Subs' Kang Mao is angry

Remember how I had a few gripes and grumbles about the InMusic Festival? Turns out things weren't all that great backstage either. China Music Radar alluded to the poor treatment of acts in their excellent review of the festival and now Subs' lead singer Kang Mao has posted an entry on her blog where she says, "I didn't eat a single mouthful of food, I was too scared to use the toilet and I didn't dare drink the water" (maybe that explains why Fu Han from Queen Sea Big Shark had to go on a beer run) - plus they've still not been paid. However, that's not what's really got her angry. Indeed, though she says conditions were far from ideal, Kang praises the sound set-up on stage (in general it was really good from the audience point of view too), says that she felt really comfortable up there and that overall she had a good time. You can see some video of the band's performance in this post, also on her blog.

So what's really wound up China's leading lady of "spunk rock"? It's the press and their coverage of the festival.

In her post, "I don't want to talk about Zhangbei", she writes of how, in the week leading up to the InMusic Festival, the media and public opinion had been whipped up into a frenzy about the event and what it meant for Zhangbei, a poor town in a remote part of the country, and its government. There was a lot of attention in the press in the run up to the festival talking about what a momentous occasion this was for a town that had only received press coverage in the past when it was struck by a 6.2 magnitude earthquake in 1998. Some of this hyperbole came from the organisers, naturally trying to promote their festival, some of it came from the local government - essentially saying "look, we may be just a poor backwater town but look at the great music festival we're putting on." It's hardly surprising that the local government and the organisers wanted to attract more people to their event, but Kang's real fire is trained on the reporters who regurgitated these lines, compared the festival to a certain American one that took place 40 years ago this summer and contributed to "a media and public opinion frenzy with discussion groups on the topic growing and growing."