SmartShanghai | Mp3 Monday: Ourself Beside Me

Mp3 Monday: Ourself Beside Me

By Morgan Short, Dec 8th, 2008 | In Nightlife

MP3 Monday is a weekly SmartShanghai column, serving up mp3s from bands living and making music in China (or coming to China, or thinking about coming to China, or whatever). Right click on the links and choose "Save Link As..." to download 'em. Click play to rock 'em.

Your intrepid MP3 Monday correspondent was in Beijing over the weekend and managed to catch up with Maybe Mars record label co-creative mogul/ D22 bar manager Nevin Domer to talk about the label's upcoming releases.

Maybe Mars, if you don't know, is a Beijing-based record label founded in 2007, home to the (inter)nationally-revered post punk band PK14, and a crop of the new wave of Chinese rock acts like Carsick Cars, Snapline, Demerit, AK Akubo, The Gar, Guali, 24 Hours, White, and today's MP3 Monday band, Ourself Beside Me.

Although there isn't a specific sound or genre that unifies the roster, they're very much joined by a certain visual style and creative attitude that springs from the collectivist musicians community of Beijing. If you talk to anyone at the bar about D22 and Beijing, the analogy that inevitably arises is CBGBs in New York in the mid-70's. Just as CBGBs was a one-time stage and watering hole to The Ramones, Blondie, The Dictators, The Dead Boys, Patty Smith, Talking Heads, and Television, so too D22 has come to serve as a similar social and creative anchor point to the diverse and seemingly incongruous sound of the aforementioned BJ bands.

When you hang out there you get the impression that one day someone will write a nice oral re-telling of this one snap-shot of Beijing history a la Please Kill Me, talking about who was fucking who, who was shooting what, and who was a real asshole.

Anyways, here are some songs off the debut album from all-gal three-piece, Ourself Beside Me due out at the start of next year. I picked the first one because it reminds me of PK14 (PK14 frontman Yang Haisong produced the CD) and the second one because it reminds me of Jesus and Mary Chain. Yep. It does. I'm not prepared to justify that though.

Ourself Beside Me �C Here I Come

Ourself Beside Me �C Oh Jim

According to Nevin, Maybe Mars "has really blown up over the last year" with international attention being shown to PK14 and Carsick Cars. Carsick Cars, for example, is currently mulling over an invitation to play in Russia as well as a U.K. music festival. The label is also solidifying their national domination, looking to bring their bands regularly to Shanghai and Guangzhou, as well as increasing their appearances in "second tier" cities like Wuhan and Nanjing.

Although there is already a bit of a buzz about new wave act Snapline's latest album, virtually every other band on the roster is also releasing recorded material by the end of this year or the first half of next year. Specific release dates are hard to pin down exactly, because part of the process of releasing albums in China is getting government approval for them. But with all these new albums coming out, expect to see way more Maybe Mars bands playing shows in Shanghai.

And way more MP3s being pirated by yours truly.

Ourself Besides Me will be in town January 17, accompanied by Carsick Cars, for a Maybe Mars record label showcase at the Zhijiang Dream Factory. That one is being organized by local rock promoters Split Works, and should be quite the big ticket for January. If that show goes well, Nevin says Maybe Mars will look to do similar label showcase concerts in Shanghai every other month or every three months.

Bottom photo of Ourself Beside Me by Matthew Niederhauser. He's so great.