China Muzak

Amongst the minority that listens to music and follows pop-culture, and amongst the minority of that minority that don't listen to Asian pop, American imitation bands or even more the minority that don't listen to old skool Chinese punk rock or *nu-metal(!?)/raunchy metal or jam bands, the Chinese underground is surprisingly experimental and avant-garde.

"CHINESE ROCKS"(CHINA　Punk　-　from the Discorder - Vancouver indie webrag)

Unlike in North America where the independent music scene has been strongly driven by various genres of post-punk, indie rock for the past few years, China seems to either be wallowing in old-school punk rock (Rancid style） or forging ahead into experimental electronic, improv/experimental, minimal/ambient, noise, as well as folk.


It seems China skipped an entire step that the rest of the world seems to be embracing. There are still people here producing indie pop rock, but it is mostly a mish-mash minority influence from expats.

Reconfiguration Records – experimental, electronic
2pi - noise/experimental
Sub Jam / Kwanyin - experimental /electronic / sound art
Shan-Shui Records (Landscape in English..) - electronic
River Music - folk/rock
Modern Sky - rock/pop big indie label kinda like China's Subpop
Mam – old rock label from the 80’s
Scream Records - metal

thanks to Jon from MidiFestival for showing me some things about Beijing. As well as the friendly people at Sugar Jar - record store who battled through broken english to show me music.

Expat Culture:

Modern culture (music and art industry) in Asian cities are developed and dominated by expats. Often industry heads are expatriates from the West or western educated locals.

As expats settle, expats create a community similar to their own back home. As a result, bars, clubs, taverns, sprout up in districts providing a place for socializing and entertainment for these businessmen on their evenings and weekends. Expats influence a lot of local culture introducing music trends and bar/club culture. But since expats come from all over the world, they create a rather sporadic and disjunctive local community that seems to lack a distinct cohesiveness and quality. Businessmen are often not pros in culture. They will virtually soak up anything that is thrown at them even if it is a cheap rip-off of London parties. Most clubs and bars are filled with globally-minded locals and expatriates’ trying to make it seem like it’s the rest of the world.





* aside: China has a bizarre fascination with nu-metal I have yet to understand