On The Scene: Old What? Bar 01-06-2012

Oh Old What? Bar – you and your shenanigans – it’s been too long. Between everyone’s’ shirts coming off at one point, to drunken spectators sharing down passing-by cars in the middle of the street, to wiping out on the back table tearing down the awning in the process, tonight was extra sloppy. This was true punk. It’s only expected I guess, when Sister Qin, the lovely, chatty owner who always behind the bar having a ball, is calling the shots – she’s a true believer, arguably the most accepting owner in the music venue business here – you wanna play, you got it. If you’re hard enough to pick up an instrument and play in front of people, that’s all you need for Sister Qin. So it was sad to see her on her last night behind the bar and up on stage even, as she has been should a prominent presence at the cozy scrappy Old What? But in true fashion, she threw a hell of a party Friday with Discord, Perpetual Motion Machine, Sacrifice, and the dame herself.

Arriving fashionably late, the place was already packed, overflowing into the streets. I poked in my head to catch Discord, whose name pops up a lot around the younger-geared venues, but haven’t had any chance to check out yet. Did I mention that tonight was sloppy?

That’s not a dig at these boys – they have a classic punk sound that’s fun and light and easy to start a shoving match too. Though there was a certain lack of energy within the group, almost as if their were bored with their own material. Hell, just go on their douban page and listen to how much quicker the tempo is there. Nevertheless, there’s nothing wrong with a little inebriated laziness and they seemed to perk a hell a lot more for their closer “Beijing Power”, which is as catchy as you would expect.

It’s a great love letter to the city that’s easy to admire and in the right hands could be the punk anthem for all the scrappers in the punk scene here. You have redeemed yourselves Discord, for now.

Perpetual Motion Machine are as my friend put it – “fucking proper”. No nonsense, no fat, just pure rock n’ roll.

Someone gets these boys out there – cause they have potential. This is really some of the most danceable old school new wave post-90’s rock that’s being made in the city at the moment. Part Strokes, part Jet, part Spoon but all their own – there’s an unstoppable momentum to their songs that makes it impossible to stop moving once the beat hits. Part of me wants to believe these boys were raised on all their catchy cars commercials of the augths – you know the ones I’m taking about.

I mean that as high praise though – every other song of theirs’ is a catchy single ready for the airwaves. And with Baijin’s deep Barry White voice (no not really), and Tianyang Lee blow out haircut and rapid-fire bass, and Jianxi Lee’s on spot madman drumming skills, the soul of rock n roll was alive and well in Perpetual Motion Machine tonight.

The last band to grace my camera lens was Sacrifice, the death metal band who’s got quite the screecher for a frontman.

I didn’t stick around too long, but man has our frontman have some lungs on him – switching between full-on death cries and ‘speaking-in-tongues’ processed sinner (or dying goose) – he was giving the audience his all.

I’ve heard it done better, but I’ll be lying to say that I wasn’t impressed not even a little. And it is pretty cute seeing a metal band squeezed into the narrow space of the Old What?.

But hell, it’s the Old What? Bar, if you want the mic, you got it. That’s what I loved about the place from the get-go. This point was brought home as Sister Qin, jumped up on the mic after and showed everyone how it’s done. It was the perfect exit to her era (hopefully not her last) here at the Old What? Cheers Sister Qin!

Photo from Old What’s website