Since forming in 1999, Wang Wen have earned their moniker as China’s premier post-rock band. The Dalian group has shared international stages with genre giants like Mogwai, collaborated with peers in Godspeed! You Black Emperor and will embark on a national tour to celebrate their upcoming eighth album 8 Houses.
Guitarist Xie Yugang credits the band’s longevity to curiosity. “What keeps us going on is that we still have new ideas about music that we want to keep expressing,” he says. “We’re all interested in new things and hate to always be playing the same style.”
Listening to 2010’s sophisticated 0.7, it’s hard to imagine Wang Wen was formed by two guitarists, Xie and Geng Xin, obsessed with the Smashing Pumpkins. Their first drummer Zhou Dan named the group, a reference to the idiom “Zhi ruo wang wen” – basically to act as if one hadn’t heard and the lineup eventually stabilized with bassist Xu Zengzheng, keyboardist Zhang Yanfeng and drummer Lian Jiang.
Over the course of three demos, the transitioned into an instrumental one. Although their 2003 debut Sleepless Days Diary emanates from an alternative nation, it struck a chord buoyed by lead single ‘The Dying Year End’.
With their success, Wang Wen became unlikely trailblazers in the Mainland’s nascent indie music scene. Subsequent albums were praised as bold steps forward musically as the band expanded their swelling soundscapes with Western and domestic influences, especially on 2007’s standout RE: RE: RE:.
They were the first Mainland group to release a vinyl record, toured Europe last year and had their music licensed by Nike and leading sixth-generation filmmaker for 2012’s Floating City Mystery.
Despite the accolades, the quintet remains loyal to their hometown. It’s only been a couple of years since Xie quit his job working at a shipyard and started the bilingual bookstore/café/live house Echo. He remains buzzed about the DanSheng Music Festival they organized days earlier – a multi-day gathering involving bands across China performing on the beach that they hope to organize every few months – and praises local groups Doc Talk Shock and Which Park.
“Dalian is a small city, even on the music side,” Xie says. “There are few bands that live here and much like other groups in other second or third tier cities, bands here are much more difficult than those in Beijing.”
8 Houses captures Wang Wen’s loyalty for their home and penchant for experimenting. They eschewed the studio to record in a small library in Dalian. Four producers, including P.K. 14’s Yang Haisong and Belgium indie-group Toman’s frontman Wouter Vlaeminckx worked on the record with ambient noises like cars parking outside mixed into its sounds.
“We were really tired of the common recording room’s sound and had played the library once. The sound there is very cool so why not try a new place?” Xie explains of the eight-song disc. “Each song is quite different and we wanted the producers to mix it in their own way.”
Shanghai fans will be able to hear the record when the group plays MAO Livehouse on June 28. For newcomers, Xie promises a dynamic show. “Some parts are very loud and some quite calm,” he says. “It’s very emotional.”
// June 28, 8.30pm-late, RMB80-100. MAO Livehouse.
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