Beijing Pop Festival 2007

Sep 8-9
Chaoyang Park

The blue skies and big names attracted record numbers to this year’s Beijing Pop Festival, with organizers putting the number of festival-goers at approximately 15,000 for each day of the festival. Reports have been mixed but generally positive, with complaints about poor management – the availability of water, a general indifference to the environmental impact of the event, and the perennial (and much deserved) dissatisfaction with the messed-up VIP seating arrangements – being outweighed by a general consensus that despite the difficulties, Beijing is better for having a major festival that gives residents a chance to sit out on the grass under a bluish late autumn sky and enjoy international acts of the caliber of Nine Inch Nails. Keep scrolling down for more great images from the festival

Chuck D

Views on the Festival

For more on what others thought of the festival and comments on everything from the presence of scalpers to complaints about the policy of not letting people take their own water into the festival site, check out this post on the tbjforum.

Sina.com have the most comprehensive coverage of the festival available with images and video of every single act that performed. The site also has an attached Chinese-language forum in which one poster waxes lyrical about the lead singer of Japanese outfit Rize pushing past the many security guards and jumping into the crowd. An added bonus of checking out this site is that if you look at it for about 2-3 minutes, you should be able to see Jing and Cha – the new virtual cops that we blogged about a couple of weeks ago – come out, salute you and say "Hello Everybody, we’re the capital virtual police."

Domestic media tended to focus more on the big name local acts like this piece from the People’s Daily that reports that Cui Jian used the festival as a chance to reveal his first English-language song – by all accounts, it sucked.

International media also covered the festival with reports focusing on the apparent irony of the overtly subversive nature of the headline acts.

A few Beijing-based bloggers took a similar approach, using the subversive reputations of the main acts as as the crux of their post, but they’ve also included more personal details about their own experiences of the festival here, here and here.

Trent Reznor

Cui Jian

David Johansen - New York Dolls

Find more photos from the festival at the tbjgallery.

Links and Sources:
Beijing Pop Festival Official Site
tbjgallery:Beijing Pop Festival 2007
tbjforum: Beijing POP Festival-September8-9 Chaoyang park
Sina.com: The most comprehensive site covering the festival available with images and video of every single act
Sina: Nine Inch Nails Set (video)
Sina.com: 视频：嘻哈乐团P.E.2007北京流行音乐节现场 (video)
Sunday Lovers: the final word.
People's Daily: Cui Jian’s first English Song
AFP: Western acts rock Beijing music fest
Zhongnanhai: Nine Inch Nails, Cui Jian rock Beijing
China Expat: Fighting which Power?
NetEase: 2007北京流行音乐节 国内外大牌悉数登场
The Beijing News: 崔健、九寸钉缔造"最佳现场"
QQ: 北京流行音乐节完美落幕 崔健和九寸钉受热捧
Sina: Beijing Pop Festival Forum (Chinese)