The Chinese Album
album by Spacehog
The Chinese Album is the second album from the expatriate British alternative rock band Spacehog. It was released on Sire Records in 1998.
The Chinese Album was considered for a soundtrack and basis of a film called Mungo City (later called The Chinese Movie). It was to be about a band that moves to Hong Kong for success after being rejected by a New York record company. Unsatisfied with the final script, Spacehog dismissed any plans for shooting.
Spacehog wrote and recorded 20 songs for The Chinese Album. Among these are the B-sides "Final Frontier", "Isle of Manhattan" and "Cryogenic Lover", which were released on European singles.
"Carry On" peaked at No. 43 on the UK Singles Chart where as "Mungo City" peaked at 79.
Critical reception
The A.V. Club wrote that "for the most part, The Chinese Album sounds like Aladdin Sane or Roxy Music's early material, stripped of any sense of commitment or adventure." The Orlando Sentinel wrote that "one can only admire a group so unrepentantly unfashionable, especially when it stirs its influences together with such flair and flamboyance." The Austin Chronicle called the album "a pretty, precious confection of pop ditties." The Rough Guide to Rock deemed it "a beautifully crafted masterpiece, intelligent, edgy and eclectic."
Track listing
All songs by Royston Langdon except when noted.
Begin with the source’s own compact description: “The Chinese Album” is album by Spacehog. The dossier treats that line as a proposition to test through Chinese, Album and album, not as a finished interpretation.
Why this record matters
The phrase “album by Spacehog” supplies a clear boundary for inquiry. It also exposes the unanswered questions: who defined that boundary, when it became stable and which sources sit outside it.
Attribution, date and provenance are strongest when supported by the original work, a catalogue record and documented transmission. The source revision retrieved here is dated Sep 14, 2026. The linked authority identifier is Q7722551. 1 of 1 selected statements include explicit references; 0 carry qualifiers and 0 use preferred rank. The first chronological checks are 1998.
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This entry incorporates text from “The Chinese Album” on English Wikipedia. Contributors are listed in the page history. Text is available under the Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike 4.0 License. Selected authority identifiers and statements are retrieved from Wikidata under CC0; their references and qualifiers remain part of the verification path.