I wrote that the opening night of Mao Shanghai, a new 800 capacity venue, was not a true indicator of how the venue may work. Well, this time was the first show that was a ticketed rock show headlined by a local band.
The Mushrooms are especially good at cultivating their online community groups and front man Pupu is a major personality on Douban. All indicators said that they could add to their usual 3-400 YYT crowd.
One funny incident on the way in. In front of us at the ticket desk were a group of two local couples. They didn't know it wasn't free, they'd obviously been last week. So they asked who was playing. When explained to them they gave a group sarcastic laugh and even broke into English to say "Chinese band?". Then they left. Echoes of the Windows Underground manager/incident.You could see last week though, that a free promotion give-away crowd is not the same as the rock crowd.
Anyway, fuck them, because there were 500-600 true local rock fans there on the night. Support act Double Control Where played a mixture of thrash with screaming and very Mushrooms-esque slow parts. I was told they are Emo, maybe Screamo? The stage seemed a bit big for a newer band (you know, metaphorically) but the crowd liked them.
The Mushrooms came on to high expectations and played a proper headlining set of well over an hour. They played a lot of new songs and tried to organise the set with changes of pace. Pupu doesn't need to do much to please his fans these days, but he doesn't know any other way except all-out. Good. I was a bit disappointed that the crowd was a bit too much poser and not enough pogo but we all had fun anyway. Our little contingent of crazy fans got an unexpected boost when a group of girls also turned up in matching tees and joined in the jump/mosh action. Nice.
But could it be last time? Stay tuned to our blogs to see what happens.
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