I hear you. The claim that Zebra hasn’t been bringing compelling lineups is legitimate, but I question their commitment to keeping it interesting when huge crowds seem to show up no matter what. It’s good that prominent local bands were given slots on the main stage this year (unlike previous years) but generally speaking the lineup was lackluster. Since local performers aren’t compensated, it seems like most of the money collected from ticket sales are going straight to the headliners for each day of the festival. Even for those though, they don’t bring a really big show at all. Last night Edison Chen’s performance was like 6-7 songs in total, about 35 minutes, and half of the songs weren’t even his (he brought MC Yen (sp?) and some other HK MC with him). As soon as he left the stage at 10:20pm and everything began to shut down, he headed straight for Muse Club where he performed for another hour for what was surely a small mountain of cash.
Obviously we’re all aware of the hardships that China’s modern music and culture have had to endure. But it’s hard to realistically expect things at Zebra to change considering the third annual festival is still plagued by these huge problems.