Weekly Update: BJ Underground Trax

By Josh, 2015年 11月 17日

Traxman — playing THU Nov 19 @ Dada

Really getting into winter mode over here. Hope your heaters are fully fired up — looks like snow for the rest of the week. Luckily I can recommend some hot trax to keep you warm.

First up let’s take a listen to the latest release from Zhu Wenbo‘s Zoomin’ Night label, an untitled mess of a live, free improv freakout by Zhu, Wang Ziheng, Ding Chenchen, Yu Yiyi, and yours truly recorded at XP last May. Not much info to go on besides this telling textual note: “Due to technical failure caused by microphone volume excess, the complete recording was cut to four pieces automatically.”

Nice! And here’s where to get your live fix this week:

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Lars Åkerlund

First up, tonight: Yan Jun is back at the helm of his MIJI concert series, this time around hosting Swedish electronic music composer Lars Åkerlund. If you’ve been following these pages you’ll know that Meridian’s been in a legal gray area for the past couple of weeks. Seems they’re out of the woods now. Quoth Yan Jun:

“thanx for been crossing fingers with us. and thanx for all effort meridian space made. Miji Concert on next tuesday will be there with no harass. less venues and less organizers, more forced cancellations, while the quality of music increasing. strange but exciting time, right?”

Right. Check in tonight at 7pm for solo sets from Åkerlund, Yan Jun, and Liu Xinyu. Full info here.

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Dada Bar has a busy week ahead. Thursday night they host ghetto house pioneer Traxman for his China debut. Going to quote myself to save time:

“Traxman, née Cornelius Ferguson, has been at the epicenter of Chicago’s monumental narrative dancefloor shifts over the past few decades. He’s presided over the rise of juke and footwork while pumping out his own fusions of these genres with afro-beat and electronic jazz. Sample:”

Think the plan on Thursday is for Traxman to unleash a four-hour-long “history of Chicago house” set, stretching from the early days through the current Footwork/Juke zeitgeist. Go get schooled!

The following night (FRI Nov 20), new Shanghai label Co:Motion occupies Dada, presenting a live set from French “minimal disco” producer Roscius followed up by a dancefloor burner by Italian producer Rodion. Not really my jam but always glad to see new blood in the DIY label game here in China, regardless of genre. Here’s a Rodion remix included on Co:Motion’s first release:

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And Dada steamrolls right on into Saturday, hosting internet phenom QT, coming straight out of Austin, TX/NYC/bombastic white music journalists’ collective wet dreams. Quoting myself again:

“Maybe the most intriguing booking is QT, the cypher-like avatar of American artist and alleged soft drink chemist Hayden Dunham. QT is the best-known act on PC Music, a British netlabel peddling hyper-overproduced uptempo pop masquerading as avant-kitsch experimental laptop music. Critical reactions to PC Music’s vibe — best encapsulated by the breakout success of QT’s single “Hey QT”, which you may have missed if you didn’t use the internet at all in the second half of 2014 — have been mixed. Whether it’s “the future of pop or ‘contemptuous parody'” (N.B. it’s both), PC Music touches some kind of nerve among the emerging generation of kids raised on internet cultural ambiguity, and you can expect all the post-’90s/’00s weirdos to be out in force for this one.”

Seriously, QT/PC Music have generated more inane thinkpieces over the last two years than any topic besides maybe selfie-sticks… Swing by Dada Saturday night to see what the hype’s about, or don’t?

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Last up: inveterate multi-instrumentalist French rabble-rouser around town Djang San is throwing an all-day showcase on Saturday at DDC, the second mini-festival propping up his Beijing Underground music blog/aggregator. He did his first BJ Underground showcase in January — seems he’s book-ending the year with them. Good call.

Quite a long and diverse lineup on this thing, including Mongolian folk group Horse Radio, post-metalers Nakoma, unanimously unemployed indie folk duo Little Punk, French drum’n’bass producer DJ Oshi, American drone’n’bass producers Noise Arcade and Charm, and more…

Find full lineup and artist bios here. 70rmb at the door, runs from 4pm ’til midnight or so.

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RECAP:

Miji concert #30 = TONIGHT (TUE Nov 17) @ Meridian Space

Traxman = THU Nov 19 @ Dada

Co:Motion pres. Roscius & Rodion = FRI Nov 20 @ Dada

QT = SAT Nov 21 @ Dada

Beijing Underground Showcase #2 = SAT Nov 21 @ DDC

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