Shanghai Doesn't Welcome You video harmonized off Youku

Given how sensitive officials are about the Shanghai World Expo (we hear from one anonymous magazine worker that the slightest jokes about Haibao are censured heavily from even expat mags), we suppose this news is kind of inevitable. Still, it is to our great disappointment to hear that Top Floor Circus' anti-Shanghai tune, Shanghai Doesn't Welcome You is now nowhere to be found.

According to Andy Best:

... Shanghai Welcomes You is now off their page and the video has been harmonized from Youku. Not only is it banned from being performed but it must be removed from history too, yes, just like in Orwell's 1984.

In it's place is now an ironic saccharine pop song called Let me sing you a Top Floor Circus song.

What's worse, the song may have gotten Mao Livehouse in trouble. Apparently the management is still subletting it from the guys who owned the short-lived WTF Club - which means they don't have a proper license. Not too big a deal until one of the acts piss off the powers that be (which a song with lyrics like "Shanghai doesn’t welcome outsiders or people from Shanghai, Shanghai only welcomes the kind of people whose faces are on money..." probably would do).

Says Jake Newby,, they're not the only ones worried about their place in the city come Expo time. Perennial live music favorite Yuyintang is also in danger of being shut down until the event's over. The six month long event. Egads, what will we do with our Friday nights if that happens?