LAUNCH EFFECT

Carsick Cars

Accord­ing to the graf­fiti in D22, Beijing’s answer to CBGB’s, the Chi­nese love their mum’s, their coun­try, and Car­sick Cars.

It’s not hard to see why. Writ­ing Pixie-esque noise-rock songs that never lose sight of a catchy musi­cal­ity tends to make you a few fans. Which is why Car­sick Cars are not only a main­stay of the Chi­nese punk rock scene, but have also toured Amer­ica and Europe, play­ing fes­ti­vals like Pri­mav­era, SXSW and All Tommorrow’s Parties.

Live, the act are a force to be reck­oned with. Hook laden songs are wretched apart by white noise in a fash­ion that would please fans of Jesus and the Mary Chain, Sui­cide or The Vel­vet under­ground. Per­for­mances of sub­ver­sive favourite Zhong Nan Hai – the name of both a cig­a­rette brand and a metonym for the Chi­nese lead­er­ship – see the band bom­barded by loose cig­a­rettes from the crowd, in a rit­ual that per­fectly rep­re­sents how impor­tant this band are to alter­na­tive music in China.