Andy Best: February 2012 Archives

Trash A Go Go has left the building

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trash a gogo logo
Shanghai garage rock promoters Trash A Go Go have put on their last show.

They were Toshi, Mizusu and B.O.

Toshi and B.O. were kind enough to send me some of their picks for their favorite shows and if you follow after the jump there's some great look backs and I have some of their wonderful flyers.

Toshi:

1)The Fevers
The best show for me in the last 2-3 years. Their show was just a blast. They played so tight and had so much energy on stage. This band is not just a vocalist or guitarist being a hero on the stage. All of them are quite remarkable. One of the few bands where I want to play in their band. It was the most energetic craziest show with the smallest audience by Trash a Gogo ever I think.

Video: Cold Fairyland live in Finland

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And now ... for those of us who like our music polished, technical and professional here is an excellent video of Shanghai's veteran folk rockers Cold Fairyland playing a show in Finland. 



Local Music Fest at YYT on Sunday: great timing.

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rocksh
This is awesome on so many levels. For weeks, the ex-pat realm has been alive with talk of the scene, the locals, the internationals and what everyone thinks the other should be doing.

And now, a collaboration between five local labels/collectives/management agencies bring us the wonderfully titled Sunday show:

了了上海伐老乱哪能立得牢脚

That's Shanghainese and is basically asking if you are Loh Lu (老乱) enough. And of course, the timing is not really a coincidence.

It will run from 3.30 in the afternoon till 10.30 at night and feature ten bands. It's going to be packed and a great opportunity to meet local people from the scene. So if you have any interest in the scene as a community, as a place to make music for fun or to hang out  - then support this event.

The bands:

15:30 - 16:00 JASEY
16:10 - 16:40 吴维纯
16:40 - 17:00 安来宁
17:00 - 17:30 格子团
17:50 - 18:20 暴走蜗牛
18:40 - 19:10 Prank
19:30 - 20:00 大囍福
20:20 - 20:50 New Vector
21:10 - 21:40 Pink Berry
22:00 - 22:30 Broken Promises

The organizers: 
竹露荷风音乐社 (Zhu Lu He Feng)
天线音乐 (Tension Music)
Playful Warrior
青春伙伴 (Youthus)
楽空唱片 (Ako)
感冒音乐 (Music Fever)

Photos: Androsace play in Nanchang

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Shanghai rockers Androsace are doing a China tour at the moment. On Saturday they played in Nanchang at the Hei Tie Livehouse (黑铁酒吧). Over the past few years, many cities in China have added live houses and developed them to the point where you can now do a pretty good tour of the country. The show went well and here are some pics.

Click for larger

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Bi Gong Bi Jing live @ Dclub

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bigongbijing
Friday night and it was time to make a return to the city's North-East, where the North-East scene is itself making a return. The venue was D-club and here was the line up:


Both bands play Rock with a big R. Androsace play quiet-loud grunge with subtle infusions of Chinese trad music. Guitarist Sasha and vocalist Lenz both come from minority areas. Bi Gong Bi Jing play punk with a hardcore element that is taken from metal style riffing into full out thrash metal sections. Both bands played great and the sound was excellent.

That's brings me to D-club. It's in Yangpu, 15 mins walk from line 4 Dalian Road Station. It's a basement rock bar with a stage, in the mold of a Logo, but everything is slightly better. The stage is a little better organised, the equipment is a little better, the bar is a little bigger and nicer. The guy doing sound actually cared and made good adjustments. It seems like a great place to put on a bar show. But the surrounding area is a bit sparse and weird. It's tobacco central, pay attention to the buildings as you walk there and see what I mean. 

The scene used to be in Yangpu, before the move downtown and when most students were up there. It dipped but there were always bands who'd make a point of saying they were Yangpu bands or something. Now they have new Live Bar, 696 and D-club ... and the Left Rock rehearsal space. And it follows that the number of bands is starting to go up. Bi Gong Bi Jing met while hanging out at Live Bar, as usual, and were part of a definite sub-scene / crowd there. The emphasis is on playing and having fun. They are keeping that torch alive for sure.

Free show at Uptown Records

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uptownshow
Couple of caveats for this one. I must disclose that my significant other plays in one of the bands at this event. And, as you've all noticed, I don't do listings or previews unless it's something unusual or whatever.

So, Uptown is a totally awesome record store with vinyl and record players. They are having a promotional show, for free, on 17th March. Click on the flyer for a larger one with all the details.

The line up features an eclectic line up of interesting acts and it should be a great event.

Alpine Decline (Beijing via L.A.)
Torturing Nurse (Shanghai harsh-noise)
Stalin Gardens (SH experimental rock)

Stalin Gardens have recently changed their name from Rank Moist Vegetation. 

This seems like a kind of perfect underground type event to me. And, it's actually underground. See you all there.

Video: whole live set from 21 Grams

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Shanghai post-rock group 21 Grams recently played Yuyintang. Here is a video of their whole set that night. The sound quality is really good. Check it out.



Bookworm International Lit Festival: Red Rock

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redrock
As most people are aware, Beijing based Jonathan Campbell has an excellent book out now called Red Rock. It details the history of the Chinese rock scene from it's roots until present day.

He will be appearing in the Bookworm International Literary Festival ... and I'll be appearing with him, in dialogue, for the Suzhou event. Hopefully, we'll be playing some music and media and making it a bit more than just a writer talk.

We'll be on at 6.30 P.M. Sunday March 11th. You'll have to watch their sites for details as they are published. The Bookworm Festival is a huge deal in Beijing and Suzhou is its second branch, after Chengdu. So come and help us get it underway.

Here are the links:


See you there.

Senlin Mu live @ Yuyintang

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senlinmu
Friday night was the second Kai Chun show (育音堂开春), marking the end of the holiday period at Yuyintang. Headliners were Brit-pop stylers Senlinmu.

Derwish
Orange

Orange are a local Oasis tribute band who ended up going on last. 

DerWish are a student band from one of the international schools. They came out first and played a competent set of metal songs including some classic covers such as Metallica's Seek and Destroy. Good job guys. Full disclosure, I also covered Seek and Destroy at jams in my late teens. Yes, Kill 'Em All was released in 1983.

Senlinmu (森林木) were the main band of the night. This three piece played a full set of Brit-pop / rock style songs, which used to be really really popular with Shanghai bands a couple of years ago. These guys have honed their skills and stuck around and are worth checking out. The set leaned towards the slower 'jangly indie' tracks but the uptempo songs were good and would have gone over great with a larger crowd. They threw in an interesting cover of Michael Jackson's Beat It near the end of the set. The Van Halen riff and breaks were replaced with chorus pedal laden Brit-rock arpeggios. Good job the metal kids weren't around to hear that. Ha. 

Great moments in time: Marrow (Sui 髓)

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sui mofo
Those readers who know me personally have probably heard me blab on about how 2003/Sars up to the Olympics was kind of an era of its own for music in Shanghai.

And if we talked about that, you've heard me talk about seeing a dark/experimental indie band called Marrow (sui 髓) play at Harley's Bar in 2004 and 2005. I thought they were excellent and were going to be the real breakout band of the scene. But then the singer had a baby, with the drummer, and they quit. 

I recently found out that the two guitarists were in fact Linfen (李林枫) and Zhang Feng (张锋) of Banana Monkey fame, and then, with the help of Brad Ferguson, was able to get a hold of their 2005 album - produced by none other than Zhang Hai Sheng of Yuyintang fame. By help I mean that Brad did everything and Zhang Feng (Bono) was kind enough to give us one of the old CDs he still had.

Here's the track listing:

1 1937
2 Limit
3 Love
4 The End-Result (归宿 Gui Su)
5 Milk
6 可能在想象中沸腾 Ke Neng Zai Xiang Xiang Zhong Fei Teng
7 捕捉 Bu Zhuo
8 五官错位 Wu Guan Cuo Wei
9 Untitled

The album is still kicking around some sites like Indievox and the project is long gone, but I have permission to stream a track or two. So here's a little piece of the post-sars Harley's years on the Shanghai underground scene: The End Result


Shan Hai Livehouse closes

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shan hai
Less than a year ago, the fine folks at Zhu Lu He Feng decided to open a livehouse. The result was Shan Hai and it opened up in a Xin Tian Di type development up on Aomen Road.

The place was going to be somewhere between a Yuyintang and a Mao in size and there were plans to work with a dance/electronic promoter to get a regular money spinning night on the go while the band side grew.

And now comes the news that it has closed. If the announcement at their page is anything to go by, they aim to try again in another location.



I don't really know what to think of it all. I assumed that the ZLHF bands, on the back of their good work on the university and festival circuit, and great Douban numbers, would be able to pull in a couple of big shows a month. Maybe someone will go on the record about it all shortly. But anyway, it's confirmed, it's all over at Aomen Lu.

Birdstriking CD out on Maybe Mars

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birdstrikingd22
Next generation Beijing band Birdstriking are significant among scene watchers for being a Chinese band who are mainly influenced by other Chinese bands. A true next gen band in the modern scene here. Their style is noise indie / punk.

And now they have their first album out on Maybe Mars.

Hear some tracks on their Douban page here.


And finally, the track listing.

01.Intro
02.儿子
03.喜鹊
04.Monkey Snake
05.恨我吗,你老啦
06.枪决
07.七点钟的电视机
08.Kakakaka
09.Space Hakka
10.带颜色的心
11.Untitled 512
12.No More Rock 'n' Roll
13.One Thousand Dreams

Death To Giants live album on Bandcamp

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dtgcard
Good news, we're only a day or two into the Year of the Dragon and someone has put out a release already.

It's Shanghai's Death to Giants.

The album is a four track live recording of a show from Yuyintang and it rocks.


Track listing:

1. Children Play Amongst the Graves while Cities Burn and Humans are Enslaved (live)儿童们在坟墓间嬉闹,城市在燃烧,人们带上了镣铐

2.Anyone Can Learn How To Count in Chinese (live) 谁都会学中文数数

3.Sick and Elastic (live) 疾病与伸缩

4.I Just Can't Wait to be King (disney cover)

Video: Pairs in New Zealand

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Here's a longish video. Shanghai noise punk duo Pairs are currently touring New Zealand and Cheese on Toast caught up with them.

Youtube only right now.



About this Archive

This page is a archive of recent entries written by Andy Best in February 2012.

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