BeijingDazeTales of Live Music From Beijing's Mostly Underground Rock Scene..

Jul
3rdSummersonic, Tiger Translate and other random updates

a lot of things been happening in Beijing lately but I haven’t actually gotten around to bringing them up on ‘daze… let’s do a bit of roundup.

First up, the competition for China representative at the 2012 Summersonic festival in Japan.. after what seemed like a heated competition, a band a warned you about a long time ago, The Power Powder, won the right to fly over and represent Beijing. Congrats to the kids for all the hard work they put in and for taking the competition seriously. When i first saw them at Kolegas last year, I felt they were special and they proved me right… good go! They’ll be representing China alongside Ashura from Chengdu (who??) as well as Mercy & Sorrow (Da Bei 大悲) from Shanghai..
I poked around for extra information and it doesn’t seem like any other bands are headed to Japan this year which is a huge difference from 2011 when re-TROS, Muma, QSBS were invited among others. I have mixed feelings about how this selection/competition is held in terms of voting and attendance and I can’t blame some bands for not taking part or even pulling out. At the same time, Bands with enough support and means are able to get through so it is a mixed bag… I leave the ranting for another time.

I gotta give credit though to Power Powder for doing things right: When I saw them at MIDI, they have fans wearing their t-shirts, banners and flags flying in front of the stage not to mention a decent little set with charismatic front people… they’re acting the part and building a brand, something 90% of the Beijing bands can’t understand.

As quick and painless as the Summersonic competition was, The Tiger Translate 2012 one seems like a non ending affair. It’s been going on for a month already and has a couple of other gigs scheduled all the way until the end of July pretty much. Nothing every happened with Emitter, winner of the 2011 edition, because they couldn’t cut it really. I’m hoping the organizers have learned from their mistakes and can avoid a crapout this year. I’ll try and make it to one of the competition legs over the next few days to get a feeling for it.

Last year, both competitions were very widely publicized throughout the English press but not as much now… heck, even here at ‘daze, we’ve barely covered them… let’s how this ends up.

In other random news, it looks like Rolling Bowling, one of the hardest working bands in Beijing, has been signed to a label. Look for them to play a lot less from now on. Hanggai is setting up for one last show at 2Kolegas coming up on July 20th before they head overseas again. Bad Mamasan‘s new record is almost ready for release so expect that baby to be out at Temple soon.
The Black Snakes are coming back for yet another Beijing show this coming sunday, also at Temple. and finally, The Beijinger is looking to organize their own mini festival showcasing new bands… I’ll have more on that later.