Moving the Mountain

The writing has been on the wall and emblazoned on the bright orange T-shirts of the bartenders for a long time now: Yugong Yishan, one of the best live music venues in town and winner of that’s Beijing Readers Bar and Club Awards Best Live Music gong in 2004, 2005 and 2006, is about to be chai’d. What you might not know is that owner Lü Zhiqiang (known to his friends as Gouzi) is preparing to move the pool table, sound system and couches to the up-market space on Zhang Zizhong Lu that used to house Henry Lee’s short-lived Rui Fu venture.

After hearing that Yugong Yishan was set to be chai’d along with neighboring venues Nanjie, Red Ball and Bus Bar back in February, we’ve been surprised how long they’ve kept providing us with event listings month after month. The well-loved bar has hosted some great events since it opened up in its present location in 2003. Highlights of the past year have included performances from Yann Tiersen, Wang Tone and the Beijing leg of the World Battle of the Bands. The venue has also served as host to a great set of regular events including Upstepper, Section 6 Hip Hop nights, Drum ‘n’ Bass at Syndication and more recently the Bloody Sunday series.

On the other side of the spectrum is Rui Fu. Despite having all the makings of another Henry Lee success story and starting off with a wild that’s Beijing Halloween party last October, Ruifu descended into farce as lame-theme-party after lame-theme-party failed to attract anyone to the well-designed but not exactly conveniently-located venue.

Yugong Yishan plans to go out with a bang and has organized a huge Chai party for July 27-28. The line-up for the night is still being decided, but we’re sure some of the regulars performers (such as DJ Wordy) will all be there to help Gouzi give the bar a proper send-off.