MIDI Awards 2011 | BeijingDaze

Dec
13thMidi Awards 2011: Do you agree with the winners?

As much as I wanted to hangout with the Santas on Saturday and make the most of a rare not so cold, blue sky day in the Jing, I also wanted even more to head into the big warm dark cave that is Tango 3rd Floor and spend the entire day watching bands, drinking beer and seeing who got to take home a Midi brick or 2 (or 3 in the case of one lucky person!) So with BD on a plane downunder, Alex & I headed to Yonghegong to party with our favourite bands! If you’re not sure who was nominated this year, check out this cool clip from Midi introducing the awards and the nominees: And, drumroll please, here are your winners: Best New Band: Steely Heart Best Album Artwork Design Award: Pet Conspiracy 宠物同谋 “Pet Conspiracy” Best Instrumental Performance: Jì Yuán 纪元 (Air Carnival 空中狂欢节乐队- Guitar) Best Hard Rock Band: Ordnance 巨蟹座 Best Metal Band: Yaksa 夜叉 Best Female Vocalist: Jiāng Xīn 姜昕 Best Folk Musician: Hao Yun 郝云 (presented by Alex from Beijing Gig Guide!) Best Rock Song: Gala “The Purest Dream Chasing Heart” Best Rock Album Year: Long Shen Dao 龙神道 “Hug” Best Live Performance: Miserable Faith 痛仰 Best Rock Band: Long Shen Dao 龙神道 Best Male Vocalist: Zuoxiao Zuzhou 左小祖咒 Contribution to Rock: Modern Sky 摩登天空 Big congrats to all the winners, especially the busiest guy of the day, guitarist Gao Xu, who took home 3 awards (2 with Long Shen Dao, 1 with [...]
Dec
6thLive Music Quicklsants: Aussies, Albums, Awards … and Santas!

Well, BD is escaping the snow and heading off to sit on the beach in sunny Australia, so you’ve got Ruby on quickslants this week, Which means I get to plug the shows I’ll be heading too! And there’s some good ones in the mix too, looks like I’ve swapped BD for a couple of Aussie bands, there’s also an awards show, 2 album launches and a Christmas pub crawl. Who says things slow down over the winter? Wednesday December 7th: Splitworks 5th Anniversary Party @ Temple The lovely peeps over at Splitworks have brought us many great shows including last year’s JUE Festival and this year’s Black Rabbit, so come out and help them celebrate their 5th birthday. They’ve even brought us a present – chillwave legend Chad Valley with support from Streets Kill Strange Animals. Parkway Drive @ Mao Livehouse Aussie hardcore hits the ‘Jing! Tickets ain’t cheap for this one, but as someone who’s seen these guys before at a festival, they’re totally worth it. And it’s conveniently close to Temple, so you can join the party afterwards …. Thursday December 8th: Steely Heart Album release @ Yugong Yishan These indie rockers have been getting better and better each time I’ve seen them. They’ve been working hard on their debut album, and are launching it with support for Brain Failure and the always awesome Ghost Spardac. Flounder & Illness Sickness @ Gulou 121 Another Aussie band touring the Middle Kingdom, Flounder have worked there way up north [...]
Nov
25thMIDI Awards 2011 Nominations announced: The New Guard is IN

most of the blogosphere has given MIDI a lot of shit over the past 2 years for their awards and the incestuous nature of the nominees/winners. Fact is a lot of progress was made from the first edition to the second edition last year. This year, the jump is even bigger! The nomination process notice was given months ago and it looks like people have answered! http://www.midischool.cn/bbs/viewthread.php?tid=54374&extra=page%3D1 This one is probably the most diverse I’ve seen so far and I like it. Seeing fresh faces on there like Long Shen Dao is cool. Omnipotent Youth Society ciments their status as one of the better bands in China whereas Namo doesn’t really come through despite a busy year touring. Steely Heart, soon to release an album, makes an appearance as nominee for best new band which is a bit surprising in my book. Missing is also Xiao He with his latest release in the folk side but Su Yang makes a well deserved appearance. No Maybe Mars or Modern Sky artists, including MIDI favorite, Xie Tian Xiao who hasn’t done much this year. Here is the roughly translated list of nominees 1、“最佳年度摇滚专辑”提名 “Best Rock Album Year” ：龙神道《拥抱》- Long Shen Dao “Hug” 马木尔与IZ乐队《影子》 – Mamer & IZ “shadow” 苏阳《像草一样》- Su Yang “Like Grass” 左小祖咒《庙会之旅II》 Zuoxiao Zuzhou “Temple Journey II” 　 2、“最佳年度摇滚歌曲”提名 Best Rock Song of the Year：川子《郑钱花》 Chuan Zi “zhèng qián huā” GALA《追梦赤子心》 GALA “The Purest Heart” 咖啡因《时光》 Caffeine “time” 龙神道《慢慢飞》 Long Shen Dao “slowly fly” 万能青年旅店《杀死那个石家庄人》 Omnipotent Youth Society [...]