City Weekend Awards | BeijingDaze

May
24thYugong Yishan: Still The King.. and more award for 2 Kolegas, Temple, The Stable, Hot Club and Residence A

a lot of happenings in town the last few week have kept me beyond busy with half a dozen unfinished reviews.. They’ll come out sooner or later! In the meantime, a few things have been happening: Yugong Yishan took home the award for Best Live music venue for both The Beijinger and City Weekend Awards. There’s not much that can be said other than Congratulations!! The past year, it’s been a bit better but I’ve also not gone there as much so I’ve had less chances to bitch about it. Still, they hosted Simple Plan, Grand Master Flash, Jorma and more whereas the other Beijing venues have struggled to get any big names that expats recognize. The win makes sense. 2 Kolegas continues to play second fiddle with both an editor’s award ( City Weekend) and an outstanding award ( Beijinger). I love the place and as they get to celebrate their 7th anniversary, I extend my thanks and best wishes to them. This year, they’ve upped the ante quite a bit with renovations, better planning, better promotion overall. They seem slightly more organized but just as fun and crazy as they ever were! See you over the weekend folks! Temple has arrived with a bang and is already making huge waves in Gulou… The place took home an outstanding mention at the Beijinger awards. The gang over there is putting all the venues on notice and forcing them to up their standards i hope. They got a good ear [...]
Apr
6thCity Weekend Beijing Awards for Best Local Band: Loving it

I remember a time when only local expat bands got any coverage from the expat rags and I’m extremely happy to see that things are changing slowly! There is hope! Last year, DH & The Hellcats deservedly managed to run away with the award and they have exploded since then as one of the fun darlings of the scene! Try asking them to play a private gig and see how that goes! This year, CW is at it again with an interesting set of nominees: So, we have Hedgehog, Residence A, SUBS, Shan Ren, Hot Club of Beijing and The Randy Able Stable…. Nice selection there folks! Here are some thoughts. Let me start by saying that I love the “local band” moniker! It does not discriminate against bands based on their nationality and that is something that usually pisses the living shit out of me in Beijing/China. So seeing an award for local Beijing-based musicians is fantastic. I asked Alex Searson ( Friend, CW Nightlife editor, Beijing Gig Guide owner) about the nomination process and this is what she had to say: i tried to pick a range of music styles, and based it on 1) the quality of the music and 2) what they’ve done in the last year I’m not surprised to see Hedgehog, Residence A or Shan Ren on there. They all had records come last year and are fairly popular among CW’s readership (and their nightlife editor ×wink× ). They also played some memorable shows [...]
May
30thCity Weekend Awards: DH & The Hellcats, Yugong take the big ones

Hot on the heels of the beijinger awards, City Weekend had their little celebration last wednesday at Migas. It was one hell of a good party, nice crowd and lots of friends… Before going any further, I must say I’m extremely impressed with the 360 degree turn that happened at that magazine… I’ve never agreed with anything they had done before or their selection. heck, the pink elephant in the room was pretty much that whomever advertised with CW got the award… It’s no longer the case! They’ve opened their reader awards to the public, much like The Beijinger, and the results prove it! Mao Mao Chong took home Bar of the Year award which is an amazing feat! Congrats to Stephen and Stephanie on that one. now, let’s get back to music: Yugong Yishan Got the reader’s nod with Mao Live coming in second. 2 Kolegas took Editor’s choice! Can’t argue with that, much like i wrote last week when Yugong won the TBJ award. DH & The Hellcats took band of the year and i could not be more pleased… These guys are freaking awesome at what they do and they do it well, with a smile, making sure everyone has a good time. Queen Sea Big Shark took home the Editor’s award… fair enough, not my taste but they did release an album and tour extensively this year so I can handle that. Solidaz took honorable mention and that is just a travesty… enough people saw them [...]