First all boys then all girls in Shanghai
First all boys then all girls in Shanghai
Very interesting past couple of days. My colleague, James, dropped a note saying he met an interesting couple in Hong Kong on their way to Shanghai, and if I could meet up with them if I had time. The next day I arranged to meet Mike and Jenn Kush at the Kommune in Tianzifang so they could enjoy the artsy atmosphere and have a nice brunch. Mike and Jenn told me all about their big trip which they chronicle on their site www.chasingharvest.com. They're winemakers, and have been traveling all around different wine producing regions of the world working from harvest to harvest. They've been doing this for over a year and will end up back in Argentina right after Shanghai.
Jenn asked about hearing some music, so I took them to Jz Club to check out the Jz Big Band. I kept telling her "This is a really big band," knowing she wouldn't get the full meaning of what I meant until she saw the 20 horns plus rhythm section on stage right in front of her face. When they played, she turned to me and said, "Oh my god. This is a really big band."
Some obnoxious Germans came late and for some reason stood right in front of our seats in the front row. We asked them politely to move, but they told us to "Deal with it." I didn't feel like getting into a fight, so we called the management, and they ignored them too. So finally I told the two wives with them, "Listen why don't you two sit down in our seats which we got here very early to get, and we'll stand right in front of you so you can't see anything but our asses." Amazingly, they actually accepted my deal.
So we ending up standing the whole set right in front of these jerks, so close to the band that I could read most of the charts. Nothing like 20 horns to clear your head. I loved it because I always played in big bands as a kid. It was nice hearing the exceptional talent and chops of the Chinese players. It's like the Taiwanese players are all so proud of their two year stints at Berklee or M.I., and come back to become "laoshi" while these Chinese cats blow circles around them just learning off 2nd hand CDs and actually playing.
Saturday it was an all boys brass band...
Click here if you are in China and YouTube is blocked.
Then tonight I went to see Bjork with Bryce and some of his advertising gang. I didn't know what to expect as most concerts I've seen or played in China have usually been chaos. We got there and it was messy outside but completely under control inside. It was interesting to note that they black light scanned our tickets twice in front, and finally used a PDA barcode scanner at the door, before tearing off a stub. This was of course to try to prevent the usual fake tickets. Emma, who was recently bought by Ticket Master promoted the show, and I was blown away by how organized and relaxed everything seemed.
While waiting for people to get seated I took a stroll over to check out the sound/lighting deck as I always do, and asked one of the producers, "Hey, where's the mixing board?" since it wasn't there in the audience. There was just a little lighting booth.
"You're looking at it," he said.
"You mean that little thing?" I said pointing at what I though was the light mixer.
"It's pretty amazing. That little thing mixes the whole show. All the effects are on disk." He pointed at a board about the size of a Yamaha 02R and a half.
"So where's the lighting mixer?" I asked.
"It's right there behind it. That little blue thing." It was a little bigger than a laptop.
I suddenly felt very old since I somehow missed the generational gap switch from big 64 channel mixing boards sitting up on an island in the audience, to little table tops in an area about the size of a DJ booth. I realized I'd just experienced another flattening of the world and was being left far behind. The road manager caught my surprise.
"Yeah, the promoters here were surprised too when they realized they could sell sell all those seats customarily blocked behind the mixing board."
I then chatted up the guy who was running logistics. "What happened to the usual chaos?" I asked. "Where's the guys running across the stage with the cigarette in their mouth, and all the guards in over-sized green uniforms?"
"We've got this covered. There're 39 people on the ground. We handpicked all staff, and test screened them in advance for stuff like left or right handedness, fear of heights, etc. They even had an hour and a half of training."
"Left or right handedness?" I asked.
"Yeah, so we know whcih ones can take tickets faster. Some people need to stand on the left. Can't slow down the line. And check out those big dudes standing there." I looked over to the front row bouncers. Tall guys looking cool in tailored black suits with black ties.
"Notice that their suits are all cut, and their shoes are well shined. We made sure to pay attention to all the details."
Now I was really surprised. This was a level of organization I hadn't witnessed before outside of Japan.
Bjork had a very cool show. Her band consisted of 2 DJs/keyboardists behind 3 Apple notebooks, a drummer, a concert style clavichordist, a 10 piece all-girl's brass band from Iceland called "Wonderbrass" (which if you spelled it wrong dropping one 's' would be a funnier name) dressed up in yellow clownish outfits with red flags sticking out of their heads and renaissance face painting. In all it had a modern Harry-Potter-at-a-rave feel going on. The songs were all fantastically musical and intricate and electronic. The harmonic and acoustic pairing of the 10 horns with the concert pianist sort of fellow contrasted well with the two-thirds electronic rhythm section and their modern feel. There was one song that was in an odd time signature and made me wonder how the horns could keep it together without a click or a conductor, and this bugged me for a while until I finally noticed a foot wide LED meter to one side of the stage that swung an arc triggered by the BPMs from the Apples. That was a simple slick solution to those hard syncopated parts.
For the last song it was interesting how the refrain was Bjork and the band shouting "Raise your flag higher!" over and over as all the clowns with the red flags walked off the stage. I wonder if that was supposed to mean something.
And on Sunday it was an all girls brass band...
Click here if you are in China and YouTube is blocked.
I've never figured out whether it's pronounced "Moe's (like owned by one of three stooges) or Moss (like that guy out of Bonanza), but the one down the hill from me is open until 2am most days, which means that if I get out of the club early enough, I can catch the best burger in town, the muo si la bao or the Spicy Mos Burger. They have lots of jalapenos and 
