Altered Zones

Alex Zhang Hungtai of Dirty Beaches says:
I first came across the Beijing scene in 2009 when I released my first Night People tape. The Canadian Frank brothers (Hot & Cold) got in touch with me about playing shows in China, and that if I ever wanted to play a show at D-22, I would be welcome. So when I visited my parents in 2009 (who relocated to Shanghai 6 years ago from Taiwan) I decided to send them a message, and hopped on a overnight train heading northbound. Eventually I met Vince Li over the internet. He runs a fantastic tape label in Beijing with his cohorts, Rose Mansion Analog, and is 1/3 of the band that's of topic here today: The Offset: Spectacles.

The band crush didn't come until I visited Beijing once again during this past Chinese New Year, and I got to see The Offset: Spectacles play live. Joshua Frank (of Hot & Cold) dubbed them "Noir Garage," and it's quite an apt description. Featuring Vince, Kei, and Ou Jian on guitars and bass, the band achieves what Vince described to me as "phantom rhythm," where the guitars and bass work in unison to replicate the high and low-end sounds of percussion. Their combination of dark, morose, wry humor and modern Chinese social commentary requires no obvious footings of a drum beat. Instead, their music feels like the heartbeat of what's happening in the underground scene of Beijing.

Beijing is currently on the cusp of becoming an arts and music mecca for likeminded people all over China, attracting young artists to relocate and participate in a thriving and supportive scene (figuratively speaking, compared to the rest of China). This is history in the making right now for them. Rock 'n' roll and DIY culture have yet to make their mark on China in any significant way; only a minute percentage of the population is aware of this subculture phenomenon.

Hailing from Hong Kong originally, The Offset: Spectacles share the feeling of displacement that I know so well, challenged amidst their newly relocated environment-- mainly because they sing in Cantonese, not Mandarin. Despite the risk of alienating themselves from the Mandarin-speaking Beijing audience, they seem fully integrated into the Beijing scene after only three years. China is now developing a new identity of its own in all areas of art, widening its exchange with Hong Kong, Macau, and Taiwan as artists leave their homes behind like migrant workers, digging into the collective art goldmine.

As the Internet pulls everyone closer together-- despite politics-related bullshit-- they take part in a new phenomenon in which the fractured Chinese population of overseas immigrants from Hong Kong and Taiwan (myself included) exchange ideas and identities with China. I'm not talking about business and real estate, or Hong Kong blockbuster actors participating in Chinese-funded film productions; I'm talking about noise scenes, minimalist composers, weird, no wave-inspired bands that are hellbent on killing their idols. I'm talking about a whole network of young artists and musicians who are stoked on exchanging and embracing new ideas, expanding, moving forward.

This is the golden age of Internet music. We have an endless archive of amazing music from the past century at our fingertips. Geographical seclusion cannot hold back the influx of information that seeps through under Big Brother's watch on cyberspace. Gone are yesterday's Britpop imitators and horrible Cure copycats. Here come The Offset: Spectacles blasting their Teisco guitars, fresh off the train, stirring shit up in the northern frontiers of China.

The Offset: Spectacles are finding their footing in a new town, like a snake shedding its old skin, roaming the streets of Beijing like they belong there. And they certainly fucking do.

MP3: The Offset: Spectacles: "Snags"

MP3: The Offset: Spectacles: "Stomp"