Hong Kong Ham

Tonight at the Fringe, three bands from Beijing played to a good crowd on the eve of the Cure gig. That gig is significant in this case because it’s the reason these bands were here in the first place. They were here for the ‘Beijing Explosion’ — the first Beijing music party in Hong Kong for 13 years.

Due to stuffed capsicum curry at the Spicy Island on Lamma, I was an hour late to the show, which meant I missed a Filipino band that was brought in as late cover for the exciting Re-TROS, who, like, laptop artists Sulumi and Dead J, couldn’t get over the border because of visa problems.

I wrote about this gig for the South China Morning Post, and even going by the MySpace profiles and promo bios I thought Re-TROS would be the best, New Pants (above) would be stellar, Hedgehog could be promising (it turns out they also have a pint-sized, dynamo drummer), and PK14 would be the weakest. And so it proved.

Hedgehog were delightfully tight and tunefully shouty; New Pants started slow but displayed range and versatility, with each member of the band trying his hand at different instruments for songs dancing from punk to noise pop — their Korgist/bassist/robotic-singer was funktastic, especially in his spaghetti-strap wife-beater (which he wore underneath a tight-buttoned-heavily-starched white shirt); and PK14 was droney, self-indulgent and even played an uninvited encore. Most of the time they weren’t terrible, but it was a big mistake to have them on last.

Verdict? Two bands leagues ahead of what Hong Kong has to offer, and another that falls well back in the pack of what passes for rock here in the SAR.

Hedgehog — tight, fun, and a petite drummer who wields her sticks as if they were hot pokers.