Sit, Roewe, Sit

I had nothing better to do on Sunday night in Shanghai so I took a taxi to Xintiandi to meet a mate for dinner. He wanted to try this restaurant that always had a line outside, on the basis that it had to be good if that many people were prepared to wait for it. As it turned out the food was good, but not so great that I wouldn't in future just go to the Crystal Jade about fifty yards away and get seated right away. Anyway, when we arrived at this place they gave us a number, and since we had some time to kill before getting in we wandered back outside where there was a small stage with a red car on it. There was a silver version of the same car on the ground next to the stage, and a handful of what we assumed were models waiting for what we similarly assumed would be a show.

Being curious we took a closer look at the car. It was what we in the US would call "compact" and didn't resemble anything I recognized. I looked at the nameplate - it wasn't one of the homegrown Chinese makes, like Geely or Chery (you know, those ones on the YouTube videos that self-destruct during crash testing). It was a Rover, or should I say Roewe. Yes, the once proud British automotive marque, bought by the Chinese firm SAIC in a final act of humiliation for the union-ridden and inefficient ex-British Leyland / Austin Rover Triumph, erstwhile purveyor of Allegros, Marinas and Maxis, has now been phonetically neutered to make it more pronounceable by its new owners. The new car in question was a Roewe 550, a small, anonymous and inoffensive little beast and a far cry from the old SD1 or the 800 series.

We wanted to stay and watch the show; a large green laser was projecting "550" onto a nearby building, presumably preventing any unfortunate occupants in the target zone from appreciating the local TV (were such a thing indeed to be possible), but it was soon time to eat. By the time we emerged the models were gone, but the cars remained. A PA system played a Beatles song four times in a row, and then it became apparent that a band was about to play. The band in question wasn't actually on the stage but on the pavement nearby, so we took up residence outside a Haagen-Dazs ice cream shop to listen.

I didn't recognize the first song, but the first few notes of the second make it clear that the band of Chinese locals was about to launch into a rendition of Radiohead's "Creep" that would have made Thom Yorke cry. And not in a good way. I don't know where the singer came from, but I as the song progressed in this open air pedestrian zone, surrounded by nice Chinese and expat families, I wanted to know how he would handle the line that include the words "...you're so fucking special".

Well there was no need to worry. Maybe the singer didn't actually know the words and was just singing a phonetic approximation, or maybe he was just shit, but when he got to that line it came out like "...sa fickan spesha", like a cross between Father Ted and a drunk Glasegian. Just when I thought it couldn't get any better, the song reached the bit with the high notes. The suspense was awful - could he hit them? Could he carry it off? Well, ladies and gentlemen, I'm here to tell you that he couldn't. He screamed at the top of his voice into the microphone, causing two teenage girls next to us to actually put their fingers in their ears, and failed to hit within spitting distance of any of the actual notes in the song. It was a truly awful performance, something that would have embarrassed a clueless pisshead in a karaoke bar, and more closely resembled the vocal emissions of a dog fox, locked in its mate's fox-box post-coitus and screaming in pain as its dick was contracted.

As they say in the world of investigative reporting "we made our excuses and left". On the face of it the Roewe looked like a nice car, but if the Chinese Thom Yorke's version of "Creep" is anything to go by it's a long way from a real Rover. Rest in peace, British car industry. General Motors will be along to join you shortly.


Copyright © 2008 Edward Bison