Artistic self-indulgence comes in many forms. It could be a heavy metal rock singer screaming at his audience while his band thrashes around on stage; it could be a writer rambling on about his personal pursuits; or it could be an artist splashing paint over statues in the park.
For Hong Kong's icon of rock bands, Beyond, a little self-indulgence is not necessarily a bad thing if it can be tempered with an awareness of what is happening in the world around us.
Its three members are the first to admit they are self-indulgent. 'But I think our self-indulgence is different from what others perceive it to be,' says guitarist Paul Wong Koon-chung.
'We know when we are being self-indulgent and we know to what degree we are being so. You know the outside world might go, 'wah, it is Beyond being very self-indulgent again' but to us, it might just be very little.
'I think we have already compromised a lot. We are a lot more mature, which does not mean we aren't being self-indulgent but just that we know when we are,' Paul says.
'In the old days, you could say we were totally self-indulgent. No one knew of Beyond and our world only consisted of the few of us. Naturally, we just put what we think is right into it [the music] but slowly, when fans support you and follow in your footsteps, you start to think differently. Your self-indulgence changes.' It may seem ironic that Beyond is feeling the need to defend its self-indulgence again. When the band was formed in 1983, it gave the languid Canto-pop scene a good jolt with the unique Beyond sounds.