Opened just in time for winter, Brasa Rotisserie Chicken is sure to satisfy those who've been missing that sweet, sweet rotisserie chicken.

The latest Eduardo Vargas venture (And oh boy, he's had plenty lately) specializes in Peruvian style chicken that's marinated for 24 hours and slowly cooked over a bed of hardwood charcoals for one hour. The result? Crispy and flavourful skin, and hearty tender meat.

The menu has an assortment of chicken combos, as well as chicken sandwiches, chicken soups and salads. Mmmm... chicken, chicken, chicken (Sorry, vegetarians). 

TALK was treated to some Brasa fare for lunch last week. Delivered to our office, we tried the Office Combo, which is supposed to feed up to eight people with two whole chickens,  two large helpings of regular fries and garlic fries (garlic rice and roasted potatoes are also offered), two large salads, plus eight sauces for a reasonably priced RMB 228.

The fries were decent, but didn't keep well, as our food arrived a tad on the cool side. But as a lunch deal, Brasa has it bang on with a RMB 38 Quarter Combo that includes 1/4 chicken, your choice of side, one small salad and sauce.

For dessert, we also tried the Oreo cheesecake, which is dominated with cheesecake flavour and just a vague hint of Oreo. We highly recommend the Peruvian flan -- it's creamy sweetness melts in your mouth.

Brasa Rotisserie Chicken, Block 6, Shop 7, 888 South Shanxi Lu, between Zhaojiabang Lu and Jianguo Xi Lu. Delivery Tel: 400 820 2172. 

Shanghai has just upped its chic with the opening of Chanel's boutique flagship store inside the new Peninsula Hotel on 25 November.

We visited the spacious 480 square metre boutique on its opening day to see what posh features were in store. Its launch didn't draw a large crowd, but a steady stream of shoppers and VIP guests.

Its interior is designed by renowned New York architect Peter Marino and is inspired by Coco Chanel's fabled apartment.  With refined details such as antique fabric lamps, crystal quartz and original artwork, Shanghai's Chanel is elegant and classic, with a touch of avant garde. Salon-style rooms separate apparel and accessories,  and for those dahhhlings who prefer to shop in privacy, there’s also a special VIP section.

We also took notice of Paris-Shanghai Metiers d'Art, a new Chanel collection designed by Karl Lagerfield that's exclusively sold in Shanghai to celebrate the store's opening. It includes various items of clothing and accessories (including the classic quilted flapbag in lambskin with "Shanghai Karl Lagerfield" for its inside signature), with red boldly dominating the mix.

For more on Chanel's Shanghai boutique, visit the Chanel Paris Shanghai website. On 3 December, the lux brand also plans to release a short film by Lagerfield featuring the Shanghai store and his special collection.

Chanel, Peninsula Hotel, The Bund, 32 Zhongshan Dong Yi Lu, Tel: 6321 7005. 

Just opened is Essence of China at the Fellini Gallery. Representing five contemporary Chinese artists in collaboration with one young French artist, the exhbition implores us to reflect on the many contradictions that exist within the Chinese culture. The artists' work encompases different mediums, from oil painting, sculpture, ink colour to photography.

There's Xu Ze from the Sichuan province with several awards and group exhibitions behind him who works with oil to create landscapes of nature and villages that evoke the emotion of stillness. There are sculptures by Pang Yong who although Shenyang born, is based in Beijing. His sculptures are of women with pink hair and dressed in pink robes, their faces almost identical with round cheeks and closed eyes. Euraclus was born in France, has exhibited in several countries across Europe and  has spend the past 5 years here. Through experimentation, his artwork represents both his experiences here and the mix of cultures. His abstract work in oil on canvas uses strong colours and brush strokes. Then there's Qu Wei Wei from the Shandong province who works with ink and colour creating paintings which both reminds the viewer of older paintings while the shapes are contemporary and set against nature backgrounds of sea and trees. The only artist in the exhibition to work with photography is Tian Taiquan who also is from the Sichuan province. In all his work there's a common image of a naked body, while otherwise differentiating itself in being covered by a uniform, blood or words from newspaper prints. The exhibition catalogue states that in his work "The common theme is that through the whole human race's sacrifice, death, and the desire to search for oneself can reflect the dark reality that not only China, but also the whole world, has lost its direction in toaday's world." Huang Jin from the Hunan province,works with oil on canvas depicting bamboo,
as opposed to working with water colour or ink which traditionally would be used for this subject.

While all the work in the exhibition are beautiful in their own right, at the same time, the mixture of medium and subject matter reflect the many different aspects associated with Chinese culture. To see the work and stories hidden in the work, step of the street and into the Fellini Gallery. Art director: Jp LAM, Curator: missY Chao

FELLINI Gallery, 339 Changle Lu #15 near Xiangyang Lu, Tel:  5404-7787
 

Melbourne’s favourite death-folk maestros, the Tom Budge Band, are in Shanghai this week to show local music lovers their dark side. In the lead-up to their two shows at the Glamour Bar this Thursday and Friday night, guitarist, keyboardist and backing vocalist extraordinaire Hamish Michael took some time out to answer some light-hearted questions.

Your MySpace page says “Garry Ribald saved our lives”. Who on earth is Garry Ribald?

Really, who isn't Gary Ribald. He's both man and myth. He's a stimulating cocktail of calamity that is generally only visible to the naked eye as he grinds and hops his way into your personal space.

Every description I've heard of the Tom Budge Band includes the words honest and dirty. Just how honest and dirty are you guys?

Honestly? I think that the grit and truth are in the eyes and ears of the beholders. Descriptions tend to say more about the descriptors than the descriptees ... that said, we have described ourselves that way. So yeah, perhaps a whole bunch of both. We'd encourage you to come and decide for yourselves though, you music-loving, free-thinkers you.

Would you say you're more honest, or more dirty?

It can oscillate on any given day. The present forecast is a light sprinkling of incorruptible virtue with frequent trustworthy periods. Patchy recollection and isolated misdemeanours in the afternoon, becoming cloudy with a late chance of debasing one's equilibrium. A cold, dark night of the soul is expected.

What should punters at the Glamour Bar expect from your live shows (without using the words honest or dirty)?

Can we use un-honest and not-clean? Look, I must say that it's not 'dirty' in a filthy way. Let's not get carried away and imagine that the Tom Budge Band is a lecherous, wheezing collection of moral-destroying reprobates. Those two are staying in Australia.

More 'dirty' in the way that any wonderfully perfect thing has inherent glorious imperfections, like the Persian artisans who made deliberate mistakes so as not to anger their god by arrogantly attempting to create something 'perfect'. In turn, it's not 'folk' as Peter, Paul & Mary would have it. It's 'folk' that has been humiliated, stared in the face, shaken, beaten, had a long hard think about itself, and is now trying to play its song with broken fingers.

Punters can trust that their hard earned RMB 150 will be nurtured, loved, and transformed into an expansive sea of beautiful and, at times, jarring sounds, that lap and crash around the ship of Tom's meandering monologues of maudlin and magical metamorphoses.

What are you expecting from the shows?

To survive. And a reception akin to Beatle-mania, with just a handful more screaming teenagers. Really, I think it's going to be an extraordinary experience. It's a real honour to be invited to play on the other side of the world in such a fascinating and beautiful city. They're great songs to play and we have a lot of fun doing so. In Australia I don't have a grand piano, so that will be a treat. To be able to share the songs with new people, a different culture, and to see how they relate and what they glean from the music will be somewhat interesting, don't you think?

It's been bloody cold here in Shanghai lately, do you think Tom will still get his shirt off?

One comes to realise as one continues to spin ever-further around the sun that removing one's shirt in front of a crowd of strangers can be less than dignified – especially when the sartorial stakes are so high. Need I remind you it's a Glamour bar. More so, it's The Glamour Bar.

Tom has only ever taken his shirt off as a by-product of his, at times, 'enthusiastic' performance style and complete commitment to the moment. So, it's really up to the moment, not us. That said, we still orbit the sun and Tom still commits ... These are facts.

Your music makes you sound kind of angry. What really gets your goat?

China Eastern will be getting our goats and transporting them in specially made goat flight-chambers. Then a nice man at the airport will get them and bring them to our hotel room. We love our goats and refuse to tour without them.

Angry? Noooo ... Surely not.

19 & 20 November. RMB 150 including one drink. Glamour Bar, 6F, Five on the Bund,20 Guangdong Lu, near Zhongshan Dong Yi Lu. Tel: 6329 3751. Web: http://m-theglamourbar.com