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Hong Kong @ Nite
with the very rockin' BBChris
Wednesday 4th August, 2010 |
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Hello everyone! It’s been more than half a year since I last wrote. My hair now has green streaks in it. I’ve managed to do all colours of the rainbow, and I’ve decided green looks the best!!
I've been even busier this year, which is good for indie music in China!
I've been the Global Battle of the Bands (GBOB) China director for 3 years, and our China winning band "Rustic" won the world title for 2009. Rustic have been described as “imagine Motley Crue crossed with White Stripes crossed with The Ramones!” Doesn’t that make you want to check them out?
See their amazing photos, taken by my friend Ken Ruesenberg. It was such great fun to be in London and watch bands from all around the world compete in a friendly manner!
I hadn’t been in London for 12 years, and found some things hadn’t changed (which is unbelievable by Hong Kong standards), but some things had changed profoundly. Starbucks was everywhere, and people had Internet connections at home (hahahahahaa). I bought an awesome pair of PVC Dr Martens boots, which was the next best thing about London, apart from watching Rustic win!
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Then in May 2010, I put together a live music festival called “Music Matters Live!” for Music Matters, (that annual Hong Kong music conference that I was telling you about before?) We had 37 bands playing in 4 venues over 2 nights! They were all within walking distance, and it was great fun! (I found it hard to watch all the bands within that space of time. I’m not sure how you can see all those bands playing at festivals like SXSW with 500 bands playing! (Hahahahaha)). Highlights included my friend's band from his Japanese label called "Moja", a 2-piece with a female drummer who drummed with such passion and power, that I rarely see even male drummers have!
"Galaxy Express" from Korea were another excellent highlight, as were Drawn from Bees from Australia and DD/MM/YYYY from Canada! It was a fabulous free festival, and I was delighted that loads of Hong Kong musicians came to see how our International peers are doing it. The world is indeed growing smaller! I also met a lovely lady called Scarlett at Music Matters, and it turns out she’s the head of Zebra Music in China and she’s invited the winning China band from GBOB to play at her festival. This year she had 100,000 people attending! I didn’t go this year, but I’m certainly going in 2011!!!
Mid-July, I was in Korea and it was very exciting! (I was invited to the 1st Incheon Pentaport music conference and then the Pentaport festival, a 3 day festival that has been running for many years). I got to hang out with some of the best festival organisers in the world, eat a lot of kim chee, and there was also a lot of sipping of mojitos too! If you are ever asked who are one of the best Korean rock bands, you can safely say “Galaxy Express”. They rock the house whenever they play, are tight with catchy songs, and do some amazing & fun things on stage. They’ll be heading to Canada & the States early next year, so keep your eyes on them!
Here’s a pic of me in front of the stage, looking as wholesome as all the Korean festival attendees.
I went up to Shanghai in July, and one of the things I had to do was check out the Gibson Flagship store. Apparently it’s the first of its kind in the WORLD. I stared lovingly at the guitars, pranced around on stage and touched things, and no one told me off! They even let me take photos, and of course I had to pose with a really cool bass guitar. I would definitely recommend a trip there on your next trip to Shanghai.
Now that I’m back in HK, I'm sad to announce that we have a number of live music venues closing – trumpet roll for The Cavern and The Melting Pot. It makes it harder to keep hosting indie music events... Lucky we still have The Fringe Club, Rockschool, Backstage + of course The Wanch. We DO have a Hard Rock Café that will reopen (they had one in Hong Kong, before a few years ago, but the live music part of it sucked). We’re hoping that this time, they will become a proper live music venue, and not just focus on selling hamburgers! They have no excuse about lack of space etc., I mean The Hard Rock Café in Bangkok, Thailand is small, but still manages a cool stage with cool bands. I'll keep you posted on the live music situation here, and fingers crossed that it gets more exciting after the subsidence!
Personally speaking on my own music front, we finally found a bassist for Thinking Out Loud, and we’re set to write some new tunes and go back to what we all love, which is PERFORMING LIVE!!! Alas, I'm still looking for a good female drummer for Guitars & Panties. Good female drummers are really hard to find in Hong Kong. Maybe one will read this and move to Hong Kong? (Hahahhahahaha)
Last week, Slash played in Hong Kong. It was a fun gig. He played for 2 hours, and his singer Myles Kennedy has an awesome voice. Slash didn’t get any loonies jumping on stage and smashing his guitar like in Italy. Do I sound disappointed? (Hahahahhhaa)
Okay, next I’m heading on a three-week vacation. Make sure you check out some of the other girl’s writings here at CG Weekly!
Until next time,
Love bbchris xx
http://undergroundhk.com
Well let me summarize 2009 in one word… FUN!
Saturday 9th January, 2010
The Underground (http://undergroundhk.com) (that little live music event showcase that I organize) has had over 300 bands play, and we’re going to be looking forward to show #100 this year, as well as the launch of our 3rd compilation CD! That’s 34 bands (so far!) that we’ve given the golden opportunity of experiencing recording, mixing and mastering without financial worry. Wooooohooooo! Plus I’ve got this cool guy called Wain who’s been helping me film the bands at The Underground – check out our youtube (http://youtube.com/undergroundhk) to see what I mean.
Luckily swine flu and the worldwide recession hasn’t affected people’s enthusiasm for live music in Hong Kong in 2009. We had upcoming and international bands stopping off, ranging from big artists such as Craig David, Jason Mraz, Oasis, The Ting Tings to bands such as Emily the Strange, Telepathe, Typecast, Myproof, Roni Size, Truth Corroded, The Core, Pet Conspiracy, Blood Red Shoes, British Sea Power, Handsome Furs, Little Dragon, Witness, tHe pEneLOpe[s], Ratatat, Hibria, Go Jimmy Go, The Astrophonix, The Young Knives, Jose Gonzalez, Parkway Drive, Dada Ante Portas and Sham69 (these last two were organized by yours truly)! Phew! Plus we had a weirdly named festival called “Clockenflap.” It’s an arts, film, & multimedia festival with some live bands. I didn’t make it there, as it was the same day as the Global Battle of the Bands (http://gbob.com) China Final. We had top winning bands from Beijing, Shanghai, Macau, Shenzhen and Hong Kong, all competing to be the China winner and take part in the World Final in London (England) for US$100,000 in band development – how cool is that? Oh did I forget to mention that I’m also the person running this China leg of this competition? I traveled to Beijing (a 3 hour flight!) every weekend in September to host the heats and subsequent Beijing final. In fact, the China winner turned out to be Rustic (http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=NJKrLehQOJ4) whose onstage antics made all 12 judges at the Beijing Final laugh with astonishment and pleasure. Actually, we’ve never seen anything like Rustic in Hong Kong either – can you imagine a band that combines Motley Crue + White Stripes + The Ramones? Hahahhaa. It’s really hard work organizing events in China, but I also had lots of fun too!
Back here in Hong Kong for 2010, we’re all looking forward to visits from Muse, Green Day, The Killers, Saosin, Mono, Kings of Convenience, Glassjaw, Tom Jones and Bob Dylan! Possible visits to either Hong Kong or our close neighbour Macau, include bands such as: The XX, Dengue Fever, Massive Attack, Air, Kelly Clarkson, Tears for Fears, Pet Shop Boys & Prodigy. No doubt more acts will be confirmed.
In fact, back on 2nd January 2010, one of the coolest Hong Kong bands ever (and seriously they are) regrouped to play 2 shows. I’m talking about none other than LMF (http://www.last.fm/music/LMF)! It was great to see their new fans (some of them must have been toddlers when LMF first formed!) rushing to the front of the stage to see this hip-hop-meets-rock band.
Annually, we have this music business conference called “Music Matters” that happens at the end of May. In 2009, The Underground became a supporting partner, which was really cool, as we got to meet (and/or listen to) a lot of music industry people. Of course we heard some cool stories, PLUS the best part was to see Jamie Cullum 8 feet away from me, playing the piano and talking intimately about his songs. Just see him in this video (http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=61tOzOUguF4). Did you ever think the piano could be played that way!?!?
Lastly, I want to give a big cheer to all the indie music promoters & live music lovers all around Asia, especially to VOIZE (http://voize.my/) in Malaysia who are spearheading some big movements in Asia.
love bbchris xx
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Saturday, May 17th 2009: Well, it’s been a hell of a long time since I last wrote! Our Publisher Frank probably thought I disappeared off the planet! I've been mega-busy with personal relationships, and with the growth of the live original music scene here in Hong Kong...
Since I last wrote, I've sprained my ankle twice, disbanded and reformed Thinking Out Loud (new lead guitarist!), lost a drummer & found a new one for Guitars & Panties, and joined and left a new band called "COCKfight" (check out my Bruce Lee T-shirt I wore at my debut with the band!) Meanwhile, that little event called The Underground (URL below) will host its Five Year Anniversary show on 25th April 2009, and we've had more than 250 bands play at our shows...! It’s been a little overwhelming for me, as it's turned into a full-time pursuit! We have lots of videos up on youtube, and even released a compilation CD with 11 bands (all specially recorded at my friend Koya’s studio) in September 2008, (with another one launching in May 09). So I hope you readers and Frank will forgive me!
International highlights from the Underground shows included: Peabody (Australia), Transition (UK), Orange (from Uruguay of all places), Up Dharma Down (from the Philippines), and Fifitwo (an all-girl band from Taiwan).
All these bands really wanted to showcase at The Underground, so I guess we've got a hip reputation now! Although a recommendation by CNN is kind of weird...
Since I last wrote, we've lost our annual outdoor festival, Rockit. The rumors swirling were that the organizers lost a lot of money, or it was the HK Government being heavy-handed, or that the organizers were unable to get any more sponsors. Maybe one day we'll know…
Meanwhile, a different kind of outdoor festival took its place, called "Clockenflap," (which honestly sounds like a German chicken farm festival)! Although it’s a more 'multi-media' festival than Rockit, with less focus on live bands, it was still an interesting outdoor festival. Plus, we take what we can get here in HK! That was in January 2008, and it looks like another one will be happening at the end of this year! I hope they include different acts than who were showcased at #1 and Rockit.
We also had “Live N Loud” for the first time-- (an indoor festival, not the obscure British metal band that play Thin Lizzy covers!), which had some interesting acts including: Simple Plan (Canada), One Republic and Lost Prophets all in one evening. The worst part was that it was on a Tuesday night. This year, the promoters promise us it will be held THREE days over an entire weekend, plus a promise to include some local acts too! (I vote for Chochukmo, Poubelle International and Very Ape to be included.)
Asia also seems to be shrinking with many more Hong Kong bands heading over to Spring Scream (Taiwan outdoor festival), popping over to Manila (like they are popping in for a cup of tea!), and playing shows in Kuala Lumpur and Singapore. I’d like to give big shout-outs to all those event organizers in these places that make it all possible.
Big names that have drifted through HK in the last couple of years: Incubus (who were awesome!), Linkin Park (thanks for coming back for a return visit!), Westlife, The Cure, Avril Lavigne, NIN, Muse, Roger Waters, Sigur Ros, Coldplay, REM, My Chemical Romance, Stereophonics, Manic Street Preachers, Travis, Billy Joel, Alicia Keys, James Blunt, Bjork, Mogwai, David Byrne, The Ting Tings, Jason Mraz, Duran Duran, and even the Backstreet Boys! Acts to come in 2009 include Craig David and more! So I have to confess that Hong Kong must be less of a ‘last resort to make money’ stop these days…
Interestingly, many acts are starting to choose to perform in Macau: Black Eyed Peas, Celine Dion (what a relief in this case!), Linkin Park (they must like China!), Journey, and Kylie.
Things like bird flu haven’t really affected the local music scene. Oh yeah, the Olympics happened in Beijing & the equestrian event was in Hong Kong. We had the torch come through here, but for some strange reason, the Government only chose a handful of athletes, and the rest were politicians, actors, and rich people’s heirs… that’s Hong Kong for you!
Okay, I’ll stop here now and let Frank publish this, or it’ll be another 3 years before I send an update!!
Love bbchris xx |
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