Ch+indie: China's newest rock festival

The inaugural Ch+Indie (“pronounced ‘Chindie’) festival passed off successfully over the weekend in the garden of alternative favourite hang out 2 Kollegas, a dive bar tucked into a park originally designed for a drive-in theatre, which shares the space with several restaurants and KTV parlours. Unfortunately Beijing’s weather has settled into a pattern of ferociously hot days and wet nights. The rain lashed down heavy on Saturday evening about 6.30, driving bands and about 400 fans indoors. Sunday they didn’t bother to put the stage back up. Rather, local favourites like Joyside, Lonely China Day and Subs played their sets indoors. The event was organized by local label Tag Team Records, whose Lonely China Day closed out the festival Sunday night. For an RMB45 ticket per day fans got a taste of China’s most happening indie music – punk too from Subs – as well as cheap beer and vegetarian food. There were stalls too, selling t-shirts and band memorabilia.

Given the stalls and the muck and the beer, there was a real festival feeling about. A pity then that more of the locals didn’t show up. Aside from the rockers the turn-out of locals on Sunday was small. Most were girlfriends of foreign fans. Odd indeed to play your hometown to a mostly foreign crowd. Can you compare it to a bunch of Irish bands playing Chinese pop songs, or traditional tunes on the erhu and guqin, in Dublin's Phoenix Park and the crowd is made up mostly of the local Chinese community? Not really, since China has had a lot of famous rock stars like Cui Jian, but it does again prove how much a niche taste rock music is in China.