Zhi Gan: In Motion 4, Shouson Theatre, Arts Centre, July 26 Zhi Gan is a pain to watch. Not that it is appallingly bad: on the contrary, it nears aesthetic excellence, brimming with the vigour, intelligence and innovation that has been severely lacking in the mainstream music industry for aeons.
The bitter aftertaste comes because, 10 years after these six bands first received rave reviews by releasing their debut compilation Zhi Gan, they still linger somewhere between semi-stardom and obscurity.
If fairness is to reign, for example, acts like Multiplex and Minimal should already have gained their rightful places in the higher echelons of pop music. Their synthesiser-led music, beefed up by live brass and guitars (for Multiplex) or imaginative sound effects (for Minimal) - would not be out of place whatever market they are thrown into, pop or otherwise.
On the other hand, there are also acts that have maintained their hardcore electronic strands. Juno, for example, delivered at this show a brand of techno equally adaptable for dancefloor frenzy or critical dissertation.
The Currant Bun - the solo venture by music journalist Yuen Chi-chung - played a testing set anchored by grinding loops of Eurythmics' Sweet Dreams and then ancient Chinese movie sound-bites.
Meanwhile, fresh from penning songs called Summer Lover for Canto-pop singer Miriam Yeung Chin-wa, Kwan King-chung returns to alternative pastures with his new outfit Handmade. Underneath a musical accompaniment sounding like New Order reclothed by Atari Teenage Riot, he delivered apt numbers about the helplessness mortals feel in an increasingly stone-cold and repetitive world order.