Beijing Beats
by Solomon West
Sick of overly repetitive electro-dance music? Well, DJ Stan "Macca" Liu has just the medicine to cure your disease. You'd better believe it, people - Hip Hop Beijing style has none of the street, none of the grit and none of the dissin'. Non-stop Beijing hip-hop-soul-funk (mostly from the Western pop charts over the last 8 years) that will leave no excuse for having your back up against the wall and your hands in your pockets.
We caught up with him in Vics, presiding over a crowd of boozed out hip-hoppers whose feet and hands were getting everywhere. We found ourselves bustled from the bouncers toward the dance floor, and I can tell you the booty shaking was just the start of the fun. As well as spinning, scratching and cutting the mix, Macca's trademark is his live Rap accompaniment, earning him the nickname "lyrical chef" from some people occasionally.
Stan attributes his hip-hop background to the area where he grew up - the Holiday Inn Lido International Serviced Apartments. "Them streets can be reel (misspelling guessed by ed.) tough. Sometimes there'd be arguments out there once or twice a month." The worst occurrences, remembers Stan, were the drive-by shoutings. "Having had to swerve out of the way when we were crossing the road, taxi drivers would start shouting at us from the window. If there were enough of us, we would shout back, but otherwise it's best to get down and stay down until they'd rolled on, man."
For those of you with an appetite for more than just yangrouchuanr, DJ Stan "Macca" Liu will be appearing at Vics and Mix this month. Also at all bars in Wudaokou, where he promises to get the student crowd strutting their booty on the floor, onto the streets, and all the way back to their university dorm rooms, convinced that they are cool and have had a good night.