as i’m preparing to leave for china, my curiosity for the chinese music scene peaked. you don’t hear much about said scene, but there’s got to be something going on amongst the enormous sea of people. through the push shove, a blog which documents chinese youth culture, i found a playlist of what was primarily chinese punk bands. PAIRS was indeed a standout from the bunch. a powerful noise band with some flipping catchy tracks; my favorite being ‘i want to die in the ocean’. their entire EP is up for download for free on their bandcamp. 

the shanghai-based duo consists of xiao zhong, drummer originally from australia, and ‘f’ on guitar. xiao zhong explains that “the scene in shanghai is pretty active, but not as active as a city of 22 million could, or should be. lack of organized venues seems to be a big problem. a lot of bands here do a lot of DIY stuff, give out their CD’s for free at their launch, trying to do something different to get noticed/throw a nice party”. 

why are you drawn to making the kind of music you make? “we make the music we make as it’s pretty much all we can make. f’s guitar playing style is pretty strange, and she is learning the guitar, so right now it’s all simple and fast as that’s her playing style. basic chords and cocksuckery, really.”

what other chinese bands should goldzmine readers check out? yantiao, the instigation, guijian, death to giants, hotter than teppanyaki, small train heart, your boyfriend sucks.