Last Saturday night, Mao Livehouse hosted their first annual awards ceremony commemorating the bands, promoters, valuable media entities, and artists who were associated with the venue for the past year.

'Twas a fabulous gala, replete with professional TV people hosts (I think), a red carpet, celebrity awards presenters -- among others, Jake Newby of Time Out Magazine in a tastefully understated Armani gown -- and wonderful performances from Second Hand Rose, Convenience Store, Da Fresh, and more.

The awards themselves were centered around acts that had performed at Mao Livehouse in 2011, and along with Chinese acts like SUBS, XTX, Miserable Faith, and more, foreign bands like Mogwai, The Pretty Reckless, Black Rebel Motorcycle Club, and Yuksek were nominated for things too. Obviously, none of those last ones were in attendance to receive their award if they won one, but a few sent video thanks in, and, I expect, updated their Wikipedia entries accordingly.

In particular, we all got a nice video wave from Mogwai as they won Best Overseas Band.

The winners...