Greetings and salutations fellow Shanghai rockers. We are right in the middle of that meaty post-Christmas/pre-Chinese New Year season when we ask, “What do we do with ourselves?”  With the annual country-wide big sleep just a month away we don’t really have time to start any big projects or take another stab at opening that bagel cart you are convinced will be a cash cow. So what do we do? We coast my friends, we coast. I find it helps to just stare blankly at the screen until it's time to get off work. Just remember to move your mouse around every 20 minutes or so. 

Another distraction comes in the form of rock n’ roll and Shanghai seems to have plenty o’ lately. I was pleasantly surprised to see Yuyintang livehouse packed last Friday and Saturday, and Friday had a large mix of Chinese and expats alike for Danish preteen post punkers Iceage. Basically all the old-time rockers in the crowd hated them while all the ladies swooned and screamed for the brooding 19 year-old singer. Then on Saturday a Chinese crowd turned up for Wuhan punk legends SMZB, who are touring in support of their new album (which I review below). For this one all the kids were going wild slam dancing, crowd surfing, and taking heed of the SMZB singer's fired-up speeches. 

This week’s big rock event is power pop and punk pioneers The Boys, who got their start right when everything kicked off in the mid 1970’s London. They play Yuyintang on Friday. Let’s check out some of The Boys music followed by a review of the new SMZB album A Letter to China.

The Boys

While everyone has heard of The Sex Pistols and The Clash, most of the world remains unaware of many important bands that the emerging 70’s punk scene produced and The Boys are top on that list. Their story starts in 1975 with the group London SS, which contained future members of bands such as The Clash, The Damned, and Generation X along with London SS guitarist Matt Dangerfield starting The Boys in 1976. Their first big 1977 tour with John Cale of the Velvet Underground made them a household name in the British rock scene. Later that year a live session on John Peel’s radio show resulted in a "Single Of The Week" in Sounds magazine that helped their debut album reach number 50 on the UK album charts. In 1978 The Boys toured with The Ramones, helping them gain a wider audience across the pond in America. It was the success of The Boys that helped inspire countless punk and power pop bands like America’s The Knack, who put out the single My Sharona hitting Top 10 charts across the world in 1979. At the end of every year The Boys would switch the letters of their name to form The YOBs, who put out punk-themed Christmas songs like Rub-a-Dum-Dum. After four studio albums The Boys broke up in 1981 and did not reform until 1999. Just last year they finally released their 5th studio album titled “Punk Rock Menopause” that retains every bit of intensity from their early work and got positive reviews across the board. With song titles on the new album such as “1976”, “Punk Rock Girl”, and “Let’s party!”, it’s clear they haven’t lost direction in the past 40 years. The Boys are playing Friday at Yuyintang with Shanghai rock band Round Eye, who have opened up for nearly every big show in the past month. Hey Round Eye how about giving someone else a chance to shred? Since The Boys China tour was organized by Round Eye front man Chachy I’ll give them a pass and sit through another damn set this weekend. Here is a classic Boys song followed by a YOBs Christmas tune. Enjoy. The Boys – "First Time" 
 

 The YOBS – "Rub-A-Dum-Dum" 
    

SMZB

China's first punk scene was born in Wuhan over 15 years ago, led by the still angst-ridden band SMZB. If you haven’t been to Wuhan before it’s a sprawling industrial city with decaying nuclear silos and burnt out buildings dotting the dystopian landscape. Basically it’s society failing. This seems a natural setting for punk rock to get its boot in the door of China and soon there were bands springing up around from Beijing to Guangzhou. Wuhan itself remained a punk rock center with the main livehouse VOX seeing lots of local acts playing on a weekly basis. Then SMZB frontman Wu opened a small rock bar called Wuhan Prison around the corner from VOX hosting small DIY gigs. When talking to Wu at last Saturday’s gig it seems the golden age of Wuhan punk has passed with only aesthetic-based bands forming in search of girls and Converse contracts. Even if the scene has shrunk SMZB has not wavered in their mission of providing politically conscious punk rock for the masses to hear if they want to or not. It appears their new album A Letter From China was even too hot for Beijing indie label Maybe Mars who released the band’s previous two album “Sin Harmony“  and “10 Years Rebellion“ but not this bad boy. The only copy I could find was on Xiami, as even SMZB’s Douban page does not feature the album. Time will tell if Xiami’s online bots rout out the controversial rock piece. The first track starts out with SMZB’s signature bag pipes that instantly makes you think of the Dropkick Murphy’s. The Boston bag pipe totting punk band got popular around the same time as SMZB started and the American Oi! scene remains a strong influence in the SMZB sound. The track “A song for Chen Huaimin" is a ballad about one of China’s first bi-plane fighter aces and invokes strong patriotic emotions. Some may find it confusing but the whole album is juxtaposed with being patriotic yet still criticizing the man simultaneously. The second song “Chinese Speed“ leads into a powerful pit starting uptempo beast afterwards settling back down into subdued bagpipe-laced traditional rock songs. SMZB is so dangerous they were even denied to enter the USA two years when they attempted to tour the States. The band's mistake was starting off in Texas, where even though the tattooed punks had the correct visas, immigration officials at Dallas airport said no way and sent them home packing. Another strong listening point of the A Letter to China album is the flute work prominent on many of the tracks like “Violence in Public”. You just don’t see enough flautists laying it down in Chinese bands these days. The album starts to pick up in tempo wise and the track "Naked Punk" will most certainly get the moshpit started again. Title track "A Letter from China" starts off with one full minute of traditional Irish style folk before leading into a sing-a-long punk anthem very much in the vein of Dropkick Murphy’s or the Ducky Boys. All in all, while the album doesn’t have quite the same re-listening power of the 1990’s Irish style punk classics,this LP will get played at my record store at least a few times this year. Too bad it will only be via Xiami. SMZB - "A Song For Chen Huaimin"
 See you Friday at Yuyintang for a taste of the UK’s first punk bands and stay tuned for China’s first punk band SMZB who have another new album coming out in 2015. ***