In the live music scenes of Beijing and beyond, expatriate rockers discover receptive audiences and a vibrant, anything-goes atmosphere that encourages originality and experimentation

Forget the Great Wall and forget the Forbidden City. If you really want to know what makes the Chinese capital stand out, tune in now and get with the Beijing beat. If you do, you may well find that it has become one of the most exciting music scenes on the planet.

That, at least, is the way expatriate musicians who perform in the city are seeing and hearing things.

Maikel Liem, 36, laughs as he talks about a particularly memorable performance.

"It was in 2010 that the band, the Amazing Insurance Salesmen, competed in the Global Battle of the Bands in Malaysia," the Dutch bass player says.

"We represented China, and yet there was only one Chinese person in the band."

After playing at Temple Bar in Gulou, Beijing, a year ago, Amazing Insurance Salesmen disbanded, and Liem, whose day job is as a project manager at Pactera (an outsourcing company working with Microsoft), now plays in a group called Wu and the Side Effects.

Even as "the new normal" has become the cliche of choice for describing China's economic progress, "the normal abnormal" sums up his take on the local music scene.

For one thing, in the usual scheme of things, bassists take a backseat, playing second fiddle to prominent guitarists, whereas Liem is equal to the guitarist at Wu and the Side Effects.

"That's why I love making music here. You never know whether normal is normal."

So what exactly lies behind this buzzing excitement in the music scene in Beijing and elsewhere in China that has the likes of Liem so enthralled?