Shanghai, China – Strutting, preening and greeting the audience in Chinese, the Rolling Stones made their debut in mainland China on Saturday in a censored – but still raucous – show.
The “world’s greatest rock ‘n’ roll band” opened their show with “Start Me Up,” a song with suggestive lyrics that apparently made it past the censors who banned five other hits. They then pounded through almost two hours of classic rock.
“Dajia hao ma?” – or “How’s everybody doing?” – Mick Jagger yelled to the packed house at Shanghai’s 8,000-seat indoor stadium, where the audience was overwhelmingly foreign. “It’s nice to be here for the first time.”
Some paid more than $600 each for tickets.
Chinese rock pioneer Cui Jian prompted appreciative cheers when he joined Jagger for the ballad “Wild Horses.”
Cui was temporarily banned from performing after the deadly June 4, 1989, military crackdown in Beijing’s Tiananmen Square on student protesters, for whom Cui’s “Nothing to My Name” had become an anthem.
The Stones songs the government banned were believed to be “Brown Sugar,” “Honky Tonk Women,” “Beast of Burden,” “Let’s Spend the Night Together” and “Rough Justice.” But “Start Me Up” slipped through.
Four decades into their career, the Stones remain relatively unknown in China.
Still, Chinese audience reaction seemed largely positive, if a little preoccupied with the band’s longevity.
“So old, and yet he can really perform,” Song Jianghong said, referring to Jagger, 62.
Beijing resident Xue Liang said the Stones enjoyed cult status in China.
“They were among the first acts whose music was smuggled in. To see them here in China now is just amazing,” Xue said.
