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China's Beat Generation

It’s nearly 2:30 in the morning and I’m immersed in a sweaty sea of youthful bodies, bouncing and gyrating to the thumping bass of a top UK DJ.

To my left, through the smoky haze, I can make out a tall, scantily clad dancer on a podium, holding a captive audience as she demonstrates her amazing flexibility. To my right a slightly inebriated middle-aged businessman sits on a white leather couch, ordering another bottle of iced Veuve Clicquot for his gaggle of nubile, Versace-clad groupies. London? Paris? New York? No, this is Beijing on a pre-dawn Saturday, and scenes like this are now recreated in big city bars and clubs across China on a weekly basis.  

Urban nightlife in China has developed at breakneck speed over the last decade, as young and affluent Chinese search for new ways to have fun, spend their wads of renminbi and exhibit their wealth. One look at the car park outside Babyface in Beijing or Shanghai on a Friday night, and it’s immediately clear the dance floors and VIP lounges of the capital’s clubbing hotspots are still mainly the preserve of the rich and famous, hardly surprising when club entry can cost upwards of 300 yuan (nearly US$40). The expat crowd with whom they rub shoulders may be more knowledgeable about DJs and music genres, but the Chinese are playing catch-up, and certainly need no lessons on how to flout their sizeable wallets.

This nightly orgy of alcohol-fuelled reverie is light years away from the scene in China 25 years ago, when teahouses playing pop music were about as risqué as it got. Before that, most nocturnal activity was strenuously discouraged to encourage temperate habits and keep comrades safe. Tracing the entertainment timeline in China further back, the introduction in 1865 of gas lighting to Shanghai by an enterprising British company lit the way for the opening of a multitude of teahouses, bars and theatres, transforming the city into the buzzing, cosmopolitan, “sleepless” metropolis of the 1920s and 30s.  

For most of the 1980s, commercial dance halls were illegal in China. By the end of the decade, the karaoke craze was starting to sweep the nation, and al fresco pool tables lined the pavements. Today’s pulsating night scene was born in the mid-90s, when private money was pumped into the sector, and swanky new bars and clubs sprang up like mushrooms.

In 2002 the Chinese Government eased regulations for the granting of licenses to prospective nightclub, bar and KTV parlour owners. Official figures show that as a result the business of entertainment blossomed rapidly. In Beijing, licenses for more than 2,000 nightspots were ratified in just a few months. In reality China’s nightlife was already growing at an exponential rate, and authorities were taking steps to manage a virtually unregulated area of the economy. In March this year, a hastily drafted new local decree was passed which decreed that all entertainment venues had to close by 2 a.m. What effect, if any, this will have on Chinese drinking and dancing establishments is yet to be seen.

As in most countries, China’s top nightlife zones are found in the heart of the urban jungle. Hong Kong, Shanghai and Beijing offer virtually unlimited attractions for the nocturnal party animal, with huge numbers of bars and mega-clubs playing host to the very best DJs from Europe and North America. Hong Kong nightlife is probably the most highly developed in China, and will also put a sizeable dent in your wallet, with drink and admission prices to rival Tokyo and London. Shanghai offers an even bigger choice than Hong Kong, but lacks a real nightlife centre, with copious bars and clubs evenly distributed across the urban sprawl.  

Most foreign residents and Chinese partygoers in Beijing will be familiar with the city’s varied and ephemeral nightlife hotspots, each with a different character, each frequented by its own distinctive nightly crowd. Despite some major pre-Olympic facelifting operations, the renowned area around Sanlitun North and South Street is still jam-packed with a diverse range of bars and clubs catering to the tourist, resident expat and hip Chinese crowd. The environs of the nearby Workers’ Stadium and Chaoyang Park play host to a range of big, glitzy clubs, sucking up the late-night crowd and disgorging it, for better or worse, in the hours before sunrise.

For the slightly older, more Bohemian Beijing expat and Chinese crowd, the numerous cafes and bars encircling the waterfront at Houhai, and along the more recently established Nanluoguxiang nearby, provide the perfect hangout, with inexpensive drinks, live music, wireless Internet and a mildly cerebral ambience as standard. The old-meets-new formula of the comfortably stylish Passby Bar, tastefully integrated within a hutong, is typical of many of Nanluoguxiang’s watering holes. Passby owner Susan Wang says the key to success in running a Beijing bar is learning how to have fun. “We never advertise. We let our good food, relaxed environment and reasonably priced drinks do the talking. It’s important to let your enjoyment show through in your bar. Many owners worry too much about making a profit.”    

Of course, if you’re a Chinese club or bar owner, it isn’t simply a case of opening your doors and expecting the punters to roll in; today’s urban youth are a far more discerning crowd than in years gone by. Lily Li, manager of the Babyface nightclub on Gongti Xilu in Beijing, says the most difficult thing about running a Chinese club is staying ahead of the competition. Since the club was established in 2004, a number of other clubs have set up shop on nearby territory, each looking to tempt the party crowd with big name DJs, theme nights and drink offers. “Superstar DJs like John Digweed and Paul van Dyk can cost 250,000 yuan (US$31,752) or more per set to bring in; of course we have to ensure our club is full to make a profit. We also train Chinese DJs to ensure that standards are maintained and so that local talent gets the opportunity to progress.”

Moving away from the big metropolises, Chinese clubs and bars unsurprisingly become more idiosyncratic, losing some or all of the shiny, high-tech sameness of the big city. There’s still a way to go (mercifully) until Paul Oakenfold plays in Lhasa or Sasha lords it over the decks in Kashgar. Indeed, as travellers to the more remote regions of China will appreciate, a little local flavour usually makes provincial Chinese nightlife a fascinating, and, at times, highly bizarre cultural experience. Anyone who has ended up (intentionally or not) in a Chinese transvestite club in Tumen, Jilin Province, or participated in group ballroom dancing to the sound of pumping Euro-techno in Turpan, Xinjiang Uygur Autonomous Region, will fully empathize.

In some Chinese places, relatively remote but still on China’s well-worn backpacker circuit, the presence of large numbers of foreigners has had a direct effect on the bar and club scene. In Lijiang, Yunnan Province, for example, the laowai hordes that descend upon the town every year have created a thriving bar culture where you can down a pint of Guinness while listening to a Naxi orchestra. West Street in Yangshuo, Guangxi Zhuang Autonomous Region, now resembles a miniature Khao San Road thanks to the influx of Western tourists eager to exchange their renminbi for a burger and Budweiser. As the standard of Chinese tourist infrastructure continues to increase, and more foreigners flock to see the Great Wall, Terracotta Army and Tiger Leaping Gorge, so the nightlife in these places will develop to cater to taste and demand.     

So, what does the future hold for the burgeoning nightlife of the Middle Kingdom? As the Chinese hinterland and its resident population continue to develop, so, assuredly, will the bars and clubs within it. The Babyface chain already has ten clubs in China, and more are on the way. The affluent eastern and southern coastal areas will continue to lead the way, driven by social and economic factors and exposure to foreign influences. Big name Chinese DJs, already popular in China, will surely break onto the international stage to rub shoulders with their more illustrious overseas counterparts. The influx of foreign visitors to China, both during and after the 2008 Olympics, will inject more cash into the already buoyant entertainment sector, and sustain the rapid pace of change. With insightful regulation and careful planning, the next few years should prove to be a boom time in China for drinkers, dancers and landlords alike.