12 PAIRS OF EARS (iBlogNewAlbum#18)

I have not declared just yet that the new album 0:00:00 is finally done.  It is finished, by the way, at least from our end of the production. No more recording. No more mixing.  It’s done.  But I still could not find it in my heart to say that it is really finished.  Not when there are still 2 crucial things that will happen.  

Front cover of the Pre-mastering Listening Session
Comment Sheet

Comment sheet.  There's a space for each track. and instructions are simply;
"As a listener, tell us how you feel. As a musician/artist, tell us what you think"

One would be the slightly scary Pre-Mastering Listening Session that will happen this Friday, March 16.  12 carefully chosen people composed of musicians, sound engineers and artists of different disciplines will participate in the strictly-headphones-only listening session that will happen at 1032 Recording Studios.  Of course, all of the participants are music lovers! 

The reason for the listening session is mainly to get feedback.  We have been exposed to this material for the last 2 years that our ears are so comfortable and probably exhausted from all the studying and tweaking.   The new pairs of ears will give us fresh insight and we can use their observation as input and basis for final adjustments before we submit the tracks to the mastering facility.

This brings me to talk about the other crucial thing that will happen – Mastering, the last phase of album production.   I have decided to get the new album mastered in a professional mastering facility in the US. I am still researching and canvassing a good facility and a note-worthy sound engineer with the help of my active musician friends in America. I will blog about my decision soon.  And then maybe settle on an album release date.

For now, I’m letting the newly finished 0:00:00 marinate.

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DON’T FORGET TO VENTILATE (iBlogNewAlbum#17)

If it hurts then you’re not breathing right. It’s really that simple.

I wrote this thought into the new album (0:00:00) through a song that was meant to be a duet.  However, in the absence of a worthy duet partner, I decided to do all the voices and simulate a conversation. A good conversation.

When something hurts, I close my eyes and focus on my breathing and for some reason that certain something won’t seem to hurt as much. And I find that to be so cool.

And I just know that if I keep practicing this, sooner or later, nothing will hurt at all.

So just breathe…

Here’s the episode where I show you how…

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A JOINT PROJECT (iBlogNewAlbum#16)

I did say that I have the liberty to just choose whoever I want to work with and I have to say that I am lucky and blessed to be surrounded by such wonderful and talented people who are willing to work with me.  One of them is Berklee College of Music alumni Jay Young AKA Joint Project.

It was just a few months ago that we grilled our own heads while working on the music for the play The Clockwork Princess.  That was a fun few months towards the end of 2011.  Music was just waiting to be made and it was wonderful.  Simultaneously, I was making my 4^th studio album 0:00:00 and The Clockwork Princess – dealing with two Digital Audio Workstations and two collaborators.  On one end, I had Jad Bantug for my personal project, on the other was Jay for the steampunk-themed musical theater project. 

Jad Bantug and Jay Young at 1032 Recording Studio while working on the song "Small Things"

Now if you don’t call that fun, then I really don’t know what fun is…

With this in mind, I decided to get Joint Project involved in 0:00:00 and make him my collaborator for the song “SMALL THINGS”.  The other mission was to make sure he gets to record some bass lines using his awesome electric upright bass.

Recording the Electric upright bass

Mission accomplished. 

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FOR ALL THINGS NEW (iBlogNewAlbum#15)

People change. But instead of taking note of how people change, I’m going to talk about how I’ve changed.  For what business do I have with other people’s changes, right?

But admittedly, in the 3rd episode of COUNTDOWN TO 0:00:00, I did mention about certain changes in other people that I have observed that led me to write the song “NEW” - which is what the 3^rd mini-documentary episode is all about.  

The irony is - in the song, I have expressed a little disapproval on a certain person’s “changes” because as per my observation, this person has changed for the worse.  However, this song has been the stepping stone to my own changes. It is through this song that I bravely took on a new direction in terms of sound and gave up my old mindset on sound production.  It also through this song that I have decided on graduating from being in a band to just being ME.  That doesn’t necessarily mean I'm flying solo all the way, it just means I get to decide who to work with... and the thought of that is comforting! 

And whether this change is for the better or worse, that’s all up to you. . . What matters to me is I feel better and all good about it.  So there…

Here’s the 3^rd episode of COUNTDOWN TO 0:00:00…

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YOUR TEAR DUCTS ARE THERE FOR A REASON (iBlogNewAlbum#14)

So the 2^nd episode of COUNTDOWN TO 0:00:00 is mainly about my song HELLO TEARS – how it was made and how we produced it.  It is a documentary, after all, so it is loaded with stuff; studio moments, documented storytelling and some live acoustic outdoor gigging.  Fun to do, fun to do!   

Hello Tears, the song and the episode, is never for the non-confrontational. It is for those who give high regard to their emotions.  It is for those who know that their highest truths lie within their emotions.  Feelings serve as signals of what is out there that still needs to be learned.

I’m really happy with how the song and this episode of the documentary came to be.  I pretty much showed my vulnerable side, which is probably not new for some people.  But this is all in the essence of sharing. I just want to tell my story and how I didn’t just write this song. I actually lived it. 

Here’s how it happened. Watch! 

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LET ME TAKE YOU WITH ME (iBlogNewAlbum#13)

I keep saying it’s a journey. I keep saying…

I keep saying because it has been a journey as much as it is still a journey.  Nothing is ever finished…  But for now, for this particular chapter of my life, I am almost done.

And because I am, I think it’s time to start showing what I have been doing, who I’ve been doing it with and where, and what we’ve come up so far. 

My humble team from my very small independent recording label called 22 Tango Records has been following me to the studios and some other unlikely places for a year now to document the creation of 0:00:00. 

As I am producing 0:00:00 with my cohort Jad Bantug (my instrumentalist and Sound Engineer), Team 22 Tango is also creating what they fondly call “Countdown to 0:00:00” – it’s a 9-episode mini-documentary series that captured my life with Jad as we were in the process of creating the 11 (or 12) track studio album.

Here’s the intro episode…

Catch the next episode this weekend. For more details, follow me www.twitter.com/CATTSKI

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I’VE NEVER FELT SO . . . WICKED!

About 7 years ago, I’ve heard about the Broadway musical WICKED and, along with some friends, became somewhat obsessed to it.  I blame the brilliant music – it really got to us. It’s so great that based on it, we knew it’s an amazing story and an epic production.  And it didn’t take long until WICKED was considered one of Broadway’s biggest hits, if not the biggest!

Last year, I found out that the Universal Pictures production with an American/Australian cast would visit Singapore for a two-month staging of the musical at the Marina Bay Sands.  That’s the same venue where I saw the Disney Production The Lion King, another huge Broadway hit, back in 2011.  Of course, I wanted to go back, this time for WICKED.  Miraculously, by some amazing maneuver of the universe, I was booked to fly to the Lion City to finally scratch this item off my bucket list.

Minutes through Act I, while catching my breath and watching the cast do the first musical number ‘No One Mourns The Wicked’, I could already see the reasons why the world calls this “the best” to ever come out of Broadway.  Immediately, you can see that it is a super slick production in every respect.  The set, scenery and lighting are simply stunning.  And the costumes are particularly detailed and conceptually innovative.   

As you might already know, the plot of this superbly polished musical is the backstory to the original book ‘The Wizard of Oz’ written by American writer Frank L. Baum that was converted into film  starred by Judy Garland in 1939. The original idea for this off-beat, but imaginative concept, came from the mind and pen of author Gregory Maguire who wrote the novel WICKED: The Life and Times of the Wicked Witch of the West back in 1990. 

The story of WICKED was served to its audience through a wonderful marriage of words and music that was written by the genius composer & lyricist behind Godspell, Pippin & Children of Eden Stephen Schwartz. 

It takes us back to the death of the Wicked Witch of the West otherwise known here as Elphaba and how she became the evil piece of work portrayed in the film.  It also provides a history of her friendship with the Good Witch Glinda and how the characters of Oz like the Tin Man, Scarecrow & the Lion came to be. 

More importantly, Wicked offers a different perspective from the original story and has presented the character of Elphaba as “good” instead of evil. But that is the twist. And I’m not about to divulge why. I’m just going to say that it is Elphaba’s character that gives the story depth and substance aside from it being a fantastic musical extravaganza with peaking production and entertainment values.

Elphaba’s character and her struggles in the story gives us this opportunity to self-check and to look within.  I can’t speak for everyone else but that’s what happened to me.  There’s an Elphaba in me and in everyone who’s different and have, at some point in their lives, experienced being an outcast.  I know how it feels to be considered strange, to be ignored and rejected, unfairly criticized and massively misunderstood.

And I know how it feels to attempt to defy all of that.

So there, this engrossing wicked musical touched a soft spot and has shaken me to the core.  I even think that those with the toughest and hardest of hearts will find difficulty in resisting its emotional and psychological insights as well as its stunning production values.  For sure, people will keep going to Oz and if I’d have a chance, I’d go back too!

"So if you care to find me, look to the western sky! 

As someone told me lately

Ev'ryone deserves the chance to fly

And if I'm flying solo

At least I'm flying free

To those who'd ground me

Take a message back from me

Tell them how I am 

Defying gravity..." - Elphaba (The Wicked Witch of the West)

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