Because registration for bands, vendors and artists for this year's Spring Scream began only earlier this week, the concert's organizers are not yet able to provide a full list of the acts that will perform. So Taipei Times has tracked down some bands that have played at previous Spring Screams and that hope to make the annual pilgrimage between April 5 and April 8 to Liu-fu Ranch (
Psychedelic Kindergarten (迷幻幼稚園)
PHOTO COURTESY OF PSYCHEDELIC KINDERGARTEN
Psychedelic Kindergarten is a goth-rock band with a touch of punk and modern rock. On stage, band members paint their faces black and white, wear black, and adorn themselves with other goth paraphernalia. Since Taiwan's goth scene is still barely embryonic, the band's members all lead double lives, with music fulfilling the Mr Hyde side of their personas. As for Dr Jekyll, the resounding example is Ah-chang (
PHOTO COURTESY OF CAPTAIN PEANUT
What Psychedelic Kindergarten (迷幻幼稚園) and Editec
Where Underworld (地下社會), 45 Shihda Rd. B1 (師大路145號B1)
When March 14, 10pm
Tickets NT$250
Captain Peanut
Over the last two years, Captain Peanut has shifted its focus from modern rock to bossa nova. The six-man group, which adds brass instruments to the standard rock ensemble, said they simply got fed up with being another underground rock band, said vocalist Abee (阿比). "Everyone's getting heavier and heavier," he said, referring to last year's Spring Scream, "and we said to ourselves we just can't do that." So the band, whose members found themselves listening to more and more jazz, began to take inspiration from the likes of Antonio Carlos Jobim and Stan Getz. But it was just inspiration, not a prefab plan. "We're not really pure bossa nova" said Abee, who says that the group was also listening to lounge music and Shibuya, a new type of Japanese musical fusion. "In Shibuya, you have samba, mambo, bossa nova, and they're all mixed with other things," he said. Sometimes that includes disco, rock or even grunge. In performance, Captain Peanut often transforms the stage into a miniature carnival, inviting friends and audience members onto the stage to play small percussion instruments. Though they have attended Spring Scream in the past, Abee worries that they may not be able to make it this year, as they are busy recording an album. The band will be playing tomorrow night at Zeitgeist with Darcy.
Nicole Darcy
According to rock/folk singer-songwriter Nicole Darcy: "After I went to India for the third time to see the Dalai Lama in 1991, I decided to get a guitar, move back to Taiwan and start singing." Ever since, she has been living in Tainan, where she composes songs and is fairly famous as the girl who walks around barefoot. Most songs are in Mandarin. Darcy, now 38, said she chose the language out of a combination of desires to connect with the local community and take something with her when she eventually leaves Taiwan, which she may do next year. She says that recently, when she returns to Minneapolis, Minnesota, she gets plenty of gigs on the basis of her Chinese songs. She recalls that her first major gig, however, was the first Spring Scream in 1995, and plans to play again this year. In addition to a show tomorrow at Zeitgeist, Darcy will also perform at the Underworld on March 13 and at Witch House on March 17 (see listings for details).
What Captain Peanut and Nicole Darcy
Where Zeitgeist (聖界), 122 Chunghsiao E. Rd., Sec. 2, B1 (忠孝東路二段122號B1)
When Tomorrow, 9pm
Tickets NT$250
For more information on registration, camping, transportation or other news surrounding Spring Scream, check: http://www.springscream.com.
In late October of 1873 the government of Japan decided against sending a military expedition to Korea to force that nation to open trade relations. Across the government supporters of the expedition resigned immediately. The spectacle of revolt by disaffected samurai began to loom over Japanese politics. In January of 1874 disaffected samurai attacked a senior minister in Tokyo. A month later, a group of pro-Korea expedition and anti-foreign elements from Saga prefecture in Kyushu revolted, driven in part by high food prices stemming from poor harvests. Their leader, according to Edward Drea’s classic Japan’s Imperial Army, was a samurai
Located down a sideroad in old Wanhua District (萬華區), Waley Art (水谷藝術) has an established reputation for curating some of the more provocative indie art exhibitions in Taipei. And this month is no exception. Beyond the innocuous facade of a shophouse, the full three stories of the gallery space (including the basement) have been taken over by photographs, installation videos and abstract images courtesy of two creatives who hail from the opposite ends of the earth, Taiwan’s Hsu Yi-ting (許懿婷) and Germany’s Benjamin Janzen. “In 2019, I had an art residency in Europe,” Hsu says. “I met Benjamin in the lobby
April 22 to April 28 The true identity of the mastermind behind the Demon Gang (魔鬼黨) was undoubtedly on the minds of countless schoolchildren in late 1958. In the days leading up to the big reveal, more than 10,000 guesses were sent to Ta Hwa Publishing Co (大華文化社) for a chance to win prizes. The smash success of the comic series Great Battle Against the Demon Gang (大戰魔鬼黨) came as a surprise to author Yeh Hung-chia (葉宏甲), who had long given up on his dream after being jailed for 10 months in 1947 over political cartoons. Protagonist
A fossil jawbone found by a British girl and her father on a beach in Somerset, England belongs to a gigantic marine reptile dating to 202 million years ago that appears to have been among the largest animals ever on Earth. Researchers said on Wednesday the bone, called a surangular, was from a type of ocean-going reptile called an ichthyosaur. Based on its dimensions compared to the same bone in closely related ichthyosaurs, the researchers estimated that the Triassic Period creature, which they named Ichthyotitan severnensis, was between 22-26 meters long. That would make it perhaps the largest-known marine reptile and would