News, Releases, Yada Yada Yada

A bit of everything today – metal, punk, hip hop, even a little something some well known veterans of the scene. Some let’s get at it, and get these suckas into the world. Here’s the latest from Discord, Purple Hell, Black Panther, Pairs, and Bloodz Boi.

That’s the latest music video from everyone’s favorite dog rats, Pairs, whose ‘take no prisoners’ guerrilla punkfare has found an appropriate outlet for their manic depressive tune “Mean Buzz”. It involves, well, crud being thrown at the duo in an abandoned warehouse. Simple concept, good execution. Now if I could just get these goddamn hippie thoughts out of my head.

Discord, the Beijing punk mainstays who have been building quite the following since their song “Beijing Power” became an anthem for the punk scene, are ready to unleash their second album Break Away this upcoming weekend with a release show at School, Saturday, July 20^th. Believe me, that’ll be a sweaty mess – these guys do old school fist pumping punk with style. You can give it a peek over on their douban page. Beijing Power!!!

Black Panther (黑豹) are true veterans of the scene – these guys were making rock and roll while I was still in the ma dukes’ womb. Wild, right? They haven’t put anything out in almost ten years, but they were legends in the nineties, right alongside He Yong, Tomahawk, and Tang Dynasty. Well, they’re back with a new record entitled Who We Are – which was released last week. Give it a twirl. While the whole thing feels like these guys are way past their prime, I’m sure their fans out there will eat this baby up. For a little history, check out this awesome mini doc the band and the recording behind their latest here – pretty dope. Black Panther will be seen next at the Shanghai Sonic Festival in August – I’m sure Beijing will get their fair share of shows soon after.

For something a little heavier, check out the recent release from metal group Purple Hell (紫冥), fronted by ice queen  Bo on vocals. Nothing like some good old fashion melodic metal – the singer does a nice job of alternating between high pitch screaming and delicate singing (not sure how she has any breathe left to pull that off but kudos nevertheless) which adds a nice touch to the high octane material, giving it more weigh and allowing the songs more room to find their melodic footing. Give it listen here and if you’re keen some of your poor earned cash here.

Roll up a doobie and jump in your low rider, cause we have the latest track from hip hop scenester Bloodz Boi entitled Ballin’ costarring YoungPeach (don’t ask). Love the commitment to gangster rap here – just plasters a smile on my face. Check out Bloodz Boi at Dos Kolegas, Friday, July 26th for their Digital Freedom Party

And to end on a sweet note – this past Sunday, a charity show was thrown at Yugong Yishan to raise money for Bai Xue, a 23 year old rock fan who needs a hemopoietic stem cell transplantation by next week to overcome her case of serve aplastic anemia. Well looks like the show was able to raise over 67,000 RMB – all of which was directly transferred to the Ludapei Hemotology Center immediately after. Kudos to all who helped – expect good karma coming your way soon enough. Here’s wishing the best of luck to Bai Xue and her operation. Thanks to the Beijinger for this little anecdote.

And that’s it – I’m off.