2009 Dec 04 Maybe Mars Bands Returned from US Tour
After the well-received US tour (click here to see performance schedule, here for video and here for media coverage), Maybe Mars headliners Yang Haisong (of P.K.14), Zhang Shouwang and Li Qing (of Carsick Cars) returned to our beloved Wudaokou neighborhood and shared their on-the-road stories at D-22 yesterday. But it was a pity that wild folkie Xiao He sat out the event since he’s currently doing shows at Ghent in Belgium - way to go Xiao He, freak out some Europeans!
However, despite the absence, you can listen to his performances in New York and Washington here (first two tracks), or click here to read about the show in D.C.
Back to D-22, the same old question was raised about whether the “Western” audiences think they don’t sounds “Chinese” enough, to which Li Qing responded by shrugging her shoulders while Yang Haisong answered in the more conventional manner. “We get this question a lot, ” he said. “There’s only the difference between good music and bad music, whether it’s ‘Chinese’ doesn’t matter to us at all. ” Instead, you can also quote Shouwang in the Arts Beat Podcast of The New York Times, in which he responded “German bands don’t play Beethoven all the time”.
“I think we share the same kind of lifestyle with indie musicians in New York, ” Yang Haisong continued. “It doesn’t matter if you live in New York, Nanjing, Paris, London or Beijing, it’s always similar – you’ve got a day job and you play music. That’s why I felt so familiar in New York even I’ve never been there before.”
“But I think they have to work harder than we do, because the competition in New York is fierce,” added Shouwang, “and this kind of competitive environment is definitely something we need here in Beijing.”
Tour manager Charles Saliba had a great story about T-shirt, or something we should all learn as stereotypes. "We sold out all the CDs, but we made a mistake by not bringing enough medium sized T-shirt since we assumed that everybody in America was fat,” he recalled. “Then we found out that people who are into this kind of music are all skinny hispsters, which means they can’t fit in our XXL size t-shirt!”
“And I hope we can eat better next time,” Yang Haisong said. “We ate a lot of cheese, meat, all kinds of cheese and all kinds of meat.”
We’ve never questioned Michael Pettis’ passion, and this tour was definitely a confidence booster for his Bingmasi crew. But in order to keep the scene going strong, the Chinese demographic should always be the key. That’s probably why Maybe Mars also plan to expand their Chinese market by having house bands tour in more than ten cities across the country in 2010.
More on International schedule, Carsick Cars and P.K.14 will fly over the Pacific Ocean again in 2010 to rock South by Southwest Music Festival (SXSW, March 17-21) in Austin, Texas. Beijing bands Cold Blooded Animal (2001) and Brain Failure (2003) have also both performed at this festival.
Have a nice trip, and eat less Burger King, since we have it in Beijing now.
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