Taiwan's biggest-ever international music festival opens today at noon in Taipei, kicking off three days of rock, rock and more rock. Modeled after Japan's Fuji Rock and other mega-shows from the US and Europe, the Formoz Festival's lineup calls for big name US bands, including Megadeth, Yo La Tengo and Biohazard, red hot and multimillion-selling Japanese thrash and punk groups, rap metal from Hong Kong and Singapore and a slew of local bands.
Most of Taiwan's 39 representatives at the concert will play today, serving as a warm-up for bigger things to come tomorrow and Sunday. Both days of the weekend will start off fast, featuring major draws early. Opposition Party (
"We met with the organizers of Fuji Rock several times, and they told us that the first band of the day is very important. Strong bands get people in and build the mood early," said Freddy (
Headliners tomorrow include the heavy girlcore of Japan's Yellow Machine Gun, the full body tattoos, rap and speed metal of Brooklyn's Biohazard and the slightly mellower Yo La Tengo. Sunday winds up with the rank Cantonese hip hop and thrash of Hong Kong rockers LMF, Freddy's own black metal ensemble, Chthonic (
As Taiwan's first-ever festival featuring a number of famous foreign rock bands, Formoz has also brought new organizational problems that few, if any, other concert in Taiwan have ever seen.
"Megadeth needs bodyguards," said Freddy. "I forget exactly how many, but a lot. And they might be bringing some of their own too. Then, the lead singer of Biohazard, Billy, he has his birthday on Saturday. So we have to throw a party. He says he wants it kind of crazy."
According to Freddy, the festival's metal bent stems partially from his own tastes, but mostly from chance. "Originally, we didn't think it would be so much," he said. "We approached around 30 foreign bands to see which gave the best response, and went from there. For a while, we were trying really hard to get Stereolab, but they didn't work out."
Later he added, "if we do it again next year, it will be different."
For this year, however, he's throwing a very heavy rock fest in an eminently suitable location, the Whashang Arts District (
Three-day festival passes cost NT$3,500 and allow camping. Tickets for today's show cost NT$500 and cost NT$1,999 tomorrow and Sunday. Attendance will be limited to 8,000 people. Concert-goers are permitted to bring in their own food and drinks. For those who forget to bring their own, beer, water, T-shirts and other rock concert paraphernalia will be on sale at the site.
“Why does Taiwan identity decline?”a group of researchers lead by University of Nevada political scientist Austin Wang (王宏恩) asked in a recent paper. After all, it is not difficult to explain the rise in Taiwanese identity after the early 1990s. But no model predicted its decline during the 2016-2018 period, they say. After testing various alternative explanations, Wang et al argue that the fall-off in Taiwanese identity during that period is related to voter hedging based on the performance of the Democratic Progressive Party (DPP). Since the DPP is perceived as the guardian of Taiwan identity, when it performs well,
The Taiwan People’s Party (TPP) on May 18 held a rally in Taichung to mark the anniversary of President William Lai’s (賴清德) inauguration on May 20. The title of the rally could be loosely translated to “May 18 recall fraudulent goods” (518退貨ㄌㄨㄚˋ!). Unlike in English, where the terms are the same, “recall” (退貨) in this context refers to product recalls due to damaged, defective or fraudulent merchandise, not the political recalls (罷免) currently dominating the headlines. I attended the rally to determine if the impression was correct that the TPP under party Chairman Huang Kuo-Chang (黃國昌) had little of a
At Computex 2025, Nvidia CEO Jensen Huang (黃仁勳) urged the government to subsidize AI. “All schools in Taiwan must integrate AI into their curricula,” he declared. A few months earlier, he said, “If I were a student today, I’d immediately start using tools like ChatGPT, Gemini Pro and Grok to learn, write and accelerate my thinking.” Huang sees the AI-bullet train leaving the station. And as one of its drivers, he’s worried about youth not getting on board — bad for their careers, and bad for his workforce. As a semiconductor supply-chain powerhouse and AI hub wannabe, Taiwan is seeing
Jade Mountain (玉山) — Taiwan’s highest peak — is the ultimate goal for those attempting a through-hike of the Mountains to Sea National Greenway (山海圳國家綠道), and that’s precisely where we’re headed in this final installment of a quartet of articles covering the Greenway. Picking up the trail at the Tsou tribal villages of Dabang and Tefuye, it’s worth stocking up on provisions before setting off, since — aside from the scant offerings available on the mountain’s Dongpu Lodge (東埔山莊) and Paiyun Lodge’s (排雲山莊) meal service — there’s nowhere to get food from here on out. TEFUYE HISTORIC TRAIL The journey recommences with