In the wake of the 40th anniversary of Woodstock, China has just had its very first and very own equivalent. InMusic Festival or 张北音乐节/zhang bei yin yue jie rocked 100,000 live audience between the 7th and the 9th of August. Zhangbei is the name of the county where the festival was held. It’s 250-acre interrupted prairie at the border of Hebei province and Inner Mongolia, only two hours’ drive from Beijing.
During the three days, dozens of indie rock musicians performed at the festival, most of whom are unrecognizable to the mainstream audience but worshiped by indie fans. In addition, the very event being the first in such a scale also helped drew attendance and huge media attention. The festival was the brainchild of a indie music promoter and a prominent music magazine in China. On the official website, organizers promised that InMusic would be the most ‘natural high and Woodstock’ music event China had ever seen. And they succeeded overall, despite complaints of flaky logistics, insufficient camping facility, etc. In some ways, the problems were the result of the popularity of the festival, which was beyond the organizers’ expectation and planning.
So the question is what’s next for InMusic? Would it propel a force bigger than music? If so, how would the government treat it? In fact, InMusic got green light from the authorities was a surprise for many. Hopefully, that’s a sign of change. In the meantime, enjoy the video clip featuring Xu Wei/许巍/, one of the most influential indie musicians in China performing at the very first InMusic (forgive the mobile phone recording quality).
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August 14, 2009 11:52 am
100,000 people sounds impressive but we are talking about China here. Are you sure 100,000 people didn’t just happen to walk by. How come I haven’t heard of this until now, now that it is over? I wonder if it included some of the other, umm, counter-cultural aspects of Woodstock.
August 15, 2009 3:16 pm
I heard you on a BBC documentary today! You were talking about cheese of all things!
August 15, 2009 8:37 pm
Hi Jenny,
Thanks for posting this. Could you post a link to this event’s website, and perhaps to some of your favorite musicians/groups? Or to websites that would be good resources for westerners trying to find out about Chinese indie music? I’ve been listening to a lot of Chinese pop as part of the language learning process but so far I’m only getting my feet wet – I’ve only found Baidu’s top 100 and top 500 lists. I’ve found some good music there but I suspect that I’d find more more music that fits my tastes in the indie category. I’d guess that I’m not alone in this.
I’m also guessing that there aren’t many (any?) English-language websites in Chinese indie music.
Hmmm… Just did some googling. I was wrong – there’s lots of stuff. These look interesting:
http://chinadigitaltimes.net/2008/06/chinese-indie-music-scene-is-small-but-growing/
http://www.due-east.org/2007/08/17/its-chinese-indie-rock-n-roll-for-me/
And lots of other stuff, if one googles “chinese indie rock”. So, maybe I’ve answered my own question.
But if you have any suggestions they would be welcome – sites you really respect, etc – even if they are Chinese-language sites.
Also, of course, a podcast on indie Chinese music (upper intermediate?) would be awesome!
Thanks,
Douglas
August 30, 2009 6:43 pm
as history would have it insipid mush like ^ was not featured at woodstock
September 6, 2009 11:28 pm
Based on most of the retrospective analysis published recently for the 40th anniversary, Woodstock seems to have been: 1) An idealistic social phenomenon, and 2) A marker for the end of an era.
From this, it seems that China’s Woodstock probably took place 20 years ago in Beijing.