Credit: Shanghai Daily
Finally met up with Madi from the now dissolved MyLittleDeadDick for a Rebuilding the Rights of Statues’ (Re-Tros) live at Mao’s. I learned about the Drum Tower murder of an American from MSN before heading out, and by the time I came home, Russia was already in war. Mao Live House happens to be about a block from the Drum Tower, in the lively Gulou area /Houhai that’s home to restaurants, bars, shops, and the easy-stroll of Chinese, foreigners, and cabs stuck in traffic alike. Security wasn’t as hyper alert as I’d imagined. The only sense of anxiety I picked up was from a policeman whisking by on a moped. His furrowed brows and uneasy expression made me wonder what was going to happen to the security guards at the Drum Tower.
Madi was joined by a group of her friends at the restaurant we were meeting up in already. Amusingly enough, she tells me that she had just met most of them for the first time herself. The group was assembled from an online Douban (think a more personalized, enthusiastic, and sophisticated cross between Amazon reviews and a Facebook) group. Around the table was a group of photographers, critics, persons in the magazine industry, and as we sat and pounced on the topic of the opening ceremony, it was almost difficult to imagine Beijing as being “unsafe.” This city has always been square and straight and wide and patient.
Yet beneath the calm, under the shroud of 5000 years of the mandate of heaven, of heavy-handed politics and legitimacy, stirs the fists and feathers of something wild. Perhaps this is why Beijing will always be the cultural capital of China, because great art is often born out of a time of unrest, and there’s nothing like rebelling at the foot of Tiananmen. Such is the tone of the Re-Tros show. Rock n’ Roll is re-Made in China in the fist and strums of three music intrigues. When the lights dim, the harrowing voice of lead vocal/guitarist Hua Dong explodes with bassist Liu Min’s yelps in a cry that teeters between nihilism and revolution. Together with Ma Hui, a virtual one-man army contained in drums, Re-Tros were really, truly some of the most beautiful performers I’ve seen with my mortal eyes. This is the time when Rock n’ Roll reborns in China.
Re-tros’s latest EP Cut Off! is available at Tag Team Records and for download on iTunes. Check out their controversial video for TV Show (Hang the Police)