Get In The Van: Making My Bones in the Shanghai Underground

On that time I jumpstarted an unlikely Chinese expat rock scene …

SHOWTIME!

Stepping off the bus, guitar in hand, into the dark and damp Shanghai winter, the scene was exactly as I had envisioned it in my wildest dreams. Draped in my faux fur overcoat, backpack full of guitar pedals slung over my shoulder, I gripped a can of beer with the other hand and walked through the horde of fans lined up outside Live Bar for tonight’s Get In The Van show.

Entering the venue, the frigid outdoor chill was immediately met by an invisibly thick wall of humidity. The air was stuffy and stale from a mix of heavy cigarette smoke and the overbearing stench of sweat, emanating from the hundreds of concertgoers crammed inside, on the dance floor, standing atop the bar, climbing up the walls. For years I had fantasized of such a scene, and tonight, February 22, 2008, it was all coming together.

I arrived just as Boys Climbing Ropes, the opening band, played the final chorus and coda of their closing number, “A Pleasure to Be Here.” And, with every step I took towards the stage, the sea of rabid fans parted, providing a clear path towards the back of the house. It was time for the Rogue Transmission, my rock and roll quartet, to light our fuse and ignite this highly flammable crowd. It was time for me to have this moment I had been preparing for, for what seemed like a lifetime.

Playing to sell-out crowds wasn’t exactly new to me. I spent my childhood traveling the globe as part of the American Boychoir, a world class ensemble dubbed “America’s singing boys.” Performing at Carnegie Hall on a few occasions, along with famous venues like the Kennedy Center, Boston Symphony Hall, and Lincoln Center, with renowned conductors like Seiji Ozawa and Andre Previn, all before I turned 13, I even sang on a couple million-selling Christmas albums. There were live appearances on “The Today Show” and the “Hour of Power,” and recording sessions for a handful of nationally syndicated commercials, but this was something entirely different.

After years of gigging around Boston, New York, San Francisco, and Los Angeles, to basically zero fanfare, with bands like Native Dancer, the Wanton, and Vin Rouge, I had finally found my crowd. This was my church. I was its reverend. And tonight, just one year after arriving in Shanghai, I was about to deliver my most electrifying sermon to date.

The seeds for Get In The Van dated back to a brutally hot and muggy night in July 2007. I had just met Morgan Short, and we were drinking cheap cans of warm beer at a massive warehouse party-slash-open studio event. The humidity bubble had been building for weeks. The air was dense, keeping everyone on edge. That evening, the monsoon rains would finally erupt, covering Shanghai in storm showers for the coming fortnight, but earlier in the day, Morgan and I met at Eno, a local t-shirt and streetwear brand, where our bands shared a bill at an in-store performance.

At the time, I was still rather new to the city, first landing at Hongqiao Airport in February 2007 after close to half a year in central China. Within a month of my arrival, I was already playing lead guitar for the Huhu Mamas, a French-English quartet that adopted me as their wild American sideman. Expat life was fast and fleeting, transient and momentary by nature. I had no idea how much longer I’d stay in China, so I jumped at the chance to join the indie band and play a few shows, even if it was only for a few months.

Morgan and his group, Boys Climbing Ropes, took the Eno stage first. They were already a bit more established, and jetted off almost immediately afterward for a second gig, a coveted slot at the Zhijiang Dream Factory. We made quick introductions while swapping out gear, and agreed to meet up at the warehouse later that night.

Morgan was a seasoned expat, born into the overseas life, who had been in Shanghai for a few years by then. He ran the rather influential Smart Shanghai nightlife website, which was sort of thee listings bible for foreigners at the time. A conspicuous 6-foot-4 with curly hair and a quarter-sleeve tattoo on his forearm, Morgan was jaded and cynical, whip smart with a sharp and cutting wit, always quick to toss out a well-timed jab or sleight. Our senses of humor were an instant match, and we became fast friends.

While scores of local Shanghainese and Chinese mixed with hundreds of French, German, Canadian, American, and English expats, imbibing copious amounts of booze and ecstasy, Morgan and I talked shop at the warehouse, comparing notes on bands we liked, groups we had played in, and the upcoming Rock It! festival, where a few dozen acts from Beijing would play at the local Dino Beach water park. Surrounded by an international smorgasbord — there were Italians, Australians, Bulgarians, Taiwanese, Japanese, Indonesians, Singaporeans, Ecuadorians, and Spaniards, as well as a few Irish, Swedes, and Chileans in the mix at any given time — we knew there was space in Shanghai’s decadent party culture to cause a stir and build a local rock scene with a dedicated audience.

It’s not like we were inventing the wheel, or even re-inventing it for that matter. Rock bands in Shanghai dated back more than a decade, with local groups like Wu Jun’s (吴峻) Godot (戈多) and Zhang HaiSheng’s (张海生) 维多利亚空间 having come and gone, paving the way for the next generation of slicker, U2-influenced acts like the Honeys, Hanging Gardens, Flying Fruit (羽果), and Plastic Chocolate. There was an emerging pop-punk and nu-metal circuit with bands like the Mushrooms (蘑菇团) and Little Nature (小自然) on the rise, but those groups all took themselves way too seriously, trying to emulate western bands in the hopes that they’d become nationally famous, whatever that meant.

There were also more critically acclaimed groups like Cold Fairyland, which mixed rock elements with traditional Chinese instruments, 33 Island (三三岛), Muscle Snog, and Top Floor Circus, the highly controversial G.G. Allin-inspired folk-punk pranksters. They didn’t mix with foreigners much, though, and Morgan and I imagined something entirely different anyway.

We knew rock music didn’t exactly fit in with the overall party vibe in Shanghai, where international DJs and button pushers would draw all the giant crowds. Shanghai was a sophisticated and cosmopolitan metropolis, a mega city, synonymous with wealth and opulence, but we still felt there was room for something raw and edgy, where garage, punk, and indie groups could come together to play big shows.

Living abroad, in China, we were always operating on combustible, borrowed time. Our expat existence was temporary by design, with worldwide transplants arriving and departing year over year. Unbound from the limitations of permanence, we felt free and empowered to be hyper-realized versions of ourselves, determined to make our dreams and desires a reality. Now it was time to force the city to pay attention.

We didn’t exactly figure it all out that very first night, but we did settle on our first collaboration: a Halloween tribute set as the Misfits, where I’d leave the guitar behind and go full Danzig to Morgan’s Jerry Only. Our group, Horror Business, would be rounded out by Morgan’s bandmates, with Jordan Small on guitar and Devin Gallery on drums.

Thanks to our friend Reggie Bape, a Burmese-Australian DJ/producer who was one of the founding members of the S.T.D. party collective, Horror Business was able to score a primetime slot at their 2007 Halloween show at 4Live, one of the bigger venues in town. However, our rehearsals were so brilliant that we conjured up the idea for a second show that would feature a full night of tribute acts. We booked LOgO, everyone’s favorite dive hangout on Xingfu Rd. (幸福路), for the bill, which was rounded out by Mortal Fools (大傻冒樂隊) playing a set of Ramones tunes, and Kidney Stone channeling the Sex Pistols. We promoted the event as Punks for Monks, with all proceeds going to Prospect Burma, a charity in Yangon, in the wake of the Saffron Revolution.

The response to both shows was overwhelming. Expats and locals alike were floored by our Misfits set, complete with custom coiffed devil lock wigs and makeup, some not even realizing it was a tribute act. From start to finish, Horror Business incited pure chaos on the dance floor, with the mosh pit bumping from the very first notes of “We Are 138” to the closing chords of “Astro Zombies.” We were an instant hit, and plenty of performance offers came in to revive the group. We declined them all.

Morgan, Jordan, and Devin were busy recording their debut EP as BCR, and I was focused on my next project, a group that I had been envisioning for years: The Rogue Transmission.

The margins of expat life are super thin, thrill and novelty abundant at every corner. Whatever conveniences we gave up by leaving our home countries behind, we made up for by living fast and living now. We drank and bonded, intensely, almost every night, embracing new friends and experiences daily.

Random, chance encounters were everywhere in Shanghai, so when Fabien Barbet, the French drummer who first brought me into the Huhu Mamas, invited his college buddy from Lille, Clement Bouvron, to 0093, our damp and dank underground-bomb-shelter-turned-rehearsal-space, I welcomed the chance to add new players and vibes to the jam.

The Huhu Mamas had already played a few solid shows, notably the Rock for Roots & Shoots benefit and a rather wild lawn party at the Belgian Consulate for their national day, but the band was clearly stalling. Clement, on the other hand, was a good fit for where I wanted to take some new original material, so I huddled with Fabien about starting a new group. After one rehearsal as a trio, we drafted John Lynch, the formidable and strapping London-Irish bassist from the Huhu Mamas, onto our fledgling squad.

Hunkering down on Lingling Rd. (零陵路) a few nights a week to work on songs and arrangements, the Rogue Transmission came together rather quickly. I had a couple of tunes ready to go, and Fabi and John were already locked in tight. Clem brought in a few more riffs and we found our boogie woogie punk groove pretty soon thereafter.

There were only so many rock bands, venues, and promoters in Shanghai, so when word got out that we were putting a new group together, it was rather easy to land some of the better gigs in town, which were, quite often, at LOgO for the monthly S.T.D. shows.

First playing an unannounced warm-up set at the relatively new Yuyintang (育音堂) location on Kaixuan Rd. (凯旋路) — it has since gone on to be the epicenter of Shanghai’s rock scene for the last 15 years — we booked our “official debut” at an S.T.D. show at LOgO, opening up for Hush, a Britpop influenced band from Xi’An.

LOgO was really our home base, a playground for the expat scene of DJs, bands, artists, poets, writers, and promoters to drink until the sun came out. Seven nights a week, LOgO was the place to be. Whether I was donning formal attire for my weekly black-tie Monday chats with the Germans over minimal techno, skanking around the dance floor on Fridays to the reggae and dub beats of the Uprooted Sunshine Soundsystem, or drinking pints with the owner, Tai Pei, on off nights, LOgO was where our jet set generation of semi-legal expats and travelers convened.

There were endless impromptu sets from the jazz players in town and the legendary weekly jam sessions, where I’d trade vocal riffs with host John Nguidjol from time to time. Musicians and miscreants from every corner of the globe gathered here to exchange licks and trade energies. It was ground zero for an emerging class of international exile artists, and on December 1, 2007, the Rogue Transmission stepped onto the stage and tore through our four-song, 15-minute set. Short. Sweet. Left the crowd wanting much, much more.

Just weeks after the Rogue Transmission made its mark as a new local band to watch, Clement and John returned to France and England for Christmas and New Years. To keep some momentum, Fabien and I embarked on brief collaboration with Morgan we called Normandie (emphasis on the DIE) a group that included Brice Bougreau from the Huhu Mamas, Sheena Du of Hard Queen, and Little Punk (小朋克), who was now at the front of Boys Climbing Ropes.

The project, a bizarro Shanghai supergroup of sorts, was never meant to last. We just put a set together because we were offered a paying gig by Sam Dust from Chaos Mind, and you didn’t want to say no to Sam Dust from Chaos Mind. The most lovely dreadlocked Chinese metalcore stalwart there ever was, Sam Dust booked Normandie at the “Rock Your Santa” 07 Rock n’ Roll Christmas Party, which was really just a shopping event at a new mall. It was one of the many obscure shows we played outside of the club and festival circuits.

Shanghai was kind of like that back in the late aughts. The most random promoters, with straight cash marketing budgets, would come looking for foreigners to play at any number of branded events. The proposals were often impractical, sometimes outrageous, but we’d say yes from time to time. It was hard to decline these shows since they paid much better than most rock gigs. And, without a legit, steady job or work visa at the time, I’d say yes to the 4,000 RMB budget from the Xuhui District Entertainment Bureau for a set at Bourbon Street, a tourist trap on Hengshan Rd. (衡山路) where Filipina bar girls would entertain elderly foreign businessmen, or 2,500 RMB to play before a student fashion show in Xintiandi.

There were at least a dozen jazz players in Shanghai living comfortably off performance fees from these ridiculously themed parties. DJs would earn even more. My infamous handlebar moustache pushed the asking price a bit higher, once fetching 5,000 RMB to noodle electroclash guitar riffs atop a 15-foot-high catwalk in the middle of the dance floor at Attica, a super club on the historic Bund. The event was a launch for Beefeater gin. French DJ VVIP and I rehearsed for all of one hour, and I was able to live off the proceeds for more than a month. Not bad for 20 minutes of work.

Normandie came and went, as did the close of 2007. We rang in the new year at the S.T.D. party at the Atanu lighthouse on the Bund, and Morgan and I kicked off his thirtieth birthday – January 1, 2008 – brainstorming and conceptualizing our next grand effort: a two-venue rock extravaganza we’d call Get In The Van.

Named after the Henry Rollins book, Get In The Van was a unique concept in Shanghai. We’d bring the audience to the venue ourselves, loading hundreds of party people and dozens of cases of REEB beer — the cheapest beer around — onto buses, and shuttle them out to Live Bar (现场酒吧), a rather underutilized venue in the Yangpu District, where the owner was receptive to giving us an 80-percent cut of the door. Following the main bill, we’d load the buses back up and bring the masses back into the center of town for an afterparty at LOgO.

The emphasis was on the bands, but we always considered the audience, charging all of 30 RMB for the show. Bus tickets were another 10 RMB, bringing the grand total to roughly $5 USD for three bands, a ride, and unlimited cans of room temperature beer.

A novel idea, Get In the Van was no gimmick. It was a perfectly executed rock and roll circus. Pulling out all the stops, Morgan and I enlisted Banana Monkey, Shanghai’s it band at the time, to headline the show at Live Bar, while Hard Queen and DJ Boya would play the afterparty. Then, we printed more posters and flyers (designed to look like Chinese train tickets) than anyone could ever possibly need, plastering every venue, bar, and guitar shop with our advert.

There was a hard push in the local expat print media, with Get In The Van receiving pretty decent coverage from all the rags. SH Magazine, Shanghai Talk, and That’s Shanghai all ran promos, as did City Weekend Magazine, where I had just started freelancing stories a few months prior.

Small social media campaigns on Facebook (back when it still worked in China) and Douban helped spread the word. The response was huge and immediate, and bus tickets sold out in less than two weeks. The only issue was, we still didn’t have any buses.

Fortunately, in China, if you want something, you can probably find it, especially if you have the right guanxi. And with one simple phone call to Li Sisi, the local Shanghainese partner of the S.T.D. collective, four buses were booked, and even negotiated for a decent rate that helped us stay on budget.

With all the logistics set, it was time to focus on the most important parts: the music and the performance. 

Knowing that this would be a big showcase — we had over 200 RSVPs, with a strong inclination that there might be another 200 people waiting at the venue — the Rogue Transmission put in overtime at 0093, honing our chops, writing new songs, and tightening up our set, which was now up to a blistering 35 minutes.

We were peaking exactly when it mattered most, so we took the occasion to record our foot-stomping first single, “Wicked Devil Heart,” at 13D, a rehearsal spot in a thirteenth-floor apartment, where we set up four borrowed SM57 microphones and a D.I. box to track drums, bass, and guitars in an afternoon. Vocals were recorded in the same building, on the twenty-fourth floor, where we mixed with Albert Yu, a Canadian transplant and part of the original S.T.D. group, who was behind the console for many recordings of the era. It was the final piece of the puzzle in our perfect buildup to the show.

February 22, 2008 began like most any other day. I woke up late in the morning, still a little hungover from promoting Get In The Van the night before. After sucking down a few bottles of water, I went for an a jog and stretch around Xuhui Park.

Spending the next couple of hours to run through all the songs on guitar, transcendentally meditate, and do a series of vocal warmups, I ate a light dinner before hopping in the shower, tossing on the eyeliner, and throwing together an ensemble: a lavender button down with the sleeves cut off, skin tight jeans, tan platform boots, and the faux fur overcoat I was gifted in San Francisco years earlier.

With the sun still setting early, I headed to Dingxi Rd. (定西路), near C’s Bar, where we had arranged for everyone to gather and meet our fleet of buses. It was a total mob scene on the street, but we were organized, quickly loading the first coach up with Boys Climbing Ropes and their fans, followed by a second busload of Shanghai’s finest international party people.

Before the third driver agreed to depart, he asked for more money, adding a last-second tax for bringing our own alcohol aboard. I wasn’t prepared for the spontaneous and unexpected shakedown, but Fabien came up clutch, as he often did, offering to spot me. He withdrew a couple thousand RMB from the ATM across the street — he knew I was good for it — and took off, captaining the next bus.

By the time the fourth coach pulled up, I was the last man standing on Dingxi Rd., with only my dear friend Krisha, who I had met on my very first night out as a Shanghai resident, there to join me for the journey to Yangpu. I definitely hadn’t miscalculated the bus list, but a few dozen folks had sent word that they would just meet us at the venue and take the ride back. So here I was, with my own private tour bus and the remaining cases of REEB. What a way to make an entrance.

While I was excited and eager to join the party and drink face with my people, I needed to stay relatively sober in order to pull off the performance the way I imagined it in my head. There were real big nerves, shockwaves of adrenaline, racing through my system during the ride. Traffic was backed up all along the Yan’an elevated road (延安高架路), severely killing my natural buzz, but Krisha kept things calm and light during the ride, recollecting about how she took me to a gay club the time we first met. When we arrived at Live Bar, I could see my destiny waiting.

Walking onto that stage, that night, I felt invincible. My hands were a tad bit shaky, but after setting up my pedals, plugging into the backline amp, and doing a short line check, the nerves subsided. Fabien, Clement, John, and I quickly embraced to wish each other luck. We then assumed the position and proceeded to melt every single face in that venue.

Busting out the gate with “Wicked Devil Heart,” we ripped through our limited-yet-powerful repertoire, captivating the crowd with every riff, every lick, every chorus, and every shimmy. Originals like “Switchblade Sucker,” “Frogs, Frogs, Frogs,” and “Candle to Burn” received deafening applause, as did the pair of tried-and-true cover tunes we played at every show: “Speaking in Tongues” by Eagles of Death Metal, and “Ex Lion Tamer” by Wire.

The performance was magnetic. It was electric, incendiary, you name the adjective, and I was completely drained from pouring my heart out and emptying my emotional gas tank onto that stage. Numb as I was, there was also a reciprocal high from the warmth, and energy, and adoration bestowed by the crowd, appreciative for this chance to party at the altar of rock and roll. Just half a year after our first jam, the Rogue Transmission was officially the new hot band in town, and I celebrated by double fisting cans of REEB, pogo-ing in the mosh pit to Banana Monkey’s boozy garage tunes.

There are moments in life when we burn brighter than others, and my flame was white hot that night. The remainder of the evening — the bus ride back, the after party at LOgO, the shots and beers and spliffs until well after sunrise — was one shining flash after the next, fan after fan wanting to share a drink, and also curious about when we were going to do it again. Praise was at an all-time high and I needed a few days to come down off the mind-altering experience.

Following the success of Get In The Van, I returned to New Jersey for the first time since touching down on the Chinese mainland 18 months before. My family and friends on the east coast were hoping that I’d stick around the U.S. for a while, but I had different ideas. With two months still remaining on my multi-entry “F” business visa, I was intent on returning to China as soon as possible to keep the momentum going for the Rogue Transmission.

Morgan and I continued our frequent collaborations over the next five years, focusing on our monthly soul night, the Mod Dance Party. Our bands also shared stages and bills on countless occasions, playing club shows and festivals around China. However, the award-winning Get In The Van — City Weekend Magazine presented me with a novelty “Party of the Year” plaque a few months later — wouldn’t last much longer, as the opportunism of Chinese band managers and venue owners would make the bills, the buses, and the free beers economically unsustainable.

Booking a sequel in June 2008, headlined by Joyside, and then a trilogy show in April 2009, co-headlined by The Gar and 24 Hours, the events were still successful, but financially, we barely broke even after flying the groups down from Beijing, putting them up in hotels, and giving them a per diem, in addition to the lofty performance fees.

There were never any hard feelings. Get In The Van had come to its natural conclusion, but not before solidifying this nascent Shanghai rock scene that was so badly in need of some direction and cohesion. Besides, I was busy with my own group, writing new material with Fabien, Clement, and John for the Rogue Transmission’s next endeavor, the Rock/Electro Ratio Tour, which would bring us to Ningbo and Nanjing before making our long-awaited Beijing debut at D-22.

But that’s an entirely different story, for another time …

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• Additional photos courtesy of Tim Franco, Heather Coe Nesbitt, City Weekend Magazine, Smart Shanghai, SH Magazine, That’s Shanghai, Shanghai Talk, and some Facebook users.