Air Play in Beijing

The traffic and the haze are back to normal and now the foreign rocers are back too - an outburst by Bjork and a squeeze on visas kept a lot of people away. French electro rockers Air are first into the fray, coming to Beijing's Yugong Yishan tonight. How the hell can anyone afford the RMB700 you pay at the door to get in – 500 in advance? Local bricklayers and assembly line workers don't earn that in a month. Yugong Yishan didn’t charge anything for the one year birthday of their new venue, when the owners’ friends, the likes of Mickey Zhang and Meiwenti Sound came by to say a fairly electronic happy 'birthday to you.' I'm really keen to see how many people show up. Alternatively, you can have a good night of local rock for RMB30 (EUR3) at D-22 or Dos Kollegas.