Jake Newby

Strawberry Shanghai?

2012-01-20T05:11:17Z

When it comes to China festival rumours - and let's face, there's going to be a lot of them in the coming months - it's going to be hard to beat this one. Still, another one doing the rounds on the rumour mill at the moment is that Modern Sky will finally bring their Strawberry Festival to Shanghai this year. After the harmonised Strawberry Suzhou and the allegedly 'stolen' Strawberry Zhenjiang, Modern Sky are apparently looking at doing a festival in Century Park in April. Pure speculation at this stage however.

This picture on the right here incidentally, is of some revellers at the 2010 Changjiang Midi Festival and forms part of Midi's 2012 calendar. Recognise anyone?

Duck Fight Goose interview on Noisey

2012-01-15T13:41:03Z

If you were at Duck Fight Goose's release for their brilliant new album a few weeks back, you'll have noticed a bunch of cameras in Yuyintang. Some of them were from Noisey, the music channel thing from the Vice people. This here is the resulting video. More on DFG and the album here.

Rank Moist Vegetation need a drummer

2012-01-15T04:43:58Z

Want to play in one of the best-named bands in Shanghai? Here's your chance. Rank Moist Vegetation are after a drummer and the situation is pretty critical. RMV's Julien says:

'We will break up very soon if we don't find one (not that anyone actually gives a flying fuck).'

Show them you care and drop him a line if you can help: rankmoistvegetation[at]gmail.com

MAO Livehouse to host Shanghai Rock Awards

2012-01-13T10:13:40Z

A couple of years after Midi launched their awards up in Beijing, MAO Livehouse have announced that they are to hold their very own Shanghai music awards. It'd be easy to write a snide post at this point, so very easy, but to be fair to MAO, while a lot of the best performance nominations are slanted towards bands who appeared on their stage, they've at least kept themselves off the list of 'best venue' nominees and Crystal Butterfly's name is nowhere to be seen, so it's at least a step up from the ~~Miserable Faith~~ Midi Awards.

Of course, there's plenty to be said about whether Shanghai needs this or whether anyone will really care, but you can check out the nominees on the right here. No word on how they'll be judged yet, but the event itself will take place on Saturday February 18 and MAO promise that 'this night will make history.'

Earn money by going to Yuyintang this weekend

2012-01-06T05:24:20Z

There are two shows on at Yuyintang this weekend where you'll get paid 1RMB each if you attend them. Yes, instead of forking out 40 kuai to watch a show, the promoters will pay you. If you haven't heard already, this is the brainchild of DJ BO and Dabei's Xiao Wei. The idea is to get more foreigners to see Chinese bands and more Chinese people to see foreign bands in Shanghai.

The line-ups are as follows:

Saturday Dabei, Prank, Senlinmu, Baiyu, Loudspeaker

Sunday Pairs, The Horde, Icenine, Moon Tyrant, Pacific

So if you've ever fancied going to see some of these bands and not got around to it, this weekend seems like a pretty good opportunity to do so. Check out more details here.

Basket case

2012-01-05T02:44:33Z

This is good idea. The people over at Wooozy.cn, together with a few friends, have organised a big basket of local music CDs to give away to one lucky person for free. All you have to do is tell them what you think of the current Shanghai underground music scene and the basket could be yours. Not sure when the deadline is, but think it's still running - go here for more details anyway.

Video: Pairs' student band showcase

2011-12-29T17:40:59Z

The other week, Pairs put on a Sunday afternoon show at Yuyintang with a bunch of student bands to try and encourage more young acts to come through in Shanghai. Here's a video with Xiao Zhong explaining a bit more. It's mostly in Chinese, but worth a click if you understand a bit of the language. To see a clip of one of the bands performing that day, click here.

The Sound of Beijing mixtape

2011-12-11T08:51:16Z

Matthew Niederhauser (who you'll know from those famous shots of Chinese bands in D-22 and other excellent photography) and Zhang Shouwang (who you'll know for being the driving force of Carsick Cars) have put together a mixtape for Domus' city series. Naturally, it mainly focuses on bands from the capital, but there are a couple of non-Beijing acts on there too, including Duck Fight Goose. In fact, the DFG song is taken from their debut album Sports, released on Friday at Yuyintang, so if you haven't heard anything from the record yet, here's your chance to check out the track 'Golden Gate'. There's loads more great stuff on there too though, so check it out here.

Another video: Ten years of Top Floor Circus

2011-12-07T06:05:59Z

Dingma play their traditional Christmas Eve show in a couple of weeks, this year it's at MAO Livehouse. The gig will double as a celebration of the band's tenth anniversary. As part of the warm up, they've released ~~the above~~ this video (now after the jump as I couldn't get the autoplay to stop).]]>

Video: School of rock

2011-12-05T23:59:10Z

A much more worthwhile video than the one I just posted. Watch this, it's great.

Thanks to Brad for the tip.

Here's this then: Sans Tripod, episode 2

2011-12-02T02:15:25Z

78 minutes of incomprehensible mumbling and me fidgeting with a glass of water. Click play at your own risk.

View the series here.

Boys in the 'jing

2011-11-30T03:37:06Z

Just a heads up for those of you reading this in the cold north - two of Shanghai's finest will be in Beijing this Friday as Boys Climbing Ropes and X is Y release their split CD Summer and Winter Warfare at D-22. They'll also be at Yugong Yishan the next night. It's a great record and you'd be a fool not to head to either of these release parties. You can check out a couple of tracks and read more about the CD here.

Also on their way up north are Duck Fight Goose, another of Shanghai's best exports. Their debut LP, Sports, will get a release party in Beijing on Saturday 17 - another date for your diary. Read more about that one here.

It's been a great year for Shanghai releases, and these are two of the best, so if you're in Beijing, make sure you get to these gigs.

DFG off to SXSW

2011-10-19T03:39:59Z

One of Shanghai's finest, Duck Fight Goose, are set to play the legendary SXSW music festival next year. It's fantastic news for the band, who become the latest in an increasingly long line of Chinese acts to play the renowned event in Austin, Texas.

In other DFG news, an interview with Han Han has just gone up on Co-incide here and their debut LP Sports is apparently due out soon (hopefully the end of next month, if not, December).

Top Floor Circus and FM3 Buddha Machine collaboration

2011-10-18T08:46:11Z

Check out this collaboration/remix from FM3 Buddha Machine and Top Floor Circus. Lyrics and English translation available right here. Look out for a compilation album coming soon with more remixes from other leading Chinese folk artists (including Wan Xiaoli, referenced in the lyrics of this track).

顶楼的马戏团@和谐福－越来越快 Top Floor Circus - Faster and Faster by buddha machine

Shanghai's newest music venue

2011-09-02T02:13:13Z

We're getting a new livehouse. More details here.