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James’ first visit to China to play a festival in Beijing’s Ritan Park
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James – The Highpoint of Heineken Beat Music Festival – Beijing Evening News
For every person present in Ritan Park for the Heineken Beat Music Festival, the 90 minutes from 21:30 to 23:00 on May 13th, will be very hard to forget. The explosive atmosphere created by the UK’s James gave people a real idea of the power of popular rock and roll music. At last Beijing had the chance to experience this kind of passionate and exciting live music performance.
The difference between the wild cheers and waving arms and dancing feet at Ritan and the enthusiasm of the thousands of people last year at the worker’s stadium for Zhang Huimei’s concert was fundamental. First of all, on stage was a famous band from one of the original homes of rock and roll and secondly, the music resounding in the arena was far more likely to set the blood pumping in your veins.
When James was announced, the trees just outside the wall surrounding the altar of the sun were full of people. On May 13th there was an audience of more than ten thousand people in the park, both inside and outside the arena.
China Stands For James – Music 365
Despite the implications of their anthem Sit Down, James have made history in China by becoming the first western band to be granted a standing and dancing crowd.
Normally strict crowd controls were relaxed at the Heineken Beat Music Festival, held at Ritan Park in Beijing, where more than 10,000 people rocked to the Mancunian indie stalwarts’ set. The reaction to the concert has been dramatic enough to spawn two half-hour documentaries on the band, which were recently screened on Chinese TV.
In the Beijing Evening News, China’s most popular newspaper, a review of the concert positively fizzed with enthusiasm: “The explosive atmosphere created by the UK’s James gave people a real idea of the power of popular rock and roll music. At last Beijing had the chance to experience this kind of passionate and exciting live music performance.”
Well, tonight was a game of two halves. There’s no other way of describing it. Because, even to die-hard James lovers, most of the gig was excruciatingly dull.
They kick off the set – well, drift off really – with a swoony lullaby.. It is beautiful, it is serene, but it’s not the hand-clappy choral chant that the crowd are here to see. The first half of the set, mainly lifted from last year’s frankly appalling ‘Millionaires’, would be more appreciated in the confines of a well-padded lounge or boudoir. Well, somewhere comfortable, anyway, should you feel an urge to sleep.
And while the music sounds milky and ineffectual, Tim slithers, pivots and raspberry ripples around his little iso-booth world – what is the Perspex for? To fend off the sweat splashes of the pretty string section, one suspects.
This ‘mature’ James have left all the fun behind. There’s no whooping, yodeling or spasming in their new material, but that’s what we want. A glimpse of greatness sneaks out with ‘Destiny Calling’ but the lid is firmly pressed down to make way for more of James’ newest sound, monotony.
As the night drags by, it’s gradually punctuated with hits, a rogue ‘Say Something’ here, a renegade ‘I Know What I’m Here For’ there, and its so obvious that the audience aren’t here to be wooed by smooches or serious propositions. They want to jump and clap and whoop and wail.
You start to think James need a lesson or two in assembling a setlist; when you have a handful of hits, it’s always best to include them in the set, for instance. Witness the rapturous reception of the EMF-esque ‘Come Home’, or the godsend of ‘Laid’, which conjures up a huge anthemic explosion.
So there’s no ‘Sit Down’ – fair enough, this isn’t a youth centre disco – but it does climax with the goods, the pure pop that James are all about. The encores burst into crescendos of strings and guitars and the audience finally get to whoop their little hearts out
Beguiling us with an encore of hits so we leave feeling elated; a cheap trick, but everyone falls for it.
Part of MTV’s 5 Night Stand series of gigs. Support came from Coldplay.
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James sketch about 20 demos during a two-week studio session.
James are off to China next month to become one of the few western rock bands ever to play in Beijing.
The band are set to perform at the fabulously named Altar Of The Sun in the Chinese capital over the weekend May 13-14, as part of the Heineken Beat 2000 festival.
Also on the bill is Afrobeat king Femi Kuti as well as local Chinese acts. Last year’s Heineken festival was the first such outdoor event ever held in China.
James’s Chinese fanbase is said to be “small but passionate.” Meanwhile the band also plays V2000 this summer and is due to start recording an early follow-up to last year’s Millionaires album.
Source: Music 365, 13 April 2000
A track not used from the Millionaires sessions, although it had been played live in 1998, that appeared on the TV series featuring Vic Reeves and Bob Mortimer. It later featured on the 2004 compilation album The Collection.
Confusion
Release Name: | Randall and Hopkirk Deceased |
Artist Name: | James |
Release Date: | April 2000 |
Format: | Compilation (non James) Album |
Catalogue: | 31454-25552 |
Related Release(s): |
A track not used from the Millionaires sessions, although it had been played live in 1998, that appeared on the TV series featuring Vic Reeves and Bob Mortimer. It later featured on the 2004 compilation album The Collection.