldn’t fully relax. People grabbed the mic and cut in on each other’s songs. The experience was average. Extroverts probably enjoy that kind of gathering—it’s lively. Introverts, or people who think too much, probably find it uncomfortable.
In college I went a few times with roommates, mostly during freshman year. The experience was similar: more about being social than about singing. Price was one issue, but the bigger thing was that dorm activities were usually organized by me. I didn’t have many ideas, and if nobody else suggested anything, eventually no one bothered.
A room to myself
One summer I rented a place alone, and it got a bit boring. I’d also had stomach trouble for three days, which left me feeling miserable. Once I recovered, I wanted to go out and relax. KTV came to mind. On a weekday afternoon the price was low: a little over 30 yuan for three hours. I found a group-buy deal on Meituan. The place was decently decorated and the room was fairly spacious.
On the way out I hesitated about bringing water. I remembered that KTVs usually provide a pot of free tea, and I also worried that some places might not allow outside drinks, so I brought nothing. Unfortunately, this one had no free tea. Buying drinks there would of course be expensive. I figured I wouldn’t stay long enough to need much, so I made do. I had no experience and hadn’t brought any snacks or drinks.
Some people worry that going alone will be awkward—that the staff will ask questions. It really isn’t a problem. One person pays the same rate as several. You just act normal. When I went, the front desk didn’t even ask. I scanned the voucher, they opened a room and told me the number. That was it. Completely natural.
If you do feel self-conscious, you can imagine that people assume your friends are coming later. Once the door closes, nobody is watching. When you leave, they might assume your friends left earlier and you were the last one out. In fact, no one cares whether you came alone. Only you care.
Singing without an audience
The experience is completely different from the noisy group version. Alone, you can order whatever you want and sing whatever you want. You don’t worry about cracking on a high note. You don’t have to accommodate anyone else’s playlist. You can pick songs with heavy emotions and let everything out. If you’ve sung yourself hoarse, you can turn on the original vocal track and sit there listening—that counts as part of the pleasure too. With friends, probably no one would get the emotional point of the song, and you might even kill the mood.
Jay Chou’s songs are beautiful and easy to love, but they are genuinely hard to sing. I like them, but with friends I usually didn’t dare choose them. Alone, I ordered more than ten in one go. When I couldn’t sing anymore, I turned on the original track, hummed along, or just listened. The room was mine. After about an hour and a half I was nearly out of voice—probably because I hadn’t had any water. I sat, ordered a few more songs, listened, hummed when I felt like it, and played on my phone when I didn’t. When the time was nearly up, I left.
The overall feeling was great: free, unrestricted, a place to release whatever I was feeling and yell as much as I wanted.
After the room goes quiet
Sometimes I walk around or sit at my desk with headphones on. I don’t have to think about anything; I just follow the melody. If a song is upbeat, I hum quietly. If it’s sad, I listen quietly to the end. Sometimes when a song finishes, I feel as if I’ve just lived through a small stretch of someone’s life.
It’s a bit like traveling alone. No one knows you, no one cares where you’re going. You walk when you want, stop when you want. There is some loneliness to it, but the feeling of not having to accommodate anyone, not having to adjust to anyone, is wonderful.