Beggar's Chicken in the Streets of Hangzhou

Now, what’s so special about a beggar’s chicken ( also known as 富贵鸡 ,literally “rich and noble chicken” in Beijing) ? Here is the story:

Legend has it that a homeless, starving beggar had a chicken but didn’t have a stove to prepare it. Desperate for food, he came up with an idea. He killed the chicken and covered it with mud and baked it with fire…
A Qing-dynasty Emperor passed by. Attracted by the aroma of the baked chicken, he stopped and dined with the beggar. The Emperor loved the “Beggar’s Chicken” so much that it was added to the list of dishes served at the Imperial court.

A quick phone call to Wu Ming Ju confirmed that they did indeed have authentic Beggar’s Chicken and that it required 24 hours notice to get one so keep that in mind if you ever decide to check it out.

Wu Ming Ju, Liangmaqiao branch

Restaurants like Wu Ming Ju are poster establishments for the differences in dining habits between locals and foreigners: This place has 3 branches in Beijing with different reviews on dianping. Zhongguancun ( 1133+ reviews), Xizhimen (429+ reviews) and Lufthansa ( 319 + reviews). As far as I could tell, it’s not even listed on The Beijinger or City Weekend. Mobile Native has a listing for it. I’m not sure how to explain such discrepancy in taste or popularity!
The place serves up imperial and Jiangsu style cuisine. It is not cheap as far as Chinese Food goes for a good reason: It is Chinese Cuisine!

So, how about the food?

We arrived there on the 5th day of Chinese New Year trying to dodge the fireworks as much as possible. The staff was amazingly friendly and the restaurant a decent little throwback to my time in Hebei with their private rooms. I didn’t wonder around much but I can’t recall seeing a common seating area.

The menu was beautifully illustrated with English, Chinese and pictures making it a breeze to order. The main course of the night was preplanned so I just picked a few random dishes to complement our pre-ordered chicken. I was a bit tired that day so I forgot to write down the Chinese name of the dishes but a few stood out:

A peppered beef that was out of this world: The beef was tender and the peppers had quite an attitude if memory serves me right! It was quite popular on the table

Lotus shoots with prawns: I had forgotten about the prawns until i bit into what looked like the lotus shoot and was surprised at the mix of textures. This one had a hint of sweetness to it that balanced out the spiced beef nicely!

Simple Fungus n shoots: Simply elegant and tasty! Not much to say about other than it went well with the chicken. This one came as a recommendation of the staff which was surprising considering it was one of the cheaper dishes on the menu

But this is about a Beggar’s chicken, isn’t it? And finally the baby came along! The presentation was simpler than expected, a whole chicken sitting on a lotus leaf that exuded of earthy smells. I was a bit surprised as i expected to get the mud wrapping as well but the hostess explained that it was too messy and they removed it in the kitchen prior to serving.

Beggar's Chicken begging for me to bite into it

Our chicken was then taken away from us for cutting purposes and when it finally came back, it was time to dig in! I was a bit afraid of being let down as the book and the search had both resulted in increased expectations. I checked out the opened bird on offer and notice that it was stuffed with a few mushrooms inside and that was it.

ready to dig in baby

Finally, the moment of truth: A carefully picked up a piece and put it in my mouth where it just went in and melted right away! This was one of the most tender pieces of chicken that ever graced my tongue! The taste was quite suprising: The lotus aftertaste was that of green tea, quite leafy if I can describe it that way. The skin was crispy and tasty to perfection!
My dining partners all agreed that the Chicken was worth the search and the trip! By the time we were done with it, the plates looked like a prehistoric cemetery of cleaned up bones!
To say that we were still wanting more would be an understatement!!! we were begging for more!

Overall, I’ll give the experience an A- . The Chicken delivered on its promise and cost RMB 180. The rest of our dishes varied in price between 30 and 60 which is on the high end as far as Chinese Dining goes in Beijing. The total bill for the 5 of us including a few beers was about RMB 580 but almost 40% of it was just the chicken.

That said, I’ll be back for more and I’ll hunting for further Beggar’s Chicken establishments in the capital.

Wuming Ju 无名居
Màizi Diàn Zǎo Yíng Běilǐ 32 Hào
朝阳区麦子店枣营北里32号
Tel: 010-65021568 65021537

maps & reviews: Dianping | Mobile Native

Birds being set free this week with 3 shows!!!

Wednesday March 3

Michael Dalin Trio @ Salud: I’m a big fan of Michael as a songwriter and singer, not to mention a person. He’ll be playing a free gig at Salud in NLGX with special guests including FeiZai who I’ll be writing about shortly. Should be good fun for a wednesday night and the Rums don’t hurt.

Thursday March 4

3rd Maryinn @ Yugong Yishan: Arts meets Music with appearances by a shitload of decent bands including Rustic, The Molds, 24 Hours amongst others. There will also be an opportunity to buy art pieces all under 400 RMB. should be cool..

Friday March 5

M’beewan @ Jianghu: Reggae man extrordinaire is back to Beijing just in time for the weather to warm up. There was loads of fun to be had on his last trip as he was cooperating with tons of artist on musical mashups that rocked. Nice to have the rastaman back..

Saturday March 6

Rock Year 1999-2010 @ Mao: Free the Birds -for their second show of the week- along with, Toy Head, and Rolling Rolling amongst others. Definitely an interesting show to check out! I heard some good stuff about Rolling Rolling in the past and my fascination for all things Helen Feng just gets deeper by the minute.

but the real goodie on that night is

BEYOND THE OCEAN @ Yugong Yishan: Carsick Cars, White, AV Okubo, Xiao He and P.K. 14 all of whom are Maybe Mars artists, are headed State-side for SXSW 2010, the country’s largest indie music festival. This a warmup gig before they hit the road and a good chance to get acquainted with Beijing’s finest offering in commercial indie.

Special Mention Monday March 8

Ladies Night @ Yugong Yishan: I’m prebooking myself on this one! Free the Birds ( 3rd show in less than a week), DH & The Hellcats as well as Bigger Bang are set to unleash a dancing storm at Yugong Yishan. that’s one hell of an offering for a monday night with 3 of the better acts in this city if you ask me.. All seasoned professionals that know how to put on a show

Bad Mamasan, the Heavy Metal outit fronted by Jaime Welton ( Dirty Deeds, Black Cat Bone) is finally waking up from their never ending hibernation to bring out some much needed devil-horns-action to Beijing. Expect them on March 26th at 2 Kolegas.

There’s quite a bit of speculation regarding the Bob Dylan shows in Beijing/Shanghai/Taipei according to The Beijinger. Do we even bother to care at this point? Yet another “big name” act is announced and then cancelled because of no permits, greed or whatever reason… it’s not even fun anymore! That said, bands that do wanna play Beijing seem to be able to do so judging by the fact that the Backstreet Boys will be here in not too long. So what gives?

The World Peace show gang is strangely quiet these days! The website hasn’t been change in a while and no updates to sink our teeth in I did get a comment on a previous post directing people to a different site http://showofpeaceconcert.com/ claiming it as the source for news relating to the event. The original site is still standing and unchanged so i guess ….. I don’t know!

Finally, I came across this cool students band called Dude and they crack me up! These kids are taking classic Chinese songs like 月亮代表我的心 (yue liang..) and 我们的爱 (women de ai) then they punk-ify them.. yup, how about that? head on over to their Douban page where the tracks are available for download and check their upcoming shows. it’s worth it for a laugh!

In between rehearsals, studio sessions and school, Phil Schloss of Maggie Who found some time to answer a few questions for BeijingDaze… Cool beans!

1- What’s going on in your world? This is your chance to plug your stuff:

Right now we are all waiting for the record to come out and anxious to hear peoples reactions. Studio has been hard work and a lot of fun and we are all really excited that we had the chance to do something like that at this point in our lives. High school is finishing up for us so again, we are all looking forward to graduation. As for the band, going out and playing more shows is going to be a big part of the rest of this year. Eager to play as many shows as possible and rocking out as hard as we can.

2- first things first! How did the name “Maggie Who” come about?

This is a question I always get. Back in 2005 when we were doing our first show, which was a school show, we were asked for our set list and our band name. Since we didn’t have a name yet our drummer at the time threw out the word Maggie Who. That just stuck. We found out later that he was either trying to think of a porn star or a stripper that he thought was named Maggie Who. Still trying to figure out who it is we are named after.

3- The band has been together since 2005 one way or another, that’s not bad for Beijing! Did you thinks back in 05 that it would take 5 years before you recorded your first EP? and why did it take that long?

Well, back in 05 it was just Brian, a drummer, and me. We had no bassist and we were only in middle school. We were all still learning the basics of how to play in a band and as we got older and better, we brought in Jim on bass and David on drums. I don’t think that we ever really had a clue that we would be doing an EP, but it was for sure an idea that had always been around. I think it took those 5 years cause that’s when we really got tight as a band and were ready to do something like an EP. Also, with the live shows, it kind of took away time for writing, but once we all got together and had a few practices we were banging out tunes and it sounds like it’s all come together on the record.

4- First time i saw you guys was in September ‘09 opening for “Dirty Deeds”. I was talking to Desmond of Black Cat Bone fame while you were covering Buckcherry’s Too Drunk To F–k and he said “Look at these kids, they walk and act like rock stars already!” Do you consider yourselves rock stars?

Ha. I wouldn’t say we are rock stars and I doubt any of us think that. We are just following in the footsteps of guys we look up to. We are all really comfortable on stage with each other and I think that has a lot to do with the way people see us. It’s nice to have the spotlight for a little while and act like rock stars, and if people see us as rock stars already, then that’s awesome. Do we think we are rock stars? No. Do we act like rock stars? Of course.

5- You haven’t been playing much over the past year. Any special reason?

A lot to do with writing for the EP and practicing. Schoolwork, and holiday’s when we are not together takes up some time too. School has been busy this year so we don’t have as much time as we would like to, but the time we do have goes into the studio. Other than that we try to play every show we can get and we promise there will be more to come!

6- Word association. for each one of these words, write down the first thing that comes to your mind:

* Beijing: Fuck yes.

* Shanghai: Fuck no.

* Baijiu: Where’s the whiskey?

* Chou Doufu: Eat it whenever it’s around

* Cui Jian: Living legend. Godfather of all that is Chinese rock and roll.

* AC/DC: For those about to rock, we salute you!

* Polka Dots: Buddy Guy.

7- What about this EP? When is it coming out and what’s on it?

We are hoping for it to come out in early April. Still a few things left to do on it but apart from that, its sounding pretty good and now we just need to get the little bits and pieces together and it will be ready for release. It’s a 4 song EP. All originals that all the guys wrote. There are 2 tracks on the EP that we have been playing live for quite awhile now so some of our fans will be familiar with them and the other 2 are songs that have not been played live yet.

8- Name 1 high points and 1 low points of your musical career:

A high point would definitely be playing live at the Hard Rock Café. It’s pretty cool telling people that you have played at a place like that and you’re still in high school. I think all the guys were blown away by that. A low would have to be paying for an amp I broke onstage at Mao Live House. I had a beer on top of the amp and in the middle of our set at one of our biggest shows to date, my guitar cut out and it turns out that beer had overflowed in to the amp and broke it. I had to play the rest of the show with a shitty clean jazz amp and ended up paying for the repairs for the other amp. Not fun.

9- Seems to me like Beijing’s music scene has exploded over the past few years with veterans and new comers and It’s getting harder to keep track of the bands/shows now; Any particular gems people should be aware of in your opinion? Some bands or singers that pretty darn good but can’t seem to get recognition?

Rolling Rolling – Guys that would always play when we started at Mao Live and we think they are great. Can’t wait to see them play again.

Bad Mamasan – Some badass old school metal that straight up kicks ass. Jaime Welton shreds and it’s the closest thing to Motorhead and Sabbath in Beijing.

The house band at Cheers is amazing. I have never seen them play anywhere but Cheers, but every time I go there and see them they are great. The bassist is crazy and the singer has an amazing voice that always gets people dancing.

10- What if: What if you just couldn’t be in Beijing doing the things you do… where do you think you’d be and what would you be doing?

I don’t know if I would have even picked up the guitar. I know there would have never been Maggie Who. I would probably be in either Hong Kong or the states waiting to finish up high school and go off to college. As for the other guys, I can imagine that it would be similar to that too. Not as interesting compared to what we are doing now.

Catch Maggie Who along with Dude and others @ Mao Live tonight ( Feb 24th 2010) and let me know how it went!

Wedneday Feb 24th:

Maggie Who @ Mao: Well, these kids were cool enough to open for “Dirty Deeds” when they reunited back in September, need I say more? They’ve been busy recording their first EP over the past few weeks and they’re ready to kick ass ( I think). It’s part of Mao’s “Don’t Call Us Foreigners” series. I’m curious about it and really sad that I’m gonna miss it.

Thursday Feb 25th:

Daisy Sweetgrass @ Ginkgo: Do I even need to mention that this lady has the sweetest voice in Beijing along with a smile that would melt a rock? Oh, and it doesn’t hurt that she can sing with the best of them. Good old fashioned roots music at one of the most underrated places in town.

Punk Metal Orgy in Green @ Mao: how’s this for a bill: the Unsafe, Misandao, Hell City, Soju Legion, Trash Cat and Discord? There’s gonna be noise, guitars, screaming, middle fingers and lot of attitude. It’s a Beijing Guo’An themed party so try and wear green!

Friday Feb 26th:

Mademoiselle @ Ginkgo: Marie Claude works a crowd with the best of them. The Montreal Minx as she’s been knicknamed sings in French, Chinese, English and smiles. Her brand of Gypsy jazz is unique in Beijing and I love her to death. That said, French Warning on the evening, and that’s not necessarily a bad thing.

Sunday Feb 28th:

Lantern Festival @ Yugong Yishan: Free the Birds ( formerly known as ZIYO) headlines the show with Chasing Star opening the festivities. 2 Bands that could headline on their own are sharing the bill and should not be missed. Chasing Star only comes out of hiding once every blue moon but they be good y’all. Of course, Helen Feng on her own warrants a trip to Yugong that night.

i could eat this all day!!

What makes this place special? Well, how about up to two weeks waiting time to get a table? Locals are crazy for this little eatery and it shows in the reviews on dianping and other Beijing-based review sites. We got lucky on a monday preceding spring festival to get a table at 8:00 p.m for the next day! Heck, we even changed plans to accommodate the fact they had an opening so early!

simple and plain facade hides wings of wonder

The restaurant is in a hutong just outside of xidan subway station exit C. As you come out of the station, take a left and walk down for 500 meters or so. You’ll pass a few BBQ places but just keep going until you see the sign and the two red lanterns, you’ll recognize it when you get there!

The inside is a typical hutong with 2 rooms set a eateries and a section for grilling the goodies. On the night we went there, it was quite cold so there was no way to even think about sitting outside or things like that.

comments and polaroids from Biantai eaters.. fun and pain

K-hua got there first as usual and I followed along with S and a few other folks. They close early so she had to start ordering wings ahead of time and when we got there around 8:20 or so, it was “last call”.. never thought i’d get one of those on wings! The staff was pretty adamant about letting us know that we needed to get our last orders for gilled goodies in before they turned off the pit. We could always get other dishes that didn’t involve grilling but that’d be it.

The first big difference between Kuan Dian and Xidan Chiku is the menu! While the former had limited items, the latter had one hell of an extensive selection with lamb, fish, wings, veggie and tofu on a stick. They also had a lot more choices in terms of general cold dishes.

The Yangrou Chuan’r was actually quite nice, so were the mushroom and squid. This was a welcome surprise as i had expected the rest of the menu to be an afterthought and it was not! However, we were there for wings and by golly, wings there was!

perfect glaze, tender n juicy

As usual, we got a bit of everything! Their regular wings, 1 sided spicy, 2 sided spicy and the phenomenally hot-perverted biantai! K-hua, S and myself were still recovering for the Kuan Dian biantai wings we had the previous evening so we didn’t overdo it. Just one wing per person to get a taste.

u dare?

so how were these wings?

The original (bu la or yuan wei) flavor was perfectly grilled, presented a nice glaze and seasoned with cumin and small hints of pepper. The meat fell of the bone and the chicken did taste like it had been marinated for sometime. Definitely a winner!!

I fell into a burning ring of fire..not looking as afraid as i should be!

We then moved up the spicy ladder all the way to the Biantai! what can i say about these puppies? yes, they were perverse! Yes, they were evil! but beyond that, they were amazing, the gift that keeps on giving! it was like a wine with a long finish and the flavors /heat kept coming more and more! Honestly, these are the best spicy wings i’ve had in China! bar none!!!

I fully understand now why this place is so popular and will be coming back again very soon! At the moment, as far as I am concerned, they are Kings of the Wings in Beijing.

Xidan Chiku 西单翅酷 (map)
15 Zhongsheng hutong , (500m north of subway exit C )
西城区西单图书大厦东侧钟声胡同15号
tel: 6603-2605

CALL AHEAD FOR RESERVATIONS!!!!

Chinese New Year celebrations did put a damper on live shows in the capital so one’s gotta find a different way of getting their music fix. In my case, I use Douban to catch up on what my favorite bands in Beijing are up to and sometimes, it quite surprising what you find out in there:

Atom packs a punch y'all

Hedgehog: in or out?

Not really sure what’s going on with one of my favorite indie bands! At first, they supposedly broke up with the when their bass player left and the remaining 2 formed “B Side Lovers”. I was surprised to see that on their douban page, a couple of new demos showed up and the band seems still on. so far, 4 new songs have showed up and i like them all… so i guess i’ll stay tuned.

The SUBS: a whole lotta rocking coming up

My favorite screacher and her bunch of compadres are busy with a new record as evidenced by pictures from their recording sessions here and a couple of posts on the band’s official blog by Kang Mao (I think). Forthcoming album is maybe called “The Human Voice” as far as my limited mandarin lets me understand. Looking at those pictures, I realize how sexy Kang Mao is in Jeans and leather. Her stage outfits just do not do her justice.

RandomK(e): someone oughta tape this

this is what i got in my mailbox:

RandomK(e) will celebrate its fifth year of existence with an event infused with randomness, art, more randomness, and of course the music of the K(e). Save the date: Saturday, 27 March, 2010 at 2 Kolegas. We’ve got quite a few ideas up our sleeves for this show, so you won’t want to miss it. Look for the K(e) to premiere new music and generally assault your frontal lobe from all directions. More details here.

Maggie Who ready to be unleashed

Color me curious. Tweetland is buzzing about these kids recording session for their upcoming record and word on the street is that they will be taking a break from the studio to play a live show at Mao on the 24th of February. for those that don’t know who they are, this little group of expat kids won battle of the bads a few years back and rocked the house as the opening act for the Dirty Deeds reunion show last september. These cats walked and acted like rock stars on stage at Yugong Yishan to a packed house! I’m looking forward to see what they’re coming up with

so yeah, it Chinese New Year in Beijing and the city has come to a halt! No live shows, restaurants shut down, people leaving town for warmer beach-ier pastures. What of us the ones that are left behind? what are we gonna do to distract ourselves? well, it might not be much but there are a few goodies around

Friday Feb 12:

Redbucks @ Jianghu: my favorite rowdy stomp crew is still in town and still intent on getting you off your lazy rear end into a dance floor. perfect opportunity to head over to Salud afterwards for a few Rums to fight off this umpteenth cold spell that’s hitting Beijing.

Brazilian carnival @ Ginkgo: samba, costumes, sunshine, dancing and ginkgo’s eclectic crowd are incredibly unpredictable. Poncho Y Sal bring the beats and I’ve seen people over there dance til the wee hours of the morning.

and that is it folks… that will be all your live music for a little while

Sunday FEb 14

Time to get off your rear ends and get some culture with one of the million temple fairs taking place in Beijing. It’s a cool chance to just get out and especially if the weather cooperates and get exposed to a different side of the capital. The Lama Temple and Ditan Park area will be crazy so I can’t say I’d go there for sure but some of the smaller temple fairs are worth the trip:

Dongyue Temple Fair
Held within a centrally-located Daoist temple, Dongyue’s fair boasts a huge number of food stalls, with cultural exhibitions and ethnic performances. RMB 10. 8.30am-4.30pm (Feb14-20).
141 Chaoyangmenwai Dajie, Chaoyang District. (6551 0151) 东岳庙，朝阳区朝阳门外大街141号

Shijingshan Temple Fair
Unlike other temple fairs around town, Shijingshan’s is full of foreign scenes, sounds and foods. Celebrate the exotic! Perhaps as a result, this fair is said to draw many foreigners. Nothing goes with foreign like foreigners. RMB 10.
8.30am-5.30pm (Feb 14-21). 25 Shijingshan Lu, Shijingshan District. (6886 2547) 石景山游乐园, 石景山区石景山, 25号

full list over at The Beijinger Blog:

http://www.thebeijinger.com/blog/2010/02/12/All-s-Fair-During-Chunjie-Beijings-Temple-Fairs

Beijing is a cyclic city: we had a wings phase, a burger phase, a long island ice tea phase etc… and when I think of the past, I’m always wondering: “where are they now?” or “what happened to all them wings places that were all the craze back in the days?”

I don’t know what it is or why, maybe it’s doe to The Rickshaw closing and memories of RMB1 buffalo wings coming back. Or maybe it is seeing pictures of Wu Ge’s offerings on Facebook recently. Either ways, I wanted some wings and set out to get them.

I set out to find out and my first trip was to Kuan Dian 宽店. (map)

This little eatery off of jiu gulou da jie is not so little anymore. Business is pretty darn good and they opened a second branch just 2 doors down from the original one. Heck, for it being a hole in the wall, you still need reservations otherwise you might be there waiting for a while. The wing crew, K & S along with myself decided to conduct the investigation on weeknights so that we didn’t have to deal with a mob of wing chasers and that turned out to be a good decision.

The place was full when we got there but emptied rather fast as 10:00 p.m. approached!

The original is off of Jiu Gulou right across from Luce. It’s a tiny place with a covered rooftop for winter and about 6 tables in the main room. The kitchen sits in the back of the room and the walls were decorated in simplistic student canteen style, much like those of Hot Beans cooperative but slightly more rustic.

We headed over on a monday night, about 8:30 and walked in to find the place full. K made it there earlier and had grabbed a table for us which was lucky. She also proceeded to order a first batch of mixed wings, mantou, corn and mashed potatos.

oh yeah... wings of desire

The first batch was a mix of their original flavor (yuanwei), mildly spicy (weila) and one sided spicy (duanla).. This was a good start to the evening!

We also had their smasher special aka mashed potatoes in Chili Oil which was quite the potent dish if you ask me.

Wings and smashers were complemented by some roasted sweet corn and a tomato/egg flour soup to fight off the cold Beijing winter.

Once we had enough wings to grow our own, we decided it was time to get serious and go for the 2-sided spicy (shuanla) as well as their perversely spicy (biantai la):

Lord Forgive our Capsicum Sins

Ouch ouch ouch ouch! Let’s just say we needed a few more bottles of water after that and the previously spicy smashers tasted like sugar in comparison! K declined to try them so S and I had to do the honors and fullfil our investigative duties but leaving to wing untouched! There was pain… there was pain

The wings were mostly in the 3RMB range and the place had longneck tsingtaos and what not for reasonable prices. We ended up paying about RMB90 for the wings, soup, waters and all. Kuan Dian’s menu is very limited but what they do, they do will. The increased capacity was welcome news as it means the likelihood of getting there unannounced and not finding a table has decreased.

Overall, I still like the place and love the fact that they stayed true to their spirit: A bunch of students with a cool business idea that are still there cooking and serving.
The wings were well cooked and tasty with perfect glazing on the house recipe. I wasn’t a big fan of their spiced versions as they lacked dimension in my opinion: the pepper brought on the heat but without being playful! Don’t get me wrong, it did bring on a looooot of heat and I’ll go eat there anytime but I wanted more than just a punch that night. That said, it is still one of the better wing options in this city when you do not want to deal with the Chicken Wing Nazi

Kuan Dian 宽店 (map)
西城区旧鼓楼大街135号
Xīchéngqū Jiù Gǔlóu Dàjiē 135 Hào

Reviews and maps:
Mobile Native | The Beijinger | Local Noodles

stay tuned for 3 more wing visits and let me know what’s your favorite wing place in town!

The Woodie Alan Band

1- What’s going on in your world? This is your chance to plug your stuff:

I returned to the U.S. about a year ago and have signed a book deal with Harper Collins to write a memoir about my time in Beijing, with a heavy emphasis on the band. It turns out people are fascinated about how an American guy met up with three Chinese musicians (and one other American), formed a blues band and played all over China. It will be out next January and hopefully will bring me back for a few more tours.

I was very proud of what we accomplished as band in a relatively short time — just over a year — but I didn’t anticipate the resonance it would have over here. National Public Radio’s The Story did a piece on us and I got a lot of great response from that. That story actually came about from a first-person piece I wrote about the band in the Wall Street Journal, which also stirred a lot of interest. I never thought that I would spend so much time writing about the band; I thought it was a diversion from my real profession (writing).

2- How did you end up playing Blues in Beijing out of all places?

I had a fortuitous meeting with Woodie Wu in 2006 when I brought a guitar back from a visit to the U.S. and the headstock cracked in transit. I needed a good repairman and Woodie was recommended by a few friends. When we met, I saw that he had a tattoo of Stevie Ray Vaughan on his arm and was fascinated. I was a senior editor and writer at Guitar World for 15 years and did a lot of writing about Stevie and many other guitar greats. Woodie was fascinated by this and was excited to meet me. So we started talking, he invited me to jam with Sand, with whom he was then playing and when I did he and I each heard something we really liked in the other’s playing. We played a single acoustic trio gig with saxophonist Dave Loevinger, who was a friend of mine, and started seeking a rhythm section. We went through a few different people and when we found Zhang Yong (bass) and Lu Wei (drums), it just clicked and we started taking ourselves a little seriously, rather than just getting together for fun jams. Once those guys came aboard we started improving pretty quickly.

The Terror Twins: Woodie Wu & Alan Paul

3- The album contained songs in English and Chinese, Is there a difference between singing in both languages?

I basically only sing in English. The Chinese songs are written and sung by Zhang Yong. I sing harmony and background on some of them onstage and just hope I don’t mess any pronunciations up too badly.

4- What’s happening with the Band at the moment? is it on hiatus or just on hold? any plans for more shows or more records?

It is on hiatus. They continued for a about six months after I left, but then Dave also returned to the U.S. and Woodie moved to Suzhou for a while. he is back now. I will return in June for a couple of weeks and hope to play shows. Next year when the book comes out I am hoping to bring the guys to the U.S. to do a combined book reading/concert tour.

5- What do you think of the Blues Scene in the city?

There isn’t much of one. When we were playing a lot, it was primarily just us and Black Cat Bone, but I found Chinese audiences very receptive to the music when they heard it. And not just in Beijing. We played really memorable shows in Changsha, Xiamen, Nanjing, Suzhou, Hangzhou and Shenzhen as well.

6- Any good Chinese blues bands that you are aware off that you can recommend?

I wish there were more. Sand was great and very bluesy though not straight blues but I don’t believe they are still playing together. Jimmy Dash in Suzhou is an expat (Aussie, I think) doing some cool stuff, with Chinese musicians. And the Tribal Moons in Yunnan are mostly expats playing cool blues-based music. My friend Claudio Curro had a nice group, the ETone Blues Band, but they flamed out. I like the Rhythm Dogs a lot but don’t think they are still playing much. Their lead singer Humble Mike was a pal and I enjoyed jamming with him a couple of times (once with the Dogs, a couple of times him with WA) but he has left town. Their bassist Zhang Ling (BD note: Zhang Ling is now lead singer for the band) is also an old pal playing some really cool bluesy music. Not sure how much he’s gigging now. She’s not Chinese and not really blues at all, but I have always enjoyed Jess Meider’s music in a variety of contexts. I think she’s great in all of them.

7- Word association: write the first word that comes to your mind.

* Beijing: Hutongs

* shanghai: Take it or leave it. Just never really felt it there.

* Shunyi:compounds

* Banjo: abigail washburn

* Alison Krauss:high lonesome

* Hutongs: Walking.

* Polka dots: Buddy Guy’s guitar

8- Name 3 high points and 3 low points of your musical career in Beijing:

HIGH POINTS

1. Just finding these four guys and all of us getting together, forming a band and realizing that we had something special cooking. It was all so improbable. I’m really proud and happy that I was able to these great musicians learn something new — the art of the jam. They are all much more accomplished than me, but we all brought something different together to the table and developed a unique sound by finding the sweet spot that played to everyone’s strengths and steered away from their weaknesses. It’s what every band strives for and accomplishing it was magical for me. Doing it with two bandmates I could barely communicate with is just astounding.
2. The first time we played at Jianghu Jiuba, which quickly became a sort of home base for us. Before our first gig there, we had played pretty exclusively to expat dominated audiences and the realization that a young Chinese crowd could respond so strongly to the music was revelatory and really, really exciting.That place gave us a lot of energy. we also played a great show at the Star Live in August, 2008, just after the Olympics and it felt like everything we had been working towards came together at that gig. Doing it on a big stage with a large Chinese crowd enjoying it was really memorable.
3. It wasn’t in Beijing, but headlining the Xiamen Beach Festival in front of about 5,000 people was a fantastic experience.

LOW POINTS
Well, the real low point for me was leaving Beijing and having to walk away from my brothers in the band when we were really on a roll. Woodie used to laugh at me because of how frequently I walked off stage and said, “That was the best gig we’ve ever done” but it reflected the feeling we all had that we were getting better and better.

9- As far as I’m aware, there’s only one other prominent blues band in Beijing: Black Cat Bone. Ever hear of them and what do you think?

Sure. I’ve heard them many times. They are very good and quite different from us. We are more rootsy and eclectic and they are harder hitting, higher energy and more of a show. I play acoustic in the band, which sometimes gives us a folky sound. Our instrumentation is just kind of quirky, as Woodie plays lap steel and harmonica, instead of lead guitar and we have the sax. we also do a wide range of music, including the Chinese songs and a few Dylan songs. We are very off the cuff, like to welcome jammers — including several of the BCB guys at different points and just mix stuff up and see what happens.

Black Cat Bone put on more of a show. They’re really high energy, very tight and polished and a bit less spontaneous in their approach. I like how hard they hit and enjoy their performances and would have welcomed playing shows together but for some reason they never really wanted to do that.

10 – When can we expect you again in Beijing and what keeps you coming back?
I’ll be back in June. I have a great excuse to come back because of the book, but I keep coming because I love it and I love my band. I would walk over the arctic circle to play for them. Luckily, I don’t have to do that. I live 15 minutes from the Newark Airport, where I can board a direct Continental flight.

Details of Saturday’s show:

The Orchard 果园

Hegezhuang Village, Cuigezhuang Township,
Shunyi
Located right behind the Beijing Riviera and Quanfa Gardens
崔各庄乡何各庄村
139-1121-1965, 6433-6270

http://www.cityweekend.com.cn/beijing/events/60598/