The band Pinkberry dissed the show online, but hung around to win.
When news broke about Battle of the Bands, hopes were high that this would be a significant new platform for Chinese bands.
Basically they were offended by the preliminary competition: lousy sound engineering, overt branding, no bowl of brown M&Ms, et cetera. Also, they were insulted by the judges’ comments, guys who clearly had no clue about music.
So a couple of “prominent scene figures” organized a boycott, and a lot of bands dropped out and started talking smack online. A few English language bloggers chimed in, jumping on the indie integrity bandwagon and charging that Pepsi doesn’t respect rock.
There are many valid reasons for bands not to take part in Battle of the Bands. And the production at the Shanghai round was pretty lame.
Abe Deyo has been a pretty big contributor Shanghai’s rock scene. Besides promoting and tour managing for a slew of foreign bands, Abe was also music editor for Shanghaiist, and blogged for City Weekend under his alias ‘punknotjunk.’
The ever- credible Mr. Deyo
Now Abe’s a stage manager on Battle of the Bands. So I thought I’d ask his opinion on the Shanghai indie boycott. Here’s Abe’s two cents:
“And complaining about production in the preliminaries shows real ignorance, because production for that was handled locally. So some cities were great. Stadiums, five- star hotels, like being a proper rock star. In other cities, production wasn’t so good, ‘cause the distributors didn’t want to spend.
“The judges thing is a valid criticism. But again, that was the preliminaries! The judges on the actual show know China and the China market. Harry Hui, he used to work for Universal Music. Tony Yapp, he’s CEO of his own Hong Kong record label. The guest judges are all famous musicians and producers. Even if you don’t like what they’re saying, you going to say these guys don’t know what they’re talking about?
“Punk bands in the US are usually passionate about a cause. What are Chinese punk bands passionate about? If you’re in a band as a hobby, maybe because of a little narcissism, why not go mainstream? It’s not like you’re too busy doing European music festivals.”
In my humble opinion, the most difficult question for a band deciding to compete in Battle of the Bands is whether or not you want your band to be branded with Pepsi.
Expecting a mainstream media platform to promote indie culture is silly. You can’t be indie and super popular at the same time.
Maybe bands lost faith in entrusting their image to Pepsi; maybe they didn’t know what they were signing on for.
But a boycott? Get off your high horse. This is mainstream entertainment! Can you imagine Bob Dylan boycotting American Idol? Apples and oranges, people.
Next year, after this year’s bands get all rich and famous, we’re sure to see tons of bands that boycotted the competition come back for another go.
> a Pepsi band
Is this for real??
The principal organizers of the boycott were Yuyintang’s Zhang Haisheng and The Mushroom’s Pupu.
The bloggers who were ‘jumping on the bandwagon’ (a baseless cheap shot as all of us held the same unchanged view the entire time, before and after) were Elaine Chow (Shanghaiist) and Archie Hamilton (Splitworks, China Music Radar) – who broke the story – and me and Jake Newby, who followed up with updates.
In short, and including all the other people involved, we are talking about a group of people with strong independent voices and proven track records in the indie scene and in writing/promotion.
Where as you are simply the voice of a new generation mate.
Anyway, you got your wish …a comment on the blog!
Here’s my full reply
Yes, dude…a Pepsi Band……imagine that?
A corporate sponsored band. But I guess then Vans, Draven, Jagermeister, etc.. are ‘hip’ brands so their forms of cultural vandalism for the sake of capitalism is acceptable.
u. Is ‘ever-credible’ Abe drooling on himself in the photo?
g. US punks are passionate about sex & drugs, not soda pop.
h. Only one ‘rich and famous’ next year is Harry.
yes…I drool a lot on set…..for every 3 hours of action there is 8 of inertia…giving me plenty of time to indulge myself in many different ways.
Hello,
I suppose this post was written in too incendiary and aggressive a manner. Let me take another stab:
Pepsi is providing a mass media platform for bands.
No matter what the sponsor or brand providing the platform, mass media in China currently has certain dynamics that inevitably restrict expression.
It is not so much that by dint of being a Pepsi competition Battle of the Bands is not compatible with indie culture.
It’s that in order to communicate through mass media, an artist must currently limit themselves from certain ideas and aesthetics.
An artist must occasionally deal with people that don’t necessarily understand them and have a different agenda.
Whether or not bands want to reach a broader audience is up to them. I felt that the response to the competition was unfairly negative. This is still a great platform for young bands, and Pepsi is providing a lot of education, support and opportunities for the bands that are participating.
Certainly the finalist bands are frustrated by certain aspects of the show that also frustrated those that chose to boycott the competition. They have other things to express besides what they are expressing on television.
Ultimately I wanted to point out that the boycott was not based on a principled stance against cooperating with brands in order to reach a larger audience, but on problems with a production team that is not responsible for the actual show.
Whereas reporters on the boycott took the opportunity to bash the entire project as hopeless on the basis of corporate involvement. Is that really what this was about?
Every successful band must deal with business and media realities, and learn how to work with these systems to reach the public.
Brands will play more and more of a role in this process as record sales dwindle.
Pepsi will most definitely benefit from this show, and is of course motivated mostly by an imperative to sell soda pop.
But our team, everybody involved in the production, is also passionate about making an impact on the music industry. About helping talented musicians mature and achieve a successful career.
In China, ‘indie rock’ subculture is largely oriented around a lifestyle choice to pursue a satisfying means of expression.
These bands aren’t dedicated to any social message. Few of them write songs that diverge very much from mainstream pop in terms of messaging. Why organize themselves in a concerted effort to impede a TV show? To express solidarity against a media platform?
I don’t think there was any need to cry ‘big bad wolf.’
Cheers,
J
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