ZIYO profile picture

ZIYO

Building Momentum. . .

About Me


ZIYO started sometime in January 2004, when Helen walked into a guitar shop and was conned into guitar lessons by lead guitarist Da Ming. Two lessons in, they both came to the conclusion that 1 Helen had no real talent as a guitarist, and 2 Da Ming had no great patience for teaching. But they manage to salvage the relationship by forming a band, later recruiting Mao Mao whom Da Ming had met in a subway underpass only months before with similar dreams of rock stardom. Mao Mao recruited Zhang Jie an ex-bandmate in a very briefly formed death metal band, and Ziyo was born.
In 3 short months, the band wrote 10 songs, 3 of which are still performed to this day. Because all the band members had such varied musical tastes, the result was 10 very very different songs. They ran from rough reggae, to sloppy jazz, to folk songs, to punk rock, to Emo, and even some nu metal. But everything despite the huge jumps in genres was packed full of funk beats, infectious guitar hooks, and strong melodies belted out by Helen who lived half her life in the American South.
The result was a resident gig at two of Beijing's more well known underground livehouses, the New Get Lucky Bar, and Nameless Highland. The band continued to play these 10 songs, with a new song every few months added to set for a year and a half before they realized they were getting bored as the Tuesday night house band and the filler band for gigs with bigger named bands that actually had their own "sound".
So the band went on haitus. Canceled most of the gigs for the next few months, went into the rehearsal studio to find a sound, and record some demos. Not long after the first few self-funded demo songs were sent out, Ziyo got attention from some of China's biggest record companies. In October of 2005, Ziyo signed Warner Music China as a developing band (before they found their "sound").
Wang hui, ex-guitarist from the punk band Gum, joined the band to add another layer of punky guitars, and in one short year, Ziyo wrote another 30 songs, and produced 20 more self-funded demos. They were all sent to Warner whom still shook their head at the young band. The genre's were still too broad, and they wanted the sound "poppier". But just before this still directionless band was re-packaged into a sugar-coated unoriginal faux-rock band made for pre-teens, a miracle happened. Helen fell off a wall shattered her jaw, and was hospitalized for 3 months.
During those three months, she had her i-pod on shuffle listening to everything from Bloc Party to Basement Jaxx, from Libertines to Peaches. Now with a strong sense of personal identity, still bandaged and newly rebuilt, she went to her first rehearsal post surgery with a "sound". Within days, all the various genres they had experimented with was roughly cut and mixed together. The result was 50's doo-woop melodies combined with dance and funk beats, space guitars efx, mixed with some very punk rock guitars. Don't know what it is, but it certainly was a sound. When asked what they wanted, the band simply answered "to see bodies moving underneath the stage, dancing not just pounding the sh** out of each other".
ZIYO will be releasing their FIRST EP OCTOBER 2007!

My Interests

Music:

Member Since: 1/4/2005
Band Website: new chinese myspace site myspace.cn/ziyocn
Band Members:Helen (Lead Vocal)Da Ming (Guitar)Wang Hui (Guitar)Mao Mao (Drums)Zhang Jie (Bass)
Influences: Red Hot Chilli Peppers, the strokes, the 88, Hideki Kaji, Weezer, Gorillaz, Bloc Party, Radiohead, the Faint, We are Scientists, Blur, Massive Attack, PJ Harvey, Franz Ferdinand, No Doubt, Muse, the Ventures
Record Label: Warner Music International
Type of Label: Major

My Blog

November Album Launch

Thanks to all our friends for turning up at the Modern Sky festival to see us perform. It was definately one of our most memoriable performances so far.  As you know, our first EP is co...
Posted by ZIYO on Wed, 03 Oct 2007 11:56:00 PST

More EP News

Good things are worth waiting for **cough** cough**.  Well more news guys: The EP is recorded, and you can listen to 4 of the tracks on the Myspace. . . but if you wanna support us, than you can ...
Posted by ZIYO on Sun, 16 Sep 2007 08:59:00 PST

A Couple of Canceled Shows but Feared NOT!

Due to Visa Issues for our lead singer Helen, our guitarist Wang Hui having to get emergency minor surgery, and some other stuff. . . we will not be playing from the end of August to Early September.&...
Posted by ZIYO on Wed, 22 Aug 2007 09:26:00 PST

EP available end of August!

Hey guys, we have a new EP out end of this month!  The only thing is we don't know yet when it's going to get distribution in stores, so the best way to do it is first get it through us!  We...
Posted by ZIYO on Wed, 08 Aug 2007 09:09:00 PST

The Recording updating!

It's been almost a month in the studio now, and we are hammering away at the three song EP which will hopefully be out sometime in September.  We expect no less than world domination. ....
Posted by ZIYO on Thu, 19 Jul 2007 02:18:00 PST

???????! And Now It Begins!

??????????????YYYD?????. ?????????,?????????. ???? ???????, ????????.  ???????????????????. ????????????????, ??????????. ???????BASS???????????. ???????,???????????.   ; ??...
Posted by ZIYO on Wed, 04 Jul 2007 11:12:00 PST

???????! And Now It Begins!

??????????????YYYD?????. ?????????,?????????. ???? ???????, ????????.  ???????????????????. ????????????????, ??????????. ???????BASS???????????. ???????,???????????.   ; ??...
Posted by ZIYO on Wed, 04 Jul 2007 11:12:00 PST

Canceled Tour Dates & Pushed Back Release Dates

This might sound like a cliche, but doing Rock N' Roll in China is not easy.  Got the news yesterday that MTV bumped us from the MOTOROKR concert in Qingdao (undoubtedly to make space for more ba...
Posted by ZIYO on Wed, 13 Jun 2007 03:48:00 PST

In the Studio with Taekwando!

Okay. . . after a year and half under Warner, the ball is finally rolling. This has been the most post-poned EP release in the history of Warner, but since we've already booked the studio ti...
Posted by ZIYO on Mon, 07 May 2007 08:21:00 PST

Technically back on-line again

Well, Myspace is once again working, sort of, and we've now uploaded some new demos onto the website just to give you guys a change of pace.  "Indie Rock is Dead", and a Chinese language ballad&n...
Posted by ZIYO on Thu, 26 Apr 2007 09:27:00 PST