Guess who's coming to Shanghai? Ummm ... no one

If the internet itself is relentlessly unreliable when it comes to the dissemination of accurate information -- aside from Shanghaiist.com, of course -- then internet forums really take the cake. And recently we've witnessed plenty of unsubstantiated statements tossed about on Shanghai's plethora of online discussion boards like so many Double Happiness cigarette wrappers in the street.

Take music, for instance. Recent forum conversations have referred to impending Shanghai shows by the following "big name" acts:

• Coldplay


• Paul McCartney


• Sting


• Ice T (at Pegasus)


• Air (at La Fabrique)


• Moby (just about everywhere)

Shanghaiist has no real gripe with internet rumours that prove groundless. What we can't understand is why forum users don't come up with gossip that is more exciting. After all, if the Sting story happened to be true and he did play in Shanghai, wouldn't it just be another immeasurable disappointment to add to the brief list of ageing international acts who have visited this city in recent years? Where are the rumours about Phil Collins, Lionel Richie, Eric Clapton, Barbara Streisand -- hell, even a post-trial Michael Jackson? They seem to fit the Shanghai mould.

We propose that forum users come up with some better unsubstantiated rumours to fling around the place instead:

• The Strokes (at Harley's Bar)


• Outkast (Pegasus)


• Björk (Shanghai Grand Theatre)


• Aphex Twin (in a Suzhou Creek warehouse)


• Bright Eyes (Tang Hui Bar)


• James Brown (Shanghai Stadium)

Okay, so James Brown is also ageing -- well and truly. But he'd still be pretty cool. And the people who run the Element Fresh restaurant in the Shanghai Centre would be happy, since they have a habit of playing his Greatest Hits far too loudly during weekday lunch periods.

In the meantime, we can at least confirm an upcoming Shanghai performance by Yale University's barbershop group, The Whiffenpoofs. That should get the forums humming.