Girls Are Waiting To Meet You

From Rock in China Wiki

Contents 1 History 2 Discography 3 Further Information 3.1 Official pages 3.2 Interviews and Articles 3.3 References

History

GAWTMY are a band formed of Ex-pats and Chinese memebers. The band was founded by singer/songwriter Natan Doron who relocated to Beijing in February 2008 following stints playing with various indie bands in the UK. Drummer Donna Renae was one of the first to answer Natan's online advert for band members.

Donna and Natan were initially joined by three other members, two of which suffered emergency hospitalisations whilst still in the band. Eventually all three members left citing musical differences.

As GAWTMY faced mounting troubles, Luke Tweedy (Sax, Flute and Vocals) joined and the band rehearsed a while as a 3-piece. Whilst Natan concentrated on writing more songs for the project, Luke and Donna put in lots of work arranging these songs for live performance. In March, Wang Xiao Bing (Bass) and Michelle Woo (Violin) joined the band on the same night and a solid line up began to take shape.

GAWTMY made their live debut on June 10th at Beijing's legendary D-22 venue, rejoined by former-hospitalised-member Anita Chiu in a dramatic-climatic run through of the 'Zombie Song'. GAWTMY were finally born into the public imagination.

The band then played an impromptu guerilla gig on the Beijing subway. Going all the way round Line 2 playing to delighted crowds, GAWTMY played until ushered away by Beijing police on the Xizhimen platform.

The band has worked with a Producer known only as 'Al'. Unfortunately, the promising work went unfinished as Al suffered the fate of former GAWTMY members, and ended up hospitalised in Panama for up to three months whilst GAWTMY took a break due to Natan and Luke being deported from China whilst the olympics took place.

Al's work features on 'The zombie song'(also sometimes referred to as 'Zombie Girl', the band's most well-known song, enjoying repeated plays on their myspace page.

Natan and Luke both returned to Beijing in autumn 2008 and the band was joined by two new members. Liu Yang (keys) and Kirsten Melby-Thompson (Violin/Vocals) took the line up to seven members whilst expanding and developing the band's unique sound.

Luke then was forced to return to the UK with complicated VISA and personal problems. GAWTMY continued as a six-peice and played it's second show at D22 on November 18th.

December 2008 saw a busy end 2008 for GAWTMY, with the band playing another show at D22 with Hugh Reed on the 4th of December followed by a show at 2 Kolegas on Dec 19th. Many fans considered the 2 Kolegas show to be the band's best to date.

GAWTMY played a big show at Mao Live on February 28th of 2009 to their biggest audience and to a great reception. The band then spent much of their time recording, releasing 'Across Green Fields (GAWTMY)' as a free download on wa3.cn on 17th Arpil 2009 to coincide wit their first show at D22 as a 7 peice.

Across Green Fields enjoyed over 2000 downloads, signalling a growing demand for GAWTMY recordings. GAWTMY announced in June 2009 that their debut album will be launched at Yugong Yishan on July 16th 2009. The album was made available exclusively through WA3.CN in China as well as Itunes and Amazon in the rest of the world.

Poultrygeist director Andy Deemer then made a video for GAWTMY's live classic 'Zombie Girl'. The video was launched at Yugong Yishan on September 3rd 2009. After the video screening GAWTMY stunned their fans by announcing the departure of multi-instrumentalist Luke Tweedy as well as front man and songwriter Natan Doron. Natan was replaced by Aaron Bronson Rosa who was involved in the production of the album. The band are yet to announce a replacement for Tweedy.

March 27th, 2010, they performed at the Yugong Yishan together with Mademoiselle. According to Beijing Daze: As they played through their set, it was apparent that the new lineup was settling and finding their own rhythms: The songs were more uptempo to fit Aaron’s voice, the Dave’s guitar managed to fill a void that was not even there before and Kirsten helped out on vocal duties a bit more often. I almost hate to say this because I really liked what the previous incarnation had but i must admit that i like this version of the girls more… it’s a little heavier, more uptempo, there’s almost no downtime in the set and the guitar just brings it all together.^[1]

Discography

GAWTMY - 2009, July

Across Green Fields - Free Download single release (www.wa3.cn) April 17th 2009

Further Information

Official pages

• Official website
• WA3 site for GAWTMY
• douban page
• Soundclick page
• Myspace Page
• menllo page

Interviews and Articles

• Interview by Beijing Daze, October 2009

References

1. ↑ Beijing Daze (2010-03-30). "Review: Mademoiselle charms & GAWTMY awes Yugong Yishan". Retrieved on 2010-04-25.

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