Spilt Works managing director Archie Hamilton has spoken to IQ about the future of international acts performing in China.

Founded in 2006, Split Works has enjoyed a long-standing reputation as a pioneer in importing international performers to China, organising tours for Sonic Youth, Death Cab for Cutie, Grimes and Ghostface Killah.

Nowadays, Hamilton’s focus is on artist development in order to “build bridges between Asia and the West” via his booking agency Scorched – no easy task given China’s strict policies for international artists.

Chinese authorities will often require foreign artists to submit set lists and song lyrics before getting approval to tour – and even then acts are often unsuccessful.

However, this looked set to change last month when infamous rapper Kanye West was granted rare approval for two “listening parties” at the Wuyuanhe Stadium in Haikou.

The sold-out stadium gigs, which drew 70,000 people, marked Ye’s first performances in the East Asian country in 16 years – in which time the government’s tolerance for Western artists less divisive than him rapidly diminished.

“China likes stable, bankable stuff that’s not going to upset the apple cart and Kanye is about as firebrand as you could be”

In 2017, Justin Bieber was barred from China because of his reputation as a “badly behaved entertainer” while, in 2016, Lady Gaga’s entire repertoire was reportedly forbidden after she met the Dalai Lama.

More recently, Chinese authorities clamped down on hip-hop, blacklisting songs and dropping rappers from shows. Its media regulator banned Chinese television from featuring “actors with tattoos or depictions of hip-hop culture, subculture and immoral culture”.

“China likes stable, bankable stuff that’s not going to upset the apple cart and Kanye is about as firebrand as you could be,” Hamilton tells IQ.

“There was some excitement about the concert happening because it’s the first time in a while there’s been a big international stadium show – one of the last [successful] ones I can remember is Linkin Park in 2016. Plus there wasn’t a lot of preamble [ahead of the concert]. It just sort of happened. And no one knows who promoted the show. It was just really obscure.”

The show reportedly took in 51 million yuan ($7.3 million) in ticket sales and generated close to 373 million yuan (€47.2m) in total tourism revenue for the city. But its success doesn’t necessarily mean all Chinese cities will follow in the footsteps of Haikou.

As Hamilton points out, Haikou, the capital of the island province of Hainan, is somewhat of an outlier in China.

The island is one of seven Special Economic Zones (SEZ) in the country, which benefits from a separate administration, liberal economic laws and enhanced infrastructure support among other things.

“Kanye’s show was a bit of a shot in the arm after a pretty bleak year for the Chinese live market”

“The local government seems to be willing to support [concerts] from a financial standpoint and also from a permitting standpoint,” he explains. “Permits are obviously difficult to obtain in China and always have been. Given Hainan’s status as a SEZ, I think it wants to try and flex a bit of muscle and show that it can be different to the rest of the mainland.”

With its tropical climate, beach resorts and five-star hotels, Hainan also benefits from a reputation as the ‘Hawaii of China’ and a healthy influx of tourists.

“Given the challenges of travel for a lot of Chinese people who don’t necessarily have passports and money, it’s a huge destination,” Hamilton adds.

The downside of Hainan is the absence of a local audience, continues Hamilton, which perhaps explains why 95% of attendees at Ye’s show travelled from outside the island.

“It’ll be interesting to see if there’s any kind of follow-through,” he muses. “Often in China, when there’s a big moment, everyone jumps in and gets excited. But after that, people will get hopelessly over-invested and then kind of implode or explode, or just wither on the vine.”

Though Hamilton is doubtful that Ye’s concert in Hainan will kickstart a trend with international artists flocking to China, there’s no denying it’s piqued interest.

“I’ve already had three or four requests from Hainan since the concert – there is definitely more attention,” he reveals. “Kanye’s show was a bit of a shot in the arm after a pretty bleak year for the Chinese live market.

“As with any market, if artists are willing and available to put the time in, they’ll reap what they sow”

“There was a push for international artists in early ’24 but it was all really disappointing because the internet just isn’t set up for those artists,” he explains.

Indeed, the Communist Party is known to control the flow of art and content from foreign producers, and strictly censor domestic publications, performances and social media postings.

“There’s been a requirement for TV and platforms and stuff to focus on promoting and investing in domestic talent predominantly so the international stuff just gets marginalised,” Hamilton adds.

“An artist that can sell 500 tickets in China can probably sell 1,500 tickets in the West or anywhere else,” the Split Works co-founder adds. “Artists that can sell 5,000 tickets in China could probably sell 20,000 tickets anywhere else.”

However, international artists who have consistently invested in the market have reaped the rewards.

“We’ve got three arena shows with Cigarettes After Sex in March of next year that are just about to go on sale,” he continues. “That’s a band that we built from 500 capacity to arena level right in seven years – though it would have been shorter without Covid. They worked hard on coming early and coming regularly.

“We also brought Honne through twice in the last two years. They played nine cities, three festivals, six hard ticket shows and the money is pretty good, I would argue. But again, Honne started working in the market in 2017. So it’s been an eight-year cycle of investment in platforms and channels, and speaking to fans and doing collaborations and coming to the market regularly.”

Other Western stars that have recently visited the market – or are planning to visit soon – include Mariah Carey, John Legend and Charlie Puth.

Hamilton concludes: “As with any market, if artists are willing and available to put the time in, they’ll reap what they sow.”

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As some residents in the Chinese city of Wuhan, where the disease now known as Covid-19 originated in November, leave their houses for the first time in months, IQ turns to promoters in China and the wider Asia-Pacific region to find out if this means a return to business as usual any time soon.

“People are cautiously optimistic,” Archie Hamilton, managing director of Shanghai-based promoter Split Works tells IQ, noting that some clubs – but no live venues – in Shanghai opened their doors for the first time in months last weekend. “We have a while longer until things open up properly.”

Although Split Works has projects ongoing in its brand business, which has been active in China for around 15 years, and is looking into moving into the livestreaming sector, Hamilton states that the core part of his business – live events – “is not coming back any time soon”.

Zhang Ran, director of international business at Modern Sky, echoes this sentiment, saying that “nothing has changed here yet for the music industry” and adding that “some venues likely won’t survive”.

Although the situation “is getting better” with regards to the virus, Zhang believes it will be a month or two until Modern Sky will be able to hold shows again and “probably longer for [shows by] international bands, given the virus situation elsewhere.”

Zhang says that Modern Sky is currently looking to book shows for November.

Elsewhere in Asia, Tommy Jinho Yoon, president of Korea’s International Creative Agency (ICA), says that everything “is calming down” in comparison to a lot of places around the world.

“We just need to band together as an industry and try to make things work, and be good humans at the same time”

Yesterday (23 March), South Korea reported the lowest number of new coronavirus cases since infection rates hit their peak four weeks ago. Although the virus has led to the shuttering of many events and venues in Korea, some popular musical theatre productions have continued to enjoy successful runs over the past few months.

“The Covid-19 madness is not completely over yet, but we are anticipating and hoping that the majority of this gets settled down by May or June,” Jinho Yoon tells IQ.

Matthew Lazarus-Hall, senior vice-president for AEG Presents’ Asia-Pacific division, states that, although China and other countries in Asia appear to be over the curve of the pandemic, the situation in many other parts of the world continues to put the brakes on international touring.

“The challenge is that a lot of artists can’t tour due to quarantine measures,” says Lazarus-Hall. “I anticipate that this situation will continue for many months, with everyone rescheduling tours until the back half of the year, and then maybe longer.”

With government restrictions on events and other public gatherings still in place across much of Asia, domestic touring remains difficult too.

China still has a complete event ban in place, whereas a surge in new cases of the virus led to a ban on gatherings of more than 250 people over the weekend in Singapore and a resumption of social distancing measures in Hong Kong.

“At AEG Presents, the plan is evolving every day based on government regulations, the industry and doing the right thing by our artists and staff, and we are reacting, and modifying our plans in real time,” says Lazarus-Hall.

“There’s no rulebook here, we just need to band together as an industry and try to make things work, and be good humans at the same time.”

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A number of live shows in China, Hong Kong and Singapore have been called off or postponed in recent weeks over fears related to the spread of the coronavirus.

Over 7,700 cases of the novel coronavirus (2019-nCoV) have been confirmed in China, with the death toll now standing at 170. The virus, which originated in the Chinese city of Wuhan, is believed to have spread to 22 countries, including Thailand, Japan, Malaysia, Taiwan, Singapore, South Korea, France and the United States.

“There have been a couple of cancellations already, and I’m sure there will be more to come,” Archie Hamilton of Shanghai-based promoter Split Works tells IQ, explaining that mass gatherings were cancelled over the Chinese New Year and schools and businesses closed in an attempt to contain the virus.

“I imagine this will continue into March,” says Hamilton, who notes that Split Works is “monitoring the situation closely” due to upcoming tour dates by Stereolab and Mika in Beijing, Shanghai, Shenzhen and Hangzhou.

Zhang Ran, director of international business at Modern Sky, tells IQ that the promoter cancelled a number of shows in February “to avoid both artists and audiences getting affected by this virus”, adding that all fans received full refunds.

“We have updated artists that are coming for tours in March with the virus situation,” continues Zhang. “We will see how it goes for the next few weeks and see if we still can do these shows.

“From the artists’ side, most totally understand the situation – some of them agree to postpone the tour and for those who find it difficult to postpone, they are willing to refund the show fee.”

“From the artists’ side, most totally understand the situation”

Shows by US rock band X Ambassadors in the Chinese cities of Shanghai and Chengdu, as well as concerts by Japanese rock group Suchmos, are among those to have fallen foul to the virus.

Acts playing outside of China have also called off shows. Canto-pop star Andy Lau recently pulled 12 concerts at the 12,500-capacity Hong Kong Coliseum, with organisers citing health and safety concerns. Lau is currently scheduled to perform in the city of Wuhan in April. It is unclear if the show will go ahead as planned.

Upcoming shows by K-pop acts Taeyon and NCT Dream have also been postponed due to “coronavirus proliferation concerns”. Promoter One Production, which was last year acquired by Live Nation, states that it “will continue to act on advice from the authorities on the coronavirus and take precautionary measures in line with prevention efforts.”

Live Nation have also cancelled a show in Singapore, by singer Miriam Yeung, “due to the current freight and travel conditions in China”.

Although the virus was discovered at an early stage and could be “fully under control very soon”, Modern Sky’s Zhang predicts it may take “at least six months to get the whole industry back on track,” adding that some artists that have shows scheduled for as far ahead as April are looking to postpone the whole Asian leg of their tour.

“This is a fight between humans and a virus,” says Zhang, “and I don’t think we have any other option.”

Photo: Huandy618/Wikimedia Commons (CC BY-SA 3.0) (cropped)

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Shanghai-based promoter Split Works has agreed a long-term deal to represent British performance art collective Arcadia in China, with the iconic fire-breathing ‘Spider’ installation set to make its debut in China this new year.

Kicking off the ten-year agreement, Split Works has inked a three-year deal which will see Arcadia’s monumental Spider stage at the ISY Music Festival in Sanya on the island of Hainan over 30–31 December.

“The Arcadia Spider is an extraordinary, otherworldly experience – and the perfect fit for ISY, China’s most revolutionary EDM festival,” says Fay Wang, vice-president of China Minsheng Cultural Media Sanya, one of the backers of the festival, in a statement. “We love to push the boundaries of programming and talent, and the Spider is another (50-tonne) feather in our cap.”

Since making its first appearance at Glastonbury Festival over a decade ago, Arcadia’s Spider has travelled the globe, thrilling music fans at the likes of Ultra Miami, as well as in Thailand, Taiwan and in Australia.

“We can’t wait to bring more of Arcadia’s extraordinary shows to the China market”

The potential for growth in China is immense, and Split Works managing director Archie Hamilton predicts big things for Arcadia in the world’s most populous country.

“Arcadia pushes the boundaries of what live music can achieve,” she says. “It’s sheer magic, and we can’t wait to bring more of Arcadia’s extraordinary shows to the China market.”

With Hamilton and his team enabling, licensing and executing Arcadia’s immersive installations for events all over the Chinese mainland, he believes all of the group’s assets will quickly be put to use at Chinese festivals and events. As of 2018, Arcadia owns four stages, each with its own unique performance stage: the Spider, the Afterburner, the Reactor and the Bug.

Arcadia hosted its first standalone festival earlier this summer, coinciding with Glastonbury’s traditional fallow year.

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