ON stage, you see them bringing the house down as they rock the house with their eardrum-popping music. But off stage, they are your ordinary people like you and me.
Vocalist Henry Allen of Filipino rock band Faspitch, for one, says he and his bandmates play computer game Warcraft for pastime.
“We’re a geeky band. We grew up playing computers,” added Faspitch bassist Trevor Bicknell.
ADMIT it. Your musical taste is largely influenced by friends or at least people close to you. And you often want to share it with everyone or at least to those who share your taste. That is essentially the idea behind Blip.fm.
“Music discovery is social,” says Jeff Yasuda, CEO and co-founder of Blip.fm, a tab service originally under the Fuzz.com website. (Actually, Yasuda’s card reads Founder and CEO of Fuzz Artists Inc.,’ which is an independent music label).
Calling himself a former “bean counter” (read Investment Banker) and a VC (venture capitalist), Yasuda and his co-founder Brian Venneman set up Blip.fm out of their love for music — of course, they believe there’s business in the social aspect of music discovery now that you have the Internet as your platform.
“I’ve been in a band since I was 13 years old,” says Yasuda as we talked in his music-filled room that he calls his office. Everywhere you look, there is music. There’s an exclusive photo of Pearl Jam’s frontman Eddie Vedder wearing a wig and a rather funny and amusing photo of Yasuda and his funky band and a lone fan listening.
Yasuda has a vast collection of music posters of various concerts and known musicians, which gives away his own musical taste. Of course, his first guitar was hanging on one wall, reminding him about his roots. He describes Blip.fm and Fuzz as his second baby — the first is a cute child whose photos are also on his desk.
INQUIRER.NET multimedia reporter Erika Tapalla scores an exclusive interview with Long Island-based DJ, DJ Spinbad. DJ Spinbad has primetime mixshows on New York’s premiere urban station, Power 105.1, and the number one Top 40 station in the US, Z100. He was in town for the third anniversary celebration of Embassy Superclub last night.
Video taken by Jon Herrera at Greenbelt in Makati City.
DOMESTIC music still proves to be very much alive with the release of the new albums of two noteworthy OPM acts — Miguel Escueta and Moonstar 88.
Miguel Escueta recently launched his debut album “I Am M.E.,” bannered by the single “Falling Away.” His name may not ring a bell yet for some, but he has established a name for himself when he emerged as first runner-up in the “Acoustic Break” competition in 2003 and nominee for Best New Male Recording Artist in the 2005 Awit Awards. But his momentum was broken when he decided to finish his studies at the Ateneo de Manila University. With his love for music, he decided to try again and eventually got signed by MCA Music.
Moonstar 88 is not exactly new to the music scene, having released two albums and spawning the hits “Torete,” “Sulat” and “Sa Langit” with then Acel Bisa as their lead vocalist. Now connected with a new record label (Sony BMG), with a new vocalist, Maychelle Baay, and a new drummer, Bon Sundiang, joining its original members — Herbert Hernandez (guitars) Paolo Bernaldo (bass) — the band is back with “Todo Combo.”
