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Third time lucky for Rolling Stones in China?
By Doug Young

SHANGHAI (Reuters) - The Rolling Stones will be hoping it's third time lucky in their bid to perform in China this weekend, but it remains to be seen if the censor pulls the plug on some of their racier lyrics.

The band is due to arrive in Shanghai on Thursday afternoon in preparation for a gig on Saturday, their third attempt to play in China.

The first attempt a quarter of a century ago, shortly after China began to open to the West, never got off the ground after a meeting between front man Mick Jagger and Chinese officials in Washington reportedly went poorly.



A second attempt in 2003, with stops set for both Shanghai and Beijing, had to be scrapped because of an outbreak of the SARS disease.

The Stones will find the China they visit even more capitalist than the one they would have seen just three years ago, with more skyscrapers and luxury goods shops, and consumers willing to shell out hundreds of dollars for a ticket.

Tickets range from 300 yuan ($37) for the cheapest seats all the way up to 10 times that amount, in a country where the annual per capita income is $1,700.

A call to the ticketing hotline revealed that all but the most expensive tickets had been sold for the concert at the 8,500-seat Shanghai Grand Stage on Saturday.

Shanghai is trying hard to reclaim its reputation as Paris of the East and is rising fast as Asia's newest financial center. Separated from stodgier Beijing by nearly 1,500 km (900 miles), it also sees itself at the cutting edge of Chinese music, boasting a slew of racy clubs and edgy bands in a land where syrupy love ballads still rule the airwaves.

The Stones could well get to test the limits of what the censors will tolerate this time around.

They were banned last time from playing four songs, "Honky Tonk Woman," "Brown Sugar," "Beast of Burden" and "Let's Spend the Night Together," due to lyrics that were deemed too racy for the mild mannered Chinese.

The group's "Forty Licks" album was also cut to just 36 for the Chinese rendition to excise the four offending songs.

Promoters have yet to say if similar limits will be placed on Saturday when the band will perform the latest stop on its "A Bigger Bang" world tour.

Despite a general easing of restrictions of late, China has shown that it's still careful about media that push the envelope.

Last week, news emerged that Rolling Stone magazine had to stop publishing in China after printing its first local edition.

Authorities said the magazine lacked the proper licenses, but at least one report speculated authorities may have been irked by a slate of articles with themes on both politically and socially sensitive topics.

The nation's broadcasting watchdog also clamped down on foreign-funded TV joint ventures last year, just months after opening up the sector to outside investment. Even online games have come under recent scrutiny for content deemed unhealthy to youth.

[cwemory]

"Brown Sugar" was not banned for being racy, it was banned for being racial. The Chinese objected to its depiction of interracial coupling, not its sexual content.

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Stones Censored but Raucous at China Show
By CHRISTOPHER BODEEN, Associated Press Writer
Sat Apr 8, 11:13 PM ET

SHANGHAI, China - Strutting, preening and greeting the audience in Chinese, the Rolling Stones made their debut in mainland China on Saturday in a censored — but still raucous — show.

The "world's greatest rock 'n' roll band" opened their show with "Start Me Up," a song with suggestive lyrics that apparently made it past the censors who banned five other hits. They then pounded through almost two hours of classic rock.



"Dajia hao ma?" — or "How's everybody doing?" — Mick Jagger yelled to the packed house at Shanghai's 8,000-seat indoor stadium, where the audience was overwhelmingly foreign. Some paid more than $600 each for tickets.

"It's nice to be here for the first time."

The concert had all the trademark Stones touches, from ringing guitars to falling confetti and huge inflatable dolls.

Chinese rock pioneer Cui Jian prompted appreciative cheers when he joined Jagger for the ballad "Wild Horses." Cui was temporarily banned from performing after the deadly June 4, 1989, military crackdown in Beijing's Tiananmen Square on student protesters, for whom "Nothing to my Name" had become an anthem.

In another reminder of the heavy hand of China's authoritarian government, the Stones were told not to sing five of their songs, apparently because of their suggestive lyrics.

The songs were believed to be "Brown Sugar," "Honky Tonk Women," "Beast of Burden," "Let's Spend the Night Together" and "Rough Justice." But "Start Me Up" slipped through.

Four decades into their career, the Stones remain relatively unknown in China. It did not help that ticket prices ranged up to $374 — about three months' wages for most Chinese.

Still, Chinese audience reaction seemed largely positive, if a little preoccupied with the band's longevity.

"So old, and yet he can really perform," Song Jianghong said, referring to Jagger, 62.

Beijing resident Xue Liang said the Stones enjoyed cult status in China.

"They were among the first acts whose music was smuggled in. To see them here in China now is just amazing," Xue said.

Talking to reporters before the show, Cui hailed the concert as a "milestone" for him and all rock music fans in China.

"It is a big moment. I will never forget this," said Cui, who said he believed rock 'n' roll needed another five years to truly find its audience in China.

At a Friday news conference, Jagger said he was not surprised to be censored, but added acerbically: "I'm pleased that the Ministry of Culture is protecting the morals of the expat bankers and their girlfriends that are going to be coming."

He added that the Stones had another 400-plus tunes they could play.

The performance seemed a little rough before Cui's appearance, which led into a raucous performance of "Midnight Rambler" followed by other favorites including "Gimme Shelter," "Tumbling Dice," "Jumpin' Jack Flash" and "(I Can't Get No) Satisfaction."

Dressed in tight black pants and a sequined T-shirt, Jagger strutted across the stage, sometimes skipping along a catwalk stretching into the audience. He egged on the crowd with call-and-response shouts of "ohttp://www!" and urged them to join in on choruses, shouting out "zai yiqi!," or, "all together!"

"It's the first time for them in China so it's something special," said Dietl, who said he first saw the Stones in Munich, Germany, in 1973.

He played down the political significance of the band's appearance.

"I don't think Mick Jagger is going to call for the freedom of Tibet," he said.