12 November 2006
A Fair Experience
Auditions
October 20 - auditions for the SaMaPi Battle of the Bands 2006 (actually the second for the year, remember that the last fair and battle of the bands took place just this January). Not really interesting, we couldn't see the people playing, only the band, SaMaPi officials and the judges were allowed inside the room. But it's the Bio room. A band playing inside the Bio room, with all its organism and embryo samples. That's so... Martian.
At least I got a preview of the real Battle of the Bands.
Freaky Friday Fairday
Fast forward seven days. Cool. It's fairday! Okay, to be honest I wasn't really that interested. The only events I waited for are, of course, the Battle of the Bands and the fair concert.
Firstly, the fair grounds last January is better than this fair. I hate the enclosing of the soccer field and the small area around it - makes the fair grounds look small and boring.
Now the booths. I find our booth weird and funny. The 'Juice Bar' (really a misleading name), sells shakes that come in eight flavors, only about four of which are fruits. There are two evil booths - Pie in the Face and the usual Jail Booth. There was actually a Water Balloon Wargames Booth (is it really a booth?), which I never even approached due to its location - occupying the one whole boring end of the fair grounds, just behind the Jail Booth.
Speaking of the Jail Booth, I was never caught in the two days of the fair. Just like last January. (Last fair, I didn't even notice the Jail Booth until the second day!) Well at least the jailers were funnier this time. And more intimidating.
When I arrived at the frontlob in the morning, a few classmates were 'assembling' a "Juice Bar" banner, which was almost never used and, I believe, got destroyed a few hours later. We didn't really do anything during the time given us for setting-up our booth the day before, besides finding our tent and placing a table there. So we crammed setting-up. Typical Pisay. Anyway there's not much to set-up.
But still we had problems. We waited long for a power supply, and when we finally got access to electricity the blenders won't work properly. At least, not the way we want it. Sometimes, to make things worse, the problem was in the operator. Hehe. There were also problems in washing the blenders. Eventually we solved them all, operation was hectic but it worked and we earned much. Hehe. We almost closed down because we ran out of ice, but thanks to Brian and his intelligent idea of asking for ice from the caf, from the very people who sells red lemon iced tea, we were able to continue operating and earning.
I was on-duty from 9 to 11 am. That's two shifts, all we were required. I chose to be on-duty at that early time so I could enjoy the rest of the day. And that was what I did.
For three hours after my shift, I stayed at the gym lobby, playing Jiggs's electric guitar with Benj's effects processor. Cool. How fun. I'm sarcastic. It was the easiest way to stay out of the Jailers' way, I found out. Hehe.
Afterwards, I either just wandered around the fair grounds or played the guitar at the gym. Wait, I actually taught PJ about easy guitar chords and the power chords.
Not much happened until sunset. There was Project Runway. Interesting. Jio's excellent performance at the intermission. Sarcastic. I'm not interested in fashion or anything, but I did like Sir Mardan's outfit.
And of course, the big event of the day. "Appassionato", the SaMaPi Battle of the Bands 2006. And the bands played...
Paperview. The Xavier band, Red Hot Chili Peppers fans (they played two Red Hot songs), funny vocalist, good bassist. I've got a theory why they're called Paperview. I'm sure you noticed what the vocalist was holding while se sang - it's a 'paper', and he's 'viewing' it.
Outlaw. Played Sponge Cola's Jeepney and (omg) Calla Lily's Stars. The children. A Batch 2010 musician and his friends. Hehe. I don't like them.
Closed. Played two original songs (boring). Nice band, poor vocalist.
Last Minute. The only band with 09 members (if I'm right, all batches were represented, including 06 and 05, except 08). Call me biased, but they're good. The first real band to play in this BotB. They played their nice original song called Practice and Fall Out Boy's Sophomore Slump or Comeback of the Year. Only things is, Jiggs didn't play his part well. Poor lead guitars. Hehe.
Dalandan Soda (intermission; guest band). Cool band. Their version of Eraserheads' With A Smile is really interesting. I can't classify their rendition - it was reggae at the verses, rock at the chorus, pop at the rest. Cool.
Shift Control. The 06 band. Half of its members are also members of the two-time Battle of the Bands champion Chocochip, another 06 band. They played nice, all the members have good skills, but I'm not interested in the songs they played.
Aleta Band Project. The La Salle band, played Urbandub's Endless, A Silent Whisper and Bamboo's Hallelujah. One of guitarists is actually Theia's brother. They're really great - they've got an amazing drummer. He was actually able to play the drums of songs of the bands with Philippine's best drummers - that of Urbandub and Bamboo. Funny yet good vocalist. Great band overall, they just lack originality, which some say is what made them lose.
Tatlong Tinidor. Funny guys. I believe they joined just for fun - look at how they played that song. See Theia's blog. Hehe. Entertaining nevertheless.
The Nerve. Good band, though their genre and style is something I'm not interested in. Unlike the judge is, I believe. Which made them win. The have a great vocalist, who by the way idolizes Up dharma Down's vocalist, as I was to find out the next day.
Pre-Eminent. The pros. The old ones. They've got the most expensive equipment - double-bass, professional pedals and everything. They're so good they lost. Hehe. Remember, few people appreciate songs requiring great playing skills. You don't need to be able to play Metallica's Master of Puppets on the guitar to be a good, entertaining guitarist.
Ice Cream Mundae. The 05 band, I believe. They're not bad, but they're not interesting either.
In the end, The Nerve won first place. Shift Control took second. Only those two were called up to the stage - bad thing since Last Minute got third. I hope I didn't forget a band. Hehe.
Freaky Saturday Fairday
It was damn boring that morning. Ilang took over the juice bar, earning their own money in their own way with their own supplies, crew and strategy. By the looks of it, they also earned much.
Someone requested five Urbandub songs from the album Influence. Fallen on Deaf Ears, Soul Searching, Runaway, Versus and A New Tattoo if I remember correctly. Later First of Summer and Endless, A Silent Whisper was played, songs from Embrace. Hmm. I wonder who that is. Sarcastic.
Around noon we had our class picture taking. We were at the stage in front of the grandstand, looking stupid and all. Okay, skip.
I bought lunch at the KFC Booth. Cool, there was this guy here who was smoking, and in between puffs he would ask me about the fair concert and other major events in the fair. I was kind enough then to answer politely. Is tobacco smoke that effective?
I ate at the caf with Ced. There were almost no people there - whoever was behind the fair probably feared the caf so much as a business rival as to enclose the fair grounds and to discourage people going to the caf. Nice strategy. It worked, perhaps.
Ced had to leave; Dahlia still had to take their class pics. So I was left at the caf with Elevazo and Echi. I just sat there, staring blankly. I didn't feel like going back to the fair grounds - the Jailers! the Jailers! Hehe. Shortly after, Jan had to leave, I think to attend to some matters. As always. And I was left with Echi. Okay, I was bored. So I sat in the most comfortable way possible and put my head down to the table. It was 1:20 PM. When I raised my head again, the watch says 1:35 PM. And that was how I slept in the caf for the first time.
Then I gathered enough motivation as to actually walk to the frontlob. It was a really big effort, a great achievement to reach the front lobby. There I saw Benj and Ange building card pyramids and all the people around them waiting for 3:20 PM, a.k.a. the time they would be able to go out and play DOTA.
I assimilated more courage and inspiration, and eventually I was able to force myself to enter the fair grounds. Ooh, scary. The fair grounds. Hehe. I went straight to the Juice Bar, stayed there for about 15 seconds, saw some friends near the wall climbing station and walked straight to them. Some time afterwards I found myself driving a pedicab, allied with Godfrey and scaring the hell out of poor loners who looks like they've just learned how to ride a bike.
When I got tired of doing this senseless excercise, I returned to the fair grounds. There was actually something going on there - the ElimiDate. I thought those kinds of shows are made only during Valentine's season. There I learned that Shower won the Fair Idol contest. He almost won the ElimiDate too. Good thing he didn't. Then there was Jio, the new 'searcher'. Among the 'searchees' was Trish. So I thought aloud, "What if Trish wins?"
Nobody answered. But, as if to answer my question, sure enough, Trish won. End of story.
I walked around the fair grounds some more, it got darker, people prepared the stage. What I've been waiting for. Sonoluminescence. Now I'm really getting lazy and a comprehensive band-by-band review would be so tiring. I'll give short notes.
Pedicab gave a good, dancable (just like their music) performance. Paramita, who isn't so popular, managed to wow the audience with their rocking show. The people were especially pleased with the drummer/vocalist Ria. Up dharma Down also had a good show, though most of the songs they played wasn't popular. Giniling Festival as usual gave a highly entertaining set, and even though some of the songs were unknown, it managed to awe the audience with its fun, obscene lyrics and catchy, borrowed tunes. They also had funny intermissions. Radioactive Sago Project satisfied the crowd with their energetic show and witty songs. Juan Pablo Dream and Brownman Revival gave usual, not-so-interesting but nevertheless good performances. The Nerve, the Appassionato champ, gave a good, professional-sounding performance. Datu's Tribe, also not well-known, gave an amusing, traditional OPM rock performance, singing songs with satiric and sometimes funny lyrics.
Warning! Biased opinion coming.
Urbandub, of course, gave the most energetic and most rocking performance. They played mostly their famous songs: Alert The Armory, Soul Searching, First of Summer, Endless, A Silent Whisper and Gone. They gave a good show, easily got the most response from the crowd, and met their expectations.
Overall, it was a nice experience. Generally, it's a better school fair than last year.
posted by DJ at 17:43 |
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