Iconic Beijing dive bar/ live bar D-22 is 5 years old. Happy birthday good people.
You can read the first time we wrote about D-22 and Maybe Mars here.
The pangbianr boys and girls made a little documentary. Enjoy
D22 is five years old
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Tag Archives: D-22
Matt Kagler speaks out…
A few weeks back, we bemoaned the loss of two major contributors to Beijing’s live music scene. One of the two, Matt Kagler, wrote an extended comment that was all at once controversial and heartfelt. As our Friday discussion topic, we thought we would drag it up and present it as a post on its own. Does Matt have a point, or are these comments sour grapes?
As much as I hate to say it, I completely lost interest in the Chinese scene and therefore bowed out. It wasn’t as much a monetary decision as much as it was as informed thing. I mean, Tag Team most certainly couldn’t keep up with the pocket books of Michael Pettis and Shen over at Modern, but we WERE trying to do things as “indie” as possible and that doesn’t fly in the land of Zippo Nights and Converse whatnots. We were uninterested in those kind of things per say and therefore threw the towel in. D-22/ Maybe Mars have done an excellent job in creating “community” and I have endless respect for people like Charles and Nevin, but every Chinese kid on the up-n-up now somehow associates … as that’s what Lou Reed did in the late 60′s. Frankly, none of that, coupled with the overt desire to “brand” with corporations, made any sense to me whatsoever, even though …, for that matter. Plus, heads getting big for absolutely no reason/bullshit hype generated on the parts of ALL OF US running indies who have connections abroad was and remain really, really ridiculous. No one actually writes about the MUSIC and there’s a reason for that! There are currently ZERO Chinese bands doing anything non-derivative other than Lonely China Day, Xiao Hu, the folks at Shanshui and a few others. Comment as you like, but it’s true. I LOVE CHINA and I love living here, but…let’s get real for a couple of minutes. Seriously people!
Anyway, am planning to post something, somewhere, in length about this but that’s enough “truth” for now.
We have unfortunately decided to censor this article due to some recent random testing of rock bands in Beijing and not wanting to draw excess attention to something that could have serious repercussions to the bands, venues and scene in general.
The Maybe Mars/ Foreign Media debate
At the end of our review of the Beijing Festival weekend, we referenced an article that we read over at Beijing Noise that they in turn had pulled from Max-Leonhard on his excellent Rock in China archive. In it, Max rails against the continuous representation in the Western media that D22 and Maybe Mars ARE the Beijing music scene: that there are plenty of other niches/ groups/ posses that are equally deserving of the hype, but that they are hamstrung in terms of promotion to Western media due to a lack of English.
We were going to pull out comments, but you really need to read the whole article HERE.
Some UK press this time around
Posting has been a bit light recently. We’ve been on tour, and a very interesting tour it was too. More later.
If you haven’t had your fill of Western media talking up the Chinese Rock Revolution, here is one more. This time, Britain’s Telegraph has an angle on branding and youth culture. Pepsi’s Voice of a New Generation is featured, as is Converse’s Love Noise, plus vignettes from Michael Pettis and Yang Haisong.
Enjoy it in full HERE.
Matthew Niederhauser speaks to us about his book, bands, Beijing and everything in between (2)
Maybe Mars are going to New York for a big old party. Central to this party will be a photographic exhibition by Matthew Niederhauser, a photographer who has documented Maybe Mars and D-22 through images of the bands that have created this label/ venue community up in Beijing’s Northern reaches. He is launching his second book, Sound Kapital, at the same time.
You can read the first part of the interview HERE.
Matthew Niederhauser speaks to us about his book, bands, Beijing and everything in between (1)
Maybe Mars are going to New York for a big old party. Central to this party will be a photographic exhibition by Matthew Niederhauser, a photographer who has documented Maybe Mars and D-22 through images of the bands that have created this label/ venue community up in Beijing’s Northern reaches. He is launching his second book, Sound Kapital, at the same time.
Sound Kapital
Sound Kapital by Matthew Niederhauser is a second book by Beijing based American photographer depicting the rise of independent music in China through the eyes of the bands at D-22. You can read the Economist’s take on it HERE.
We have an in-depth interview with Matthew that we will be publishing next week. Stay tuned…
On Tour
Posting may be a bit slow this week. We are on a small tour of China with the Canadian band, Handsome Furs. This is them at soundcheck in D22 yesterday. They played with the amazing Offset: Spectacles.
They send their love.
From manufactured ABC Pop to gritty street punk (and other stuff)
After our last post, highlighting some car-crash American wannabee Chinese pop music, the following video has come to light. Amateur (or professional?) movie maker Shaun Jefford has made a full length documentary called Beijing Punk, seemingly last year, but is looking for distribution currently.
The Clampdown
by Stephen Zhao
It was in 1908 that the Chinese first proposed hosting the Olympics on their home turf, so the 2008 Olympics bear the weight of a 100-year-old national dream. Though we’d like to issue a moratorium on tired journalistic tropes, it’s undeniably apt to call the Beijing Olympics a “coming-out party” for a newly prosperous China.
Despite the government paying lip-service to the directive that we “should not link Olympics with politics,” of course the Games have been politicized. The maxim to “do the nation’s utmost to lead up to Olympics,” particular to China and the Chinese notion of saving-face, have made the Games both a topic of giddy fascination and a source of tension. An official with China’s Ministry of Public Security warned that “anti-China powers” and other “hostile cliques” are intensifying their campaign to destroy the Beijing Olympics, giving Chinese authorities the mandate to enact heavy-handed security measures in Beijing and supporting cities.
And so, live music venues began to feel the heavy hands come down…
