Prog-tinged indie rockers and two-time Brit Award winners Muse join eight Taiwanese and foreign bands at today's Spirit of Taiwan (正義無敵) music fest, the latest incarnation of Taiwan Rock Alliance's (TRA) annual concert held to commemorate the 228 holiday.
The lineup includes Japanese punk girls Akiane (秋茜), anarchist indie rockers LTK Commune (濁水溪公社), revolutionary Czech group Plastic People of the Universe, exiled Chinese band Punk God (盤古), and US punk and melodic hardcore band Strike Anywhere. The festival runs from noon to 10:30pm at Taipei's Zhongshan Soccer Stadium (中山足球場). NT$1,500 tickets are available at the door.
Originally called "Say No to China" and later renamed "Say Yes to Taiwan" (the Chinese name "反中國併吞和平演唱會" translated as "Anti-China annexation peace concert") the concert has been held annually since 2000 on or around the 228 holiday, which commemorates the 1947 massacre of an estimated 20,000 Taiwanese by Chinese Nationalist Party (KMT) troops.
PHOTOS COURTESY OF TRA
Organizer and TRA head Freddy Lim (林昶佐) — whose death metal band Chthonic (閃靈樂團) takes the stage at 7:40pm — said the festival was given a new name to promote reconciliation amid Taiwan's mounting political and social problems. In recent years 228 has taken on an increasingly powerful meaning, especially since the rise of the Democratic Progressive Party (DPP), driving an enormous wedge between the ethno-cultural entities described by the terms Mainlanders (外省人) and Taiwanese (本省人).
Unlike past concerts that protested China's military threat or efforts by MTV and other entertainment media outlets to cozy up to Beijing, this year's themes are national unity, solidifying Taiwan's democracy and resolving conflicts left over from the country's authoritarian past.
Several of the foreign bands have a history of performing at human rights-related events — Muse performed at Live 8 and the Frank Zappa/Velvet Underground-influenced Plastic People of the Universe were instrumental in Czechoslovakia's resistance against communism. Others are known for their political stances — Strike Anywhere rails against police brutality and capitalism, Punk God's slogan is "revenge for the people" (為人民報仇), and Akiane frontwoman Moe Suzuki has marched with DPP members and written political music about Taiwan.
"We're strong believers in rock 'n' roll as the music of protest," said Punk God singer Ao Bo (敖博), who along with fellow band member Duan Xinjun (段信軍) decided not to return to China after performing at Say Yes to Taiwan a few years ago. During a stopover in Bangkok a friend called Duan to tell him that Public Security Bureau officers were casing his parents' home. Duan and Ao Bo received political asylum from and now live in Sweden.
This year's musical lineup is smaller than usual but performance-wise contains few weak links. LTK is known for its raucous and sometimes incendiary onstage antics, Tizzy Bac always attracts a legion of eager fans, and earlier this month Muse won a Brit Award for best British live act — the second time they have received the honor.
Also scheduled are screenings of films like Hotel Rwanda and The Story of 228 (傷痕二二八) and brief speeches on human rights between sets. A portion of the profits from Spirit of Taiwan will be donated to Amnesty International, Taiwan Association for Human Rights and Forum Asia Democracy.
In recent press conferences and television appearances, Freddy Lim has emphasized the inclusive nature of this year's event. The musicians, filmmakers and actors behind it represent all of Taiwan's ethnic and groups and both side of the pan-blue/pan-green divide.
On a Web forum for Muse fans, a poster who identified herself as a Taiwanese resident of New Zealand was spreading the message that the festival was "directed towards Taiwan's internal politics. … Anyone who'd still be so concerned about our neighbor across the strait would be very ignorant."
But another fan was unhappy about Muse's decision to headline the concert: "It's just that [the] theme of the festival that [sic] makes me feel not so comfortable … . It's an internal thing in China after all."
Speaking to the Taipei Times on Monday, Lim said that a who's who of Taiwan's political leaders, from KMT heavyweights Ma Ying-jeou (馬英九) and Wang Jin-pyng (王金平) to DPP Premier Su Tseng-chang (蘇貞昌) and President Chen Shui-bian (陳水扁), have promised to attend and sign a pledge to bring "transitional justice" to Taiwan.
Lim said the goal was a process similar to South Africa's Truth and Reconciliation Commission, in which the government opens all files related to 228 and the subsequent White Terror and the perpetrators are forgiven if they tell victims the truth about their deeds. "It will be a historic moment. Everyone should be there," he said.
Zhongshan Soccer Stadium is located at 1 Yumen St, Taipei (台北市玉門街1號), next to the Yuanshan (圓山) MRT station. For more information, visit www.spiritoftaiwan.com.
On Facebook a friend posted a dashcam video of a vehicle driving through the ash-colored wasteland of what was once Taroko Gorge. A crane appears in the video, and suddenly it becomes clear: the video is in color, not black and white. The magnitude 7.2 earthquake’s destruction on April 3 around and above Taroko and its reverberations across an area heavily dependent on tourism have largely vanished from the international press discussions as the news cycle moves on, but local residents still live with its consequences every day. For example, with the damage to the road corridors between Yilan and
May 13 to May 19 While Taiwanese were eligible to take the Qing Dynasty imperial exams starting from 1686, it took more than a century for a locally-registered scholar to pass the highest levels and become a jinshi (進士). In 1823, Hsinchu City resident Cheng Yung-hsi (鄭用錫) traveled to Beijing and accomplished the feat, returning home in great glory. There were technically three Taiwan residents who did it before Cheng, but two were born in China and remained registered in their birthplaces, while historians generally discount the third as he changed his residency back to Fujian Province right after the exams.
Few scenes are more representative of rural Taiwan than a mountain slope covered in row upon row of carefully manicured tea plants. Like staring at the raked sand in a Zen garden, seeing these natural features in an unnaturally perfect arrangement of parallel lines has a certain calming effect. Snapping photos of the tea plantations blanketing Taiwan’s mountain is a favorite activity among tourists but, unfortunately, the experience is often rather superficial. As these tea fields are part of working farms, it’s not usually possible to walk amongst them or sample the teas they are producing, much less understand how the
With William Lai’s (賴清德) presidential inauguration coming up on May 20, both sides of the Taiwan Strait have been signaling each other, possibly about re-opening lines of communication. For that to happen, there are two ways this could happen, one very difficult to achieve and the other dangerous. During his presidential campaign and since Lai has repeatedly expressed his hope to re-establish communication based on equality and mutual respect, and even said he hoped to meet with Chinese leader Xi Jinping (習近平) over beef noodles and bubble tea. More dramatically, as explored in the May 2 edition of this column,