A friend of mine is very much into punk rock music, and is looking for live shows in Taichung. Are there any well-known punk bands around here? Do they play live? Seems to be a very small scene, if it exists.
You need to get in touch with Jou at shamdoer69@hotmail.com, he’s a Taiwanese dude who distributes Punk Planet (and Maximum Rock and Roll I think), he hooked me up with some free ‘DIY’ shows which were seemingly sponsered by Coke in Taipei. He’s a cool but very quiet guy who knows about the scene out here and yes, it’s very small. drop him a line, his english is self-taught and its pretty good.
Good luck.
You can defintely find it. Frenzal Rhomb were one of the bands I missed due to living in Taichung County and having work the next day and not owning a scooter.
American stuff like June of 44 came round, Biohazard and Bad Religion (I might be wrong on this count) have come over. King Lychee from Hong Kong have toured Taiwan and all over China - in fact Riz of Scratch the Surface fanzine will be able to point you in the right direction about SE Asia punk and hardcore:
sfscratch@hotmail.com, tell him Gloria says hi.
Bad Religion has never been to Taiwan. Would be nice, but probably won’t happen.
I’ve never lived in Taichung, so I don’t know if they have any kind of weekly magazine that tells when and where shows are. Most of the punk bands in Taiwan come from Taichung, though Taipei’s scene is definitely growing.
Anyway, if Taichung has a weekly magazine thing, grab it and see if any of these following bands are playing.
Fall of This Corner
Semi-Con
Fire Extinguisher
Children Sucker
LTK
The Deported
Consider the Meek
Hindsight 20/20
Hallucinogen
The Vanish
BB bomb
Broken Flower
That’s all I can think of off the top of my head. There are more. Our website occasionaly lists show;(especially if we’re playing them)
www.thedeported.com
Good luck. Any questions you can just PM me.
jeff
Biohazard played in Formoz in Taipei with Megadeth and from memory Freddy Lin lost a lot of money largely due to the lack of musical variety. Frenzal Rhomb however played at Nuno’s House(?) in Taichung I think the venu was called. Hong Kong band Hardpack are better than King Lychee in my subjective musical opinion but they usually tour together both have played in Taichung. (not sure where though as I saw both bands in Kenting one spring scream).
Bad Religion will have both foreigners and Taiwanese reaching for dictionaries.
I saw the Biohazard show a few years ago. They were so awful they were actually pretty funny. Just as well we made fake entry wristbands to get in, otherwise I’d have been pissed to have spent money on such unadulterated shite. Is that really what passes for punk rock these days? 
Bunch of jokers.
Freznal Rhomb have played in Taipei a few times and they rock!
I saw Biohazard with Pantera a few years back oin New Zealand. Pantera smelt of urine after Biohazard played. Neither band really gave a crap quality wise though because it was their last gig of the tour. Anyway I file Biohazard under bad metal.