The Beijing karaoke industry has fallen on hard times as many large-scale locations are closing due to an ongoing price war that is compounded with rising costs and declining interest.

Once home to 12 karaoke chains that offered customers features like opulent rooms and buffet meals, Beijing has seen the closure of multiple karaoke locations while those that remain operate at only 50 percent capacity.

Partyworld is the latest to be hit. It has closed two branches including its marquee location, and now just has one left. Lesheng has closed its Zhongguancun and Guomao locations, reducing its presence to just Chongwenmen, while Melody has closed its Chaoyangmen location.

A report by the Beijing Youth Daily provides three reasons for the hard times encountered by the industry, colloquially named “KTV” in China.

First, rising costs have made operating a private room karaoke facility difficult. Rent is estimated to have risen 30 to 40 percent, while employee salaries have increased by 20 to 25 percent.

Secondly, karaoke has not attracted a younger generation of customers amid the rise in popularity of the internet, social media, and piracy.

And lastly, government controls have hampered the operations of karaoke facilities.

An employee working the front counter at the Sound of Music karaoke explains that the industry is competing with itself to extreme limits:

There’s no way (to do business). In Chaoyangmenwai, all the karaoke lounges are grouped together, all together there are over ten, of course there’s going to be a price bidding war between these branches. Sometimes, we would rather not make any money, but instead gain the popularity from heavy traffic.

The Asian concept of a private room to perform karaoke is far from the communal approach adopted by the West, which hosts singing nights at neighborhood bars. But with the decline of Chinese-style KTV, perhaps the only place left to belt out your favorite tunes will be in the shower.

Photos: 66diqiu, wumii, 0735, lyh8

For all the times this last scam has targeted foreigners, someone has finally gotten caught.

Fifteen members of a criminal gang based in Pudong have been arrested by Shanghai police for fleecing foreigners of their money by “luring them into a karaoke honey trap”, reports the Shanghai Daily.

Foreigners were reportedly targeted by the gang, which intimidated them into paying exorbitant fees or be held at the club.

Police were alerted to the diabolical plan by one of the gang’s victims, who had fallen prey to the scam. On April 15, a man of Egyptian nationality had agreed to go back to a local karaoke club in Pudong while taking a nighttime stroll outside his hotel, having been told beautiful ladies would be present.

However, at the club the man was approached by a group of burly men who demanded they be paid RMB 29,000 (US $4,600) for the man’s unspecified amount of time spent at the karaoke club.

However, being that the man was in the middle of taking a nighttime stroll, he was only able to pay with the RMB 11,000 (US $1,800) that he had on him. Unsatisfied, the burly men threw the victim into a car and drove him back to his hotel where they expected to be paid the remainder of the fees.

When stopped at a red light, the victim jumped out of the car and ran to a nearby police car.

On June 13, Shanghai police took 15 suspects into custody, who all confessed to committing seven similar crimes that earned over RMB 200,000.

Photos: timetotalkbeauty

Mr Liu went to the Seaside Resort in Shiyan New Town, Bao’an District with five of his friends at 2:30 am on June 16. The group had all purchased the RMB 90 karaoke-footbath package. The friends sang together and drank alcohol.

The friends then separated to receive their massages. That’s when Liu’s masseuse knelt on Liu’s back in order to work on his neck. Twenty minutes later, however, Liu fell to the masseuse’s feet from a sitting position.

Liu’s friend Zhang said Liu was unresponsive:

We tried to wake him up, but he wasn’t able to say anything. Instead, his eyes rolled in his sockets, his tongue fell out, and tears continually rolled down from his eyes.

When Liu was taken to the hospital, not only was he still unconscious, but Liu had lost the ability to breathe on his own. He’s now in intensive care with a ventilator to help his breathing.

According to an x-ray, the first and second vertebrae of Liu’s neck were displaced. The deputy head of the intensive care department Dr You said it’s too early to link Liu’s massage with his unconsciousness, but said the worst case scenario would see Liu suffer from paralysis.

The masseuse at the Seaside Resort is reportedly a 25 year-old woman with three years experience as a masseuse. All massage practitioners at the resort are trained according to resort standards as explained by a representative for the Seaside Resort, Mr Xing:

(Massage) practitioners at the resort can complete their required training in ten days if they are quick, or 12 days to half a month if they are slow.

Police are currently investigating.

Related:

• Foshan Court Rules that Happy Ending Massages Do Not Amount to Prostitution
• New Dongguan “Massage” iPhone App Gives New Meaning to Facetime
• Happy-Ending Massages No Crime, Now Barber Shop Owners Want Compensation

Photo: Guangzhou Daily

Photo: SCMP

When one says they’re going on a trip to Dongguan, it’s often greeted with a wink-wink, nudge-nudge.  Such is the reputation of the city; while it has world-class golf courses and famous shopping markets, the PRD city has become synonymous with sex.

Reporter Vivienne Chow with the South China Morning Post has published a story (behind a paywall) on a new movie coming out called Due West, which is based on a book of the same name.  It documents Hong Kong men who seek sex on the Mainland, particularly Dongguan.

“Simon” serves as one of the extras in the film, and explains why men head north for sex, even when they’re married:

“You know, tenderness is not to be found from your wife,” he says. “A wife is not as good as a concubine; a concubine is not as good as a secret affair; and a secret affair is not as good as one that you desire, but who’s beyond your reach. It is this excitement that makes men want to go to these places. In here, you can enjoy the lifestyle of a king that you will never have at home with your woman.”

Interestingly enough, the men interviewed in Chow’s article seem to indicate they are seeking more than just sex.  They also blame Hong Kong women for their attitudes, which they claim are forcing them to go elsewhere for affection.

Despite all the hassles – and the risk of getting caught – some men cannot resist making the trip to Dongguan every now and then. “That’s because you don’t find this tenderness in reality… such as feeding you a piece of melon,” says 34-year-old “John”, another extra in Due West.

“You can never get that [from Hong Kong women]. Men are egoistic. We need to be respected, and these venues give us the respect that we need. It’s true that I pay for it. It’s a kind of service. It’s fake. But it’s worth it,” John says.

“Men are afraid of being controlled. Many Hong Kong women suffer from the ‘princess syndrome’. They want to tie their men down, but it never works,” Simon says.

Sex can cost anywhere from RMB300 to RMB1,100 depending on the girl, venue, and service provided, the article said.  Many are paraded out for men to select as though they were picking players for a middle-school flag football team.

Prostitution is rampant in China, but one wonders how Dongguan became one of the country’s sex capitals.  Its proximity to Hong Kong certainly doesn’t hurt, but Shenzhen is even closer (although it, too, has a large-scale sex industry).  Aside from what is on offer in Dongguan, it would be interesting to read how the industry developed to such a degree in the city.

No word on when the movie will be released.