In Conversation With Alien Tits About Creating a Club Night Brand (and Saving the Pangolins)
It’s quite apparent that Lizzie Li likes aliens. Apart from the grey-blue metallic sheen of her hair, a three-inch long alien pendant that dangles from her ear, and the alien tattoo that covers her entire left forearm, she now puts most of her time and effort into her own personal brand and club night, which in keeping with Li’s love of all things ET, happens to be called Alien Tits.
We first heard of Alien Tits in the Beijinger office at the end of last November – a somewhat mysterious event listing had been uploaded to our site but it wasn’t so much the scant details that piqued my interest but the name alone, which had me giggling to myself on and off for the next week.
As more events began to roll in I subscribed to the Alien Tits official WeChat (lizzie_bar) it became obvious that this wasn’t some one-off strange visitation but someone building their own unique voice through weird promotions, random in-house made gifs, and suggestions for media in a similar vein.
Raised on a diet of Star Trek and Close Encounters of a Third Kind, Li holds the strong belief that “we’re being watched.” She’s also unabashed in her optimistic outlook of our future relations with creatures from outer space: “There are two theories about aliens: one is that they are good, the other is that they are evil. I want to help promote the opinion that if aliens do visit they may not do so to harm us but out of curiosity and to know about human beings.”
Enjoying but somewhat dissatisfied with alien-themed nights that she had been to in Beijing, Li set out to create her own, which behind the branding is actually an evening dedicated to giving young local bass, hip-hop, and psytrance DJs a platform and regular evening to spin strange sounds.
To help grow the brand Li and her business partner, who handles the online aspects of sales and advertising, also sell small merchandise like T-shirts and electronic items covered in tailored designs by artists they like. The hope is that through collaboration with likeminded artists and musicians the Alien Tits name can transmit their message and attract a subsect of creatives in Beijing looking for an outlet and an extra-terrestrial community.
In her next outing, this Wednesday (Mar 15) Li hopes to help use her club night at Sanlitun’s Rec Room, to bring attention to the plight of pangolins, which makes perfect sense given their otherworldly (and oh-so-adorable) quality.
Li explains, “I watched news about pangolins in China and as an animal lover I believe that animals are not just a valuable thing for the Earth but also a valuable thing for the universe, and for all existence. We can’t do whatever we want just for money or for our own benefits – we have to help nature, not just use it. It was then that I knew I wanted to do something for them.”
It was at that point that Li decided to inform her friends about the killing of pangolins, an odd anteater-like animal that evolved 80 million years ago but is in now critically endangered because of illegal trading of their meat and scales, commonly used in traditional Chinese medicine practices. However, after posting about them via her WeChat moments she frustrated by resounding inaction and apathy.
She then decided to turn her efforts into creating a night dedicated to raising money and awareness against their killing. “I found that there are often a lot of rock concerts dedicated to a cause but very few electronic music nights – it really sucks,” Li laments.
And what about that name? “At first I wanted to have a cool name but was working with normal English words. It’s also kind of personal; I don’t have big boobs, but I really appreciate a full figure. That being said, people often describe aliens as sexless, and that if we were to encounter them then we would be unable to discern between males and females, but I like the belief that female aliens still have female body parts.” We can’t argue with that.
All proceeds from donations on the door plus 25 percent of all money taken at the bar at Wednesday’s (March 15, 9pm) Alien Tit’s Swag Night will go to the Beijing Loving Animal Foundation in aid of saving China’s dying pangolin population. Read more about the event via Alien Tits’ WeChat account here or our event listing here. If you are unable to make it, the entire event will also be streamed via LeTV.
More stories by this author here.
Email: tomarnstein@thebeijinger.com
WeChat: tenglish_
Instagram: @tenglish__
Images courtesy of Lizzie Li, qz.com
