Hong Kong can boast of gigs by music world's legends

With everyone from Franz Ferdinand to Pharrell Williams to Chic to Grandmaster Flash taking to the stage, last year's Clockenflap and Blohk Party festivals featured some of the finest line-ups of Western musical acts to visit our shores in recent years.

But Hong Kong has attracted performances by all sorts of overseas stars over the decades, starting with the biggest of them all in 1964, and taking in many of the most influential names of musical history, sometimes playing at rather unlikely venues. Just which Hong Kong gigs were the best of all will always remain a matter of debate, and there are many great ones that have been left out of the list, but here are 10 that we, and some local musical experts, reckon are among the most memorable.

Princess Theatre, 1964

The first great event concert by an overseas rock band in Hong Kong was also the first gig here by the biggest and best band in musical history. Many of those at the Ringo-less gig (he was back in Britain, recovering from tonsillitis), at a site that is now The Mira hotel, reported that the teenaged female fans were screaming so loudly the band were virtually inaudible. Opinion, however, was divided both over the gig's popularity at the time, given that high ticket prices meant it wasn't even a sell-out, and over whether it really did kickstart Hong Kong's interest in Western rock, given that there was already quite a band scene here at the time. Nonetheless, it certainly played a role in sparking the explosion in Western-style pop music in Hong Kong - an explosion that, in the 1970s, indirectly gave birth to Canto-pop.

Hong Kong Coliseum, 1983

Bowie's Serious Moonlight Tour was a mind-boggling undertaking that involved 96 dates in 16 countries spread over more than six months, seen by more than 2.6 million people - and the climax to that mammoth sweep of the world came in the form of two nights at the Hong Kong Coliseum. This was ultra-slick, 1980s-era Bowie, admittedly all shoulder pads and bleached blond barnet but he always did know how to put on a show, and the Hong Kong concerts included some emotional moments - particularly the second one, says Yuen Chi-chung, local DJ, music critic and founder of influential magazine . "It was December 8, and he sang in tribute to John Lennon" on the third anniversary of his death. Bowie, ever the raconteur live, also recounted at length how he'd last seen his old friend Lennon, co-writer of his 1975 hit , at a market in Hong Kong.