Boys’ Night had a nostalgic twist this week. The Eagles (including Don Henley, Glenn Frey, Joe Walsh and Timothy Schmit), the top-selling US rock band of the 1970s that proved it could still produce Grammy award winning hits as recently as 2007, made its China debut at the new Mercedes-Benz Arena in Shanghai. And Shanghai welcomed them with open arms, packing the arena with about 15,000 fans, most of them Chinese, and many if not most of them born long after the band was formed in 1971. Not counting the migrant worker population, that number represents about 1 person in every 1,000 in Shanghai.
So, why such enthusiasm for these 60-something rockers? My best guess is that at least in part it’s because “Hotel California” remains one of the most popular English-language karaoke songs in China. Whatever the reason, the reality is that Eagles tickets sold for about 50% more than tickets to see Usher (a 32-year-old R&B superstar) at the same arena this weekend. Go figure.
In any case, it was a great show. As the band played Desperado for their last encore, we knew that this night would go down in the annals of our Shanghai adventures …
Welcome to the Hotel California … um, I mean Shanghai?!
9 Mar 2011
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