Last night, I had the opportunity to travel over to Chen Yuli's studio south of Guo Mao, where Arrows Made of Desire is recording its new album. Producer/Wire writer/music genius Steve Barker is behind the board as Joewi Verehoven and the rest of Arrows (with some support from the Red Hand Jazz Band) lay down their tracks on the new Arrow's album, Songs that Sell Out.

When I arrived at the studio, the band was just finishing up a long day of tracking. I talked to the City Weekend photographer, Xiao Yang about how I wanted him to frame a few of the shots, then I started to check out the unbelievable gear that Yuli had fit into his small, but beautiful studio.

Chen Yuli (http://www.chenyuli.com) is a 24 year-old French national of Chinese background. A few years ago, he traveled to New York to study sound engineering. While he was there, he picked up some incredible gear from older studios who were selling off some of their tube pre-amps and analog gear to make room fro the latest digital gadgetry. The result is an incredible analog-digital studio (all tracking is done on a full-blown ProTools getup) owned by a smart, highly capable young producer.

Of the many places I have seen in the Beijing music scene that convince me Beijing will be the next Seattle/Brooklyn/Lower East Side/..., this studio is certainly the most wicked.

In issue 23 (Nov 29-Dec 12), City Weekend will run a feature on Arrows and the recording process for their new album. Rachel Simhon is writing it at this very moment, while I'm waiting anxiously to learn the next details.