Tag Archives: rustic

Duck Fight Goose at SxSW

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So, there were lots of Chinese bands at SxSW last week. Most seemed to think it somewhat of a pain

PANGBIANR:

In general the festival was a shitshow, such a grind, more work than passion. The more successful American bands sit smug on their rotting thrones while we just keep our noses to the grindstone and do what we do.

BRAD FERGUSON (harder to pick up, but self deprecating in the extreme)

[DAY2] Reactions were good from the few people who showed up for our set — mostly other bands who would play later in the day… [DAY4] The stage was set up in the parking lot, and there were only a couple of people there, but the band played well and we had a nice mid-afternoon lunch…

Still, Josh from Pangbianr has subsequently said that there were some good potential opportunities that might come out of it for the Chinese bands, but it definitely rings true with most of the things we’ve read about this year’s Sx. Overbranded, overdone and overpriced.

If you have access to Youtube, here is a video of one of DFG’s showcases. Enjoy:

China’s SxSW takeover

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After a couple of reasonably low key incursions in 2010 and 2011, China is going balls to the wall for SxSW 2012. Re-TROS, Carsick Cars, Snapline, Rustic, Duck Fight Goose, Deadly Cradle Death and Soviet Pop are repping from a musical perspective, while newly launched Chinese Music Video platform Caoker are hosting a party. Finally, some of the great and good of China’s music scene are paneling it up: they will cover the fantastical topic of “Why the Global Music Industry Needs China”

Pangbianr has a great synopsis of everything. Find it HERE.

What’s going on? Suzhou Strawberry canceled…

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UPDATE: There has been an official update on Douban. Apparently,

because of the recent thunderstorms, the basic facilities (at the Wujiang site) have been badly damaged, and can’t be fixed in a short time. so the festival has to be postponed, the new dates to be announced

It seems like the Gods of Chinese Music are conspiring against us on the eve of another landmark May Holiday where music festivals are slated to take over the country

First, Midi Festival in Beijing is forced to leave its spiritual Haidian Park home

Second, a spate of closures and cancellations in Beijing.

Third, and most seriously, it seems like the inaugural Strawberry Festival in Wujiang near Suzhou has been cancelled. Details are sketchy at present. We have picked up the following though:

  • mlive has stopped selling presale tickets
  • all volunteers have been informed that training is cancelled
  • the site setup has been stopped
  • Zuoxiao Zuzhou was taken to the local police station straight from the airport yesterday. He is out now, but he mentioned on Weibo that the festival organizers should not use the microblog broadcast on big screens: too risky
  • some bands such as Sound Fragment have confirmed the cancellation

This is all really bad for our industry. Part of an increasing cyclical trend away from freed0m of expressi0n?

UPDATE 2: courtesy of @mightyboom (this is the most believable for us)

Suzhou Strawberry Fest has been cancelled due to an unexpected uproar at Zhouzhuang Folk fest last weekend.

Last weekend’s Zhouzhuang Folk Festival, someone sent a message containing “Aye Way Way (sic.)” to the public tweet channel, which has been shown on the big screen. Aye Way Way, the famous Chinese dis-a-dent artist, was ‘kidnapped’ by police at Beijing Airport early this April. The message was deleted immediately, however, it did not stop people from tweeting more. Shortly ahead of Zuo Xiao Zu Zhou, a famous underground folk musician, came up on stage, young folks started yelling “Aye Way Way”. The whole ‘accident’ wasn’t planned at all, but it was one of the greatest reactions within China regarding the authority detaining Aye Way Way.

Until now, Aye Way Way has been missing for almost a month.

“Modern Sky”, known as the most influential Chinese indie label, was the host of both Zhouzhuang & Strawberry Fests.

Rustic win the Global Battle of the Bands

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Yeah, we know it’s old news, but courtesy of Musicdish*China, we came across a video documenting Rustic’s journey from Beijing to the GBOB finals in London in 2009.  You can see it in all its technicolor glory below:

Good luck to the Amazing Insurance Salesman in Malaysia for the 2010 crown.

Amazing Insurance Salesman wins Global Battle of the Bands, China

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GBOB China happened at the back end of last year. We were going to write something broader about the unfortunate nature of being an unknown band in China (let’s face it, this isn’t a phenomenon limited just to China, but it is perhaps more extreme here due to a lack of an interested media in up-and-coming anything), prompted by this post over at Beijing Daze, particularly this paragraph:

Something doesn’t add up! With a band from Beijing winning the world Battle of the Bands, this event should have been packed. instead, only 3 bands entered this heat and the 9/11 heat at D-22 had to be cancelled because of low interest. weird.. weird… the next two legs are rumored to be full so here’s hoping for more of a show.

Anyway, the Amazing Insurance Salesman won Beijing, then headed down to HK and won that too. AIS is a mixed Western/ Chinese band and will be taking their chops to Malaysia for the Global Final in February. We wish them luck.

GBOB China

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China Music Radar was on hand as The Global Battle of the Bands (GBOTB) Beijing Regional Final finished up on a recent Sunday evening at Yugong Yishan in Beijing. This was the culmination of four preliminary heats. Six bands – Rustic, Maggie Who, Out of Control, Metoo, Paier 派儿乐队 and Boy Number 6 competed for the top prize, with punk band Rustic, led by frontman “Lucifer,” emerging as the winner – Judges included local music industry luminaries Meng Jinhui from Modern Sky Records, Jon Campbell of promotion company YGTWO and Mark Klingspon, President of Gibson China among others.

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