New Jams: Stalin Gardens – “Shanghai Void”

By Josh, 2012年 9月 27日

Oh yeah. The voice of postmodern Shanghai is Stalin Gardens and it’s fuckin weird. Helmed by precocious high-school harsh noise enthusiast Achmed (birth name: Julien Raffaud), they take the China-brand No Wave Post-Punk thing down a deep k-hole into the grimiest parts of the Shanghai metropolitan subconcious, and all in time to get home before curfew. I saw them play once. Half their set was Achmed strumming disembodied riffs from “Smells Like Teen Spirit” or “Stairway to Heaven” or something while repeatedly saying “This is experimental rock” and telling the audience to shut up in between songs. (The audience was five people.)

Stalin Gardens @ Mao Livehouse, Shanghai, June 2012

Anyway, Andy Best has the scoop: SG just dropped a 9-song LP called “Shanghai Void.” In terms of hard-left-field music, Shanghai is pretty damn empty. So it’s good we have Stalin Gardens to send this plodding slow-burner — which moves from an opening Nas reference to songs about post-national consumerism and bone cancer — screaming into said void.

Stream the full album above and find some other odds & ends on their douban / soundcloud / bandcamp.

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