Chapter 289

I woke up at 6:40, when the dog and the girlfriend came back from their morning walk. “He was so annoying”, she said, still half-asleep. The little pooch is used to his early morning chuquwar, even on days off. Well, our days off, because being the unemployed NEET that he is, every day is a day off for him.

She got ready to go to school to study for some teacher certification exam she’s about to take, and I drove her there though it’s only 25 minutes away on foot. Back home, I couldn’t get back to sleep so I slowly started my day, did a bit of yoga, packed my things and got in the car. I drove to Hangzhou, which took about three hours, and it was mostly smooth, with no traffic jams. The intermittent rain soon became torrential, and I had to be quite prudent, especially with the amount of average Chinese drivers swerving around. Still, it was a pleasant drive in our mighty little Nissan, listening to podcasts and music. The one that stood out was an album by暗狱戮尸 (The Dark Prison Massacre), one of the most highly regarded in the vibrant Chinese metal scene. They play some ridiculously brutal slam/brutal death metal but add a bit of tongue-in-cheek humor and bizarre passages with Chinese folk instruments or electro loops, which is welcome in such a linear and repetitive style. They will be touring soon and I’m highly considering taking the trip to catch them live.

I arrived at the hotel, checked in, and chilled in the room. I would have gone for a walk but it was still raining, so I read the book on the history of Franco-Americans/Quebec émigrés to New England. That chapter was talking about the absolute squalor they were living in in those boarding houses by the textile mills, with overcrowding, poor sanitation, malnourishment and outbreaks of typhoid fevers and diphtheria. And that was only about one hundred years ago. I’m so far removed from that world of precarious day labor and terrible living conditions, being a middle-class doofus with a relatively easy job and tons of disposable income and free time. I have to be thankful for that.

Then I took a nap for two hours, and woke up a bit before the Eccentric Belarusian was scheduled to arrive. He’s now addicted to jiu-jitsu, and took the endless train ride from Jinan for the tournament tomorrow. We sat in the room, caught up on the news and gossip, and then went to eat. We had a fantastic and inexpensive set meal at a rustic-looking restaurant, with a miso soup, bowl of rice, and stewed meat and potatoes for me, cauliflower and tofu for his vegan self. I gave him my rice, still worried about my weight. If I’m over 88.2 kg tomorrow, I’ll have to sweat it out.

We walked to the bar where a show was about to take place. It was a pretty cool venue, covered with posters of shows past and future, stickers from bands, and crude vulgar graffiti. Half was a normal bar, with preppy kids playing pool or sitting around drinking, and then there was the area with the stage. We got our tickets, and the gig started at 20:30 on the dot, which is surprising, they usually fuck around forever. A guy with a guitar played a solo rendition of Like a Rolling Stone and then his bandmates joined him for an energetic performance, fronted by a skinny girl with dyed hair, a torn up dress with Sex Pistols painted on it, and a very “I don’t listen to what society and daddy tell me” attitude. Against All turned out to be a very competent band for their young age, playing some punk rock with a very old-school garage vibe, and to keep stuff varied, they played a ska track that got us all to skank in the pit and also a song that felt nü-metalish, with a droning high-pitched guitar and rapping vocals.

A five-piece from Shenzhen with the pretty cool name What A Beautiful Day came next, on the post-hardcore/melodic/Billy Talent-style side of things. Not the kind of music I usually enjoy but when it’s live and well done, I’ll watch and bob my head. Their positive energy was contagious, and as someone who came from the metal scene, where people can be a bit jaded and elitist, I appreciate the breath of fresh air brought forth by hardcore bands.

Also worth mentioning and praising is the fact that their sets are much shorter than their metal counterparts, which can often feel 10-15 minutes too long. So it was barely 10 PM when Unregenerate Blood took the stage by storm. The intimidating Beijing-based hardcore squad churned out some tight and ultra-aggressive tough guy/NYHC that started good circle pits and had kids spinning around flailing their arms. It’s pretty cool that HxC musicians and fans look, act and dress exactly the same in China as in the west.

A great time was had by all, and we were in bed by 11.