arriving late, i missed most of bang bang tang’s return.

@ 0093 Record Release party by [Terence], on Flickr”>@ 0093 Record Release party” />

but i got up close for the rest of the night. the next band up was rap-rock-metal-pop candy shop (tian pin dian). their line-up now somewhat stable – with newish singer sammy, they proceed to rock out. loud and melodic, with tight hooks and great presence on stage, they really kicked ass.

next up was pinkberry. i’ve talked about pinkberry before on this blog – and they continue to be my favorite local band. great pop-punk, awesome vocals from xiao yoi and even with the lineup changes, a tight tight set.

pinkberry also debuted this music video – i can’t wait to see it on a screen that isn’t split into three parts!

next up was headliners (and 2nd to last! welcome to china, where dorms close early and college students leave en masse right at 11pm) top floor circus. i’d never seen them live, but they put on a great show. i only wish that i understood shanghainese, because, at the very least, they happen to be the funniest band in shanghai with frontman lu chen. of course they played their now infamous “shanghai bu huanying ni” (shanghai does not welcome you – a play on the olympics theme song from last year “beijing welcomes you”) with lots of lyrics about you’re only welcome if you come shopping, shanghai doesn’t have culture, but it has money.

after top floor circus played, the place cleared – seriously, it went from about 500 people to about 30 in the space of 5 minutes. and poor screamo/emo college band firefighter had to play to an empty room. they should really figure out a new way to schedule concerts so that local kids get to play in front of a crowd.

seriously – look how empty it is:

it was a great night. if shanghai and mao livehouse can continue to put together live nights like this, it won’t be long before the reputation of shanghai as a dead-end for live rock will be killed (or so we can hope).