'I blame myself deeply': Taiwanese singer Tank reveals reason for disappearing from showbiz for 10 years

When Taiwanese singer Tank made a rare appearance on Chinese music variety show Time Concert recently, fellow singer Ella Chen asked him the burning question on many fans' minds.

"Where have you been for the past 10 years?"

The 41-year-old revealed: "I have a family history of arrhythmia (irregular heartbeat) and myocardial hypertrophy (thickening of the heart muscle), and my health has not been good for the past 10 years."

Tank (real name Lv Jianzhong), known for hits such as Give Me Your Love and Personal Angel, previously suffered a heart attack in 2007 and had an implantable cardioverter-defibrillator surgically placed in 2009 to regulate his heartbeat.

His sister and aunt also died of heart attacks in 2006 and 2007 respectively.

Tank went on to reveal that, when he appeared on a TV show hosted by Taiwanese singer Harlem Yu a few years ago, he had to stop as his heart rate got too high while singing.

"From then on, every time I faced the stage, I began to panic," he confessed.

In fact, it was revealed that they had to pause the recording of Time Concert too, as Tank's vision got blurry and he had difficulty breathing. Seeing his pained expression, it was S.H.E. member Ella who informed the staff that he had a heart condition and needed to take a break.

"Are you too nervous? Relax, I'll take care of you," Ella told him.

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Tank said in the episode, which also featured veteran Malaysian singers Penny Tai and Z-Chen: "I blame myself deeply for just now. When there's no way I can do my job, I would blame myself and feel like I'm being troublesome towards everyone here."

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"It's okay, don't think like this," Ella, 42, reassured him. "It's a problem that many people have. You're nervous before you go on stage because you care, and as you have said, you have high expectations of your work."

Ella shared how she was also anxious before she went on stage in the Chinese reality competition Sisters Who Make Waves but when she saw that everyone else was the same, she didn't feel alone.

"What's most important is that you must tell yourself, 'I'm good and I've done this hundreds of times and I've sung this song hundreds of times. Why should I be scared? No one is judging me, this is my stage and I'm going to enjoy it,'" she added.

Tank also confessed to being introverted and not knowing "how to talk to people" when he goes to "a strange place".

He revealed that in the past when he performed with S.H.E, Ella would be the first to approach him and talk to him at such events, and that her upbeat personality reassured him and helped him relax.

The pair go way back, with Tank and S.H.E belonging to the same recording company. He wrote songs for S.H.E. before he released his own debut album in 2006 and did a duet with Ella titled Know Me Before You Love Me on her 2012 solo EP To Be…

"I feel that every time I have her around me, I don't feel very awkward," Tank said.

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drimac@asiaone.com

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