By Erika Tapalla
INQUIRER.net

QUEZON CITY, Philippines — In a world where the concept of community has transcended barrios and has grown to include social networks, viral campaigns have worked to extend its reach by using the Internet.

KL Sol Cruz organized Project Savannah, a viral fund raising campaign aimed to raise some money to save “Savannah,” an unborn child who has been diagnosed with congenital diaphragmatic hernia. This is a condition in which the baby’s diaphragm, the organ that separates the chest cavity (containing the heart and lungs) from the abdominal cavity (containing the stomach, liver and intestines), fails to develop completely. It also involves an underdeveloped diaphragm that leaves a hole where the intestines and the stomach can enter the chest cavity, thereby affecting the development of the lungs. After birth, the lungs may collapse and the child may not be able to breathe.

Savannah must undergo a $100,000 operation, called intrauterine fetal surgery, which can only be performed in the United States.

Parents Vida and Brian Samson have approached several foundations to shoulder the cost of the procedure and are awaiting a positive response. The Philippine Airlines has already given the couple roundtrip tickets to San Francisco.

Meanwhile, Sol Cruz and a team of 13 other people have resorted to more creative ways to reach people. Through social networks Multiply and Facebook, they are gathering participants to attend “Rock the Cradle” and “Ultrasound,” to raise more funds to help cover for travel, tax and other expenses of the couple.

The advantages of Internet fund raising are many. It is quick, cheap and unobtrusive — but will it be enough to save Savannah?

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By Clarence Yu
Contributor

THE scene is all too familiar for me: take any known club in the mainstream nowadays that features a show band. The band is composed of veterans who don’t look overly familiar, yet they play a blitzing repertoire of 70s, 80s and 90s pop standards, get a rousing ovation for the night, and disappear.

If the club owners happen to like them because they bring in the customers, I’ll likely be able to catch them again next week. If not, and I happen to like them, you’ll have to search high and low for their next gig, and at the next club.

Such is the plight of session musicians — virtually virtuosos (pardon the pun) at their instruments, oftentimes with years of experience under their belts, yet unable to find a steady gig, a record deal, a good name for themselves or a steady flow of income from playing their instruments.

I would think that with the years of experience that they have, most of these session musicians will have some sort of livelihood going for them now. Having known many session musicians myself, and for a time, playing the part of a wanna-be session musician, the surprising thing for me always or whenever I get to meet up with some of them I can call my friends is most of them still play to eat and live. This is both admirable and pitiful at the same time.
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UPDATE 2: Finally, Ticketworld has started selling tickets with prices at P800 for general admission and P1,300 for patrons, according to the website.

UPDATE: Here’s a recent statement posted on the Eraserheads mailing list:

27 August 2008
Philip Morris statement on Eraserheads concert

Philip Morris Philippines Manufacturing Inc. confirms that Radiohead Media Solutions Inc. has agreed to take over as promoter of the Eraserheads reunion concert planned for 30 August 2008. We made the
decision to withdraw as promoter and will have no involvement at all in this reunion concert. We wish the Eraserheads and Radiohead Media Solutions Inc. all the best.

Dave M. Gomez
Public Affairs and Communications Manager
Philip Morris Philippines Manufacturing Inc.

Rumors about the cancellation of the Eraserheads reunion concert were dispelled. But many fans still crave for more information. For the past days local mailing lists (especially the longest-running E-heads list, among others), were abuzz about its cancellation until former E-heads drummer Raimund Marasigan announced that the much-anticipated reunion is pushing through despite the strong lobby against its former sponsor and the hitches in the Subsandwich mailing list, newsgroup of his band Sandwich.

Most fans wanted to know where to buy tickets, and how much is it worth. One E-heads list member even found an obviously fake ticket now being sold online for P50,000.

Since their split in 2002, rumors about the Reunion concert has been circulated on and off until this year when news came that they will finally play a one-night only concert.

As posted by Jim Ayson in Philmusic.com:

The rumors flew fast and thick all weekend. The story was that the Eraserheads Reunion was canceled. After all the relentless pressure from the anti-smoking lobby led by Dr. Maricar Limpin and her cronies at the Department of Health, Philip Morris did pull out of the show they organized. But on Sunday night, Raymund Marasigan himself made the announcement: The Eraserheads are “most definitely” pushing through with the reunion show. On schedule. At the right venue. On 08.30.2008 at the Fort Bonifacio open field.

At the time of this posting, fans are still in the dark about the price of the tickets, and where will they be sold.

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By Clarence Yu
Contributor

THE Rolling Stones simply defy categorization. They have played and recorded songs in every imaginable genre, be it jazz, blues, reggae, disco, rock and roll, hard rock, and pop.

This is probably why they have such a short supply of Stones fans in Manila, and why they never pervaded our culture, even after existing as a fully functioning band for the last 46 years.

While the rest of the world has celebrated its “Greatest Rock N’ Roll Band” throughout the years, the Philippines has yet to follow suit. How many Filipinos can name at least three songs of the Stones? The normal answer I get is “(I Can’t Get No) Satisfaction,” their 1965 worldwide hit. Outside my musical circle of friends, no one can give me any other two songs. And in my opinion, it is a crying shame.

The Rolling Stones were cool before cool was cool. They were the Metallica to the Bon Jovi, the Sex Pistols to the Osmond Family, and indeed, the dark, inverted persona contrasted to the mop-topped Beatles.

Perhaps not many people know that the Rolling Stones were actually marketed as the anti-Beatles, and that the Stones and Beatles, throughout the ‘60’s, actually existed together in cooperation: every time the Stones or the Beatles had a potential new single for release, each would call the other to see how the other band’s current singles were doing. If the Beatles were on top of the charts at the time, they would give sufficient way for the Stones to release theirs, and vice-versa, thus ensuring a virtual lock on the charts for both bands.
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JIM Paredes of the Apo Hiking Society talks about the present state of the Filipino music industry and the the music he grew up in.

He says that the music industry then was much more exciting due to the various styles and genres Filipino artists came up with. In addition, Paredes says the web is now being used to carry music, drastically changing the music scene.

Watch INQUIRER.net online videographer Janie Christine Octia’s video interview with Paredes.

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