Petting
Zoo
Sharon
Li
The
coolest musical purple dinosaur since Barney is coming to
China
. Mochipet (David Wang), born in Taiwan, is an experimental
electro hip-hop act whose uniquely frenetic style comes from a
childhood of mainstream hip hop, avant garde jazz, and metal
guitar.
Where
did you get that dinosaur suit?
My
friend had that suit in her closet that someone had given her. She
told me I should wear it for the record release party (of “Baby
Godzilla”). I did and the rest is dinosaur history.
Your
number one friend on Myspace is Charles Darwin. What gives?
I
think Charles Darwin is funny because in the music world, there is
no such thing as natural selection. Usually, the worst songs and
musicians rise to the top of the charts. This seems to be the
running joke in my life.
Your
music has been described as ‘breakcore’. Why do you think
everyone throws the suffix ‘core’ into descriptions of their
genres? What does it even mean?
I
think core means hard? Like hardcore? I make some pretty
aggressive music sometimes, so maybe that stuff gets lumped into
breakcore? The one thing I do like about breakcore is its punk
rock DIY aesthetics and its openness to sounds. Breakcore can be
slow and it can be fast, loud or quiet. I think it’s the new
punk rock for electronic music, yet to be defined.
You
have your own record label,
Daly City
Records. What kinds of artists do you sign?
We
have anything from noise to hip-hop to techno, with a splash of
death metal mustard in between. Mostly, I like experimental music
with a pop element.
What
can we expect this year?
The
new releases coming out later this year on Daly City Records are
mostly hip-hop and instrumental beat oriented stuff. Wonkey and
bass-y stuff with a sense of dance. A lot of really slow music
that sounds really fast for some reason.
Who
have you had the most fun working with?
Weasel
Walter of the Flying Luttenbachers. [He was] very well mannered
and quite the gentleman, but on the drums, he was an all-out
madman. Something between the Muppets and Dave Lombardo from
Slayer.
What
other passions do you have besides music?
I
like many things: philosophy, cooking, snowboarding, drawing, but
I hardly have any time. Music keeps me pretty busy.
What
if you had to choose a dream job other than music?
I’d
want to be like Andrew Zimmern on Bizarre Food from the Travel
Channel. I love food, travelling, and discovering new things, so
it would be perfect for me.
And
your dream project?
I
want to host an episode of Iron Chef with world famous musicians
battling it out, cooking fried chicken as they remix one of my
tracks. For the judges, I would have Neil Diamond, Perez Hilton,
Jet Li, and Dave Chappelle.
What
do you do after playing a show?
Usually
relax, have a beverage, and take off my purple dragon suit while I
wipe the rivers of sweat off my body.
RMB
50. Saturday August 15. The Shelter, 5 Yongfu Lu, near Fuxing Xi
Lu. Tel: 6437 0400
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