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LUOYANG ROCK

LUOYANG was the ancient capital of many of the earlier dynasties in China. For its glamorous past, little remained, and the little remains of the old town will inevitably give way to modern development. My encounter here is nevertheless unique; Chinese Rock bands supported by modern music education setup by members of these bands. Many of these rock bands rent a practice studio, audition using combo amp box, with the vocals mixed in using an aux channel – it worked!

Featured here is an emerging Chinese rock band – Hermit (北过先生) singing “A Wanderer’s Whisper” (游子呤), lending their voice to speak of those who comes from the countryside into a city. The first video captures their rehearsal in their studio, filmed with Olympus E-M1mkII + M.Zuiko 7-14 F2.8 and another Olympus E-M1mkII + M.Zuiko 17mm F1.8, audio recorded direct into camera with the Roland CS-10EM Binaural microphone – put on headphone for realistic monitoring. At DCI 4K resolution and ISO3200 on wide angle, the results were pleasing. Also featured is the live recording of the same song from the Behringer X32 digital desk USB out, mixed using Logic X.

Audio in bigger China is a rather complex situation. Tolerance for bad sound is extremely high, from the music in the park to rock concerts. Almost everyone seemed tolerant of absolutely distorted sound at extreme levels. This makes sound engineering redundant!

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