iact street party

its about time another gig came by =] iact is moving to a cooler place, and we’ll (underheadlights) be playing at their launch cum street partay!!! from what i’ve heard there’s a lot of planning going down for this event so it’s gonna be huge!

there’s gonna be bands (one buck short, underheadlights, eg), even a rap group (manhand), exhibitions (it IS an advertising institute) and awareness events all placed out through the day (25th april). so mark the date down, put on your jumping shoes and come and have a blast!

save me from myself

sounds like a pretty emo title eh? you can kinda image me at the corner of my room,  dim lights with an empty bottle of heineken by my side. i’m curled up in a fetus position, a little tear in my eye. holding a razor in my right hand and my scribbled last words to the world on a crumpled paper in my left, i’m ready to meet my maker.

but we all know my emo days are over eh? heh.

do you know this face?

you don’t? ah, here are some clues:

1. he is a musician
2. his stage name is one of a part of your body
3. his ex-band is the name of a particular yellow fruit comically spelt with a “k” instead of a “c”

for the uninformed ppl who never experienced the nu metal wave that came in the 90s, this is brian “head” welch, former lead guitarist of pioneering nu metal band korn. though i’m not a particular big fan, i must say that i really love a few of their tracks, namely freak on the leash (something takes a part of me), their cover of Cameo’s Word Up and their recent hit twisted transistor.

so yeah a small conversation on korn (that’s all i’m capable of) and now head left the band some 4 years ago after he went to church and accepted Christianity into his life. and now, what we all have been waiting for is here. head’s solo project! titled… you can guess this one =]

save me from myself

i must say the few tracks i’ve listened to on this album sounds really interesting. its still very much loud, hardcore and full of screams, so don’t expect head to suddenly become steven curtis chapman aiight? if you’re a fan of loud music with that nu metal influence then go on and sample some of his tracks by clicking on the album art above.

would your mum consider this a good influence? hmm…

i think a nice controversial song he has is die religion die which he says is about how religious ppl use the bible and its content to give them “the right” to judge ppl which is quite true in today’s world. i think we have too many ppl with strong opinions who speak up too often and think they know more than they do.

here’s a little snippet of a telephone interview he did

~

You achieved an incredible amount of success while you were in Korn. You scored two Grammys, you won several MTV awards and sold over 30 million albums worldwide. Can you define what success meant to you while you were in Korn, and then define what success means to you now?

To me, success meant getting a record deal when I started out in Korn. After that happened, I started making a lot of money and the success just went through the roof: I got a gold record, a platinum record, and then we hit No. 1 on the Billboard chart. You can’t get any higher than that! It was cool, but then I thought: “Is this it? I’ve reached my goal. I climbed the mountain of success, I reached the top and I hit the bell. Ding! I made it! Now the only way to go is down because I already made it to the top.” It was like, O.K., I rang the bell at the top, but it just didn’t satisfy me.

Now success is watching what God is doing through me. Jesus already won! He’s the success. He died on the cross, and it’s finished. He said, “It is finished.” So once I came to Christ, I reached the ultimate success! Now it’s both of us completing the work that we have together on earth, but that just flows and happens. [Sometimes I battle] with depression, but I don’t freak out because God is faithful. He’ll get me out of it, and it’s already done. Jesus did everything; that’s success—He’s my success!

~

he sounds so Christian eh? read the whole thing here

and just for fun, some videos!

mono m80. you know you want it.

it’s here! and yes, it is the best gigbag in the world! =P not that i have used many gigbags to date. this one just looks the coolest! now the love story begins.

looking at it, it is much bigger than my previous gigbag which was a fender gigbag that came with a bass that i previously bought. it was padded but not fully padded so it was a lot sleeker than the m80. and well, that’s probably the only think that my previous gigbag trumps the m80 at =P

the m80 has a few compartments for u to put lotsa stuff inside em. and they’re not just compartments, they have more compartments in them! the big pocket at the front end has cable management and what i think is a cd compartment. and an additional “hidden” pocket at the top of the m80 holds ur smaller things. tuners, baby wipes, screwdrivers, etc.

neck saver! this obviously saves ur neck in the event ur gigbag were to accidentally drop. but with a beauty like this, u’d never let it out of ur sight, so i don’t think it will drop much because of its hotness as well =] did i mention there’s a pick compartment at the neck saver?

strap pin protection! don’t know what that is? well, gigbags are usually put on the floor on, u guessed it, resting on the guitar’s strap pin. now what this m80 does is it instead puts the load of ur heavy 28-string bass  on the body of the bass rather than the little tiny strap pin. amazing huh?

apparently its also waterproof, but i have yet to test that one out yet =]

pads everywhere. hardcase-like protection with abs panels at the head and the body. anti-skip zippers. super plush smooth interior. strong straps and handle fastened by steel studs, so its equally strong worn as a backpack or just carried with ur hands. and have u ever had ur backpack straps dangling all over the place when u decide to just carry ur gigbag with 1 hand? well the m80 has a compartment to tuck ur backpack straps in! now talk about thinking out of the box for u.

its beauty can only be appreciated live in living colour, and by touching

to the one who got it for me. you shouldn’t have, but i’m not complaining =] thank you u!

we’re on gua!

well, its just an article. but woohoo!

i didn’t know there were any ppl from any web or watever covering the event that day. but looks like there were. and we got lucky, coz the article only has photos of 2 bands and we’re one of them!

here’s a portion of the article:

l-r: weeliem, cheemeng, joni, lenard, joshua

It’s not a new message but being there that night it was as if these young folks in bands and their volunteering friends wanted to be even more obvious about it, if only to wipe out the apathy that’s still bugging quite a number of us a little quicker (preferably before the world ends).

They’ve turned their best intentions into noble action, their way – isn’t it time to answer with yours?

~

read the whole article here.

earth hour malaysia compilation cd

earth hour gig was stellar! if u weren’t there, u missed out on something big. too bad for u =\ anyway…

oh lookie here. i’m in a compilation! woohoo! who says u need to have an album b4 u can get onto a compilation huh? =] oh yeah, its free too!

so if you don’t have one, well u have to hurry on to one of these locations today! i’m not sure where/when else they will be available. local radio stations and websites are giving them out too! just click on the pic above, and you’ll be directed to a superb site that tells u the locations =]

i haven’t heard the compilation yet, but i heard its good. apparently cds that go through proper burning for audio cd sales have a better quality compared to burning/cetak rompak that ppl commonly do using computer burners. the bands on it are great too! altered frequency, army of three, fourletterstory, pg165, scene at the movies, unabashed and under headlights (that’s me!)

did i mention its free? well, technically la. all u have to do is sign up and pledge to switch of your lights and nonessential electrical stuff TODAY from 830-930pm. easy right? u save electric, the world AND you get a free cd with good quality amazing bands. what a win-win situation for everyone =]

earth hour: are you part of it yet?

i’m sure u’ve heard it, but what is it? what’’s with all this buzz? how many ppl are actually doing it? and the tagline that they’ve been using pretty often: can i make a difference?

earth hour is in it’s 3rd year running, starting solely in sydney australia, spreading to 35 countries last year and growing to 82 countries this year. it’s a worldwide event where businesses and households switch off their nonessential lights for an hour.

there’s a whole lot of articles you can read about it online, but the gist is switching off things you don’t really need for an hour. its so simple. anyone can do it. everyone should do it. but knowing humankind, there is always the few that disagree.

I READ with amazement and irony the efforts of WWF Malaysia to latch on to the Earth Hour event and all the celebrities, media and corporations that have come up in support.

It is amazing that people are so easily taken in by a mere publicity stunt that fails at the very essence. Turning off our lights for one hour on one designated day of the year to save our planet surely is a PR event at best.

It shames the thousands of devoted people, government bodies, scientists and environmentalists that have for years been working on finding real solutions to address this global concern. Malaysians should see past this gimmick by international NGOs and start changing their lifestyles. Surely we can be more proactive and not be fed by an agenda of international bodies.

Why don’t we implement power conservation programmes, ride public transport on certain days in a month, car pool, etc?

It is also ironic that the organiser, WWF Malaysia, up until very recently, did not even have a climate change programme to begin with when all others (even local groups and individuals) have been persistent in their pleas for Malaysians to take action.

Remember, our leaders signed the Kyoto Protocol and there has been concerted movement towards reaching solutions. Please let us all be enlightened and move away from celebrations and gimmicks.

MARCUS,
Petaling Jaya.

some would say that switching off lights for 1 hour even on a global scale is “insignificant” and more of a publicity stunt than an actual way to safe our earth. well, i couldn’t agree more. it in fact IS a publicity stunt. the amount of energy or carbon emmissions we safe is in fact INSIGNIFICANT so to speak.

so if it is merely publicity, and insignificant in its results, why do it? i have 2 reasons for you.

1. a journey of a thousand miles begins with a single step no? i can’t speak on behalf of wwf, but i think the bigger goal is to indeed aware ppl that if everyone did something, big things can change. its a simple concept that almost everyone believes but yet is a selective hypocrite to certain situations. a simple example. vitamins, exercise, even conversation. 3 things that should well cover 100% of the world’s population. take these 3 things, and isolate them down to 1 unit of each. take 1 vitamin in your whole lifetime. exercise once in your whole lifetime. have a conversation once in your whole lifetime. the result would be unanimous. they would’ve been INSIGNIFICANT things that you’ve done in your life, right? but you still do it nonetheless. why? if its insignificant, why are you still doing it?!?!? bloody cynical selfish hypocrite you are.
2. there is a certain power in masses. this is pretty simple. if you’re the only one doing it, chances are you won’t stick to it. if everyone is doing it, its easier for you to do it again, and again, and again. simple eh?

so don’t be so short sighted as to see earth hour as merely a 1hour energy saving publicity stunt. that IS what it is, but that’s not what it wants to do. i mean, they didn’t say “save the earth just this once” did they?

if you still haven’t gotten the point. wwf just wants to scream out to the whole world, much like al gore in his movie, just to let ppl know. hey, you CAN do something you know?

dear marcus,

i am deeply saddenned for the human being that you are. you sound very knowledgable yet you fail to be just a little bit more long sighted in your observations of earth hour. i may not know as much as you do, like how wwf malaysia had no climate change programme, but i know that i am happy that they are doing something now.

i would be very interested to know what do YOU do to save our planet earth. i’m guessing nothing much, since anything you do would be insignificant to our dear earth right?

you do have many interesting suggestions on saving our planet, but are you doing anything about it? are you telling everyone around you that they can do something about it? what impact has your actions done? don’t u see that we, as shallow naive human beings, sometimes DO need a publicity stunt to push us into the right direction?

nah, i guess you’re too smart for that.

~

on a more celebrative note, underheadlights will be making its debut performance of the year in support of earth hour! read all about it here!

one of our sponsors, digi will also be present there to take your pledges to switch off your lights during earth hour. if u haven’t pledged yet, come to pledge! you’ll get a free compilation cd containing tracks from altered frequency, scene at the movies, army of three, us (of course), pg165, unabashed and many more! did i mention its free? both the gig AND the cd. what more could you ask for? if you haven’t seen us live, or any of the bands performing live before, you will be blown away. literally, musically, and volume-ally =P

so come come come! and don’t come alone, let’s bring this place down! urbanattic is a major cool chillout place! =]

facebook made me do it!

i found this cool article on newsweek. though i don’t really identify with it, i’m sure a lot of people do =] i copied the whole article here for your ease.

Everybody loves to complain about Facebook. But I’ve been wading through all the nonstop commentary over the last few weeks and I’ve made a startling discovery. Everybody also lies about why they use Facebook. After exhaustive research, here are the Seven Lies You Tell Yourself About Facebook.

1. I Only Friend People I Really Know: Stop pretending you have standards; you will friend anyone. You would accept Bernie Madoff if he asked. You want your friend count to be sky-high. That’s why I accept all sorts of people I haven’t seen in 20 years and couldn’t pick out of a line-up. I refuseto have one less friend than my arch nemesis from college. I will not tolerate a lower count than my annoying colleague who sucks her teeth in meetings whenever I say anything. Admit it, you’re no better than I am–how many of your “friends” would you invite to your house?

2. Facebook Made Me Do It: Facebook didn’t make you tell all 1,384 of your friends that you once had chlamydia. Facebook didn’t hold your hand onto the mouse and force you to type: “Josh is in favor of slapping geese and women,” as one of your “25 random things” and it certainly didn’t waterboard you into asking everyone what their slave name is. Psychiatrists call this “externalizing blame.” It’s a way to lay-off shame and self-loathing onto somebody (or something) else so you can feel better about yourself. I once wrote, “Raina is feeling like the cat’s meow,” and hated Facebook for days because of it. I know now that it was nobody else’s fault but my own.

3. Wall-to-Wall Flirting Isn’t Cheating: Just because it’s called “social networking” with “friends” doesn’t make hard-core online flirting OK. Do not try and tell me that you were surprised when your boyfriend left you after he read your pornographic wall-to-wall with his cousin. Also: stop sending your assistant cute virtual gifts. Virtual gifting counts. In fact, it’s probably not appropriate for you to be “friending” her or the cute summer intern in the first place. Same thing goes for wall-to-wall stalking the love of your 7th grade life. Online harassment is just as bad as the bricks and mortar kind.

4. I Use Facebook to Keep in Touch With People: No, the truth is you’re nosy. Admit it. You scour the profiles of other people for the same reason I do. You want to know their business. Facebook isn’t addictive–your desire to know what other people are up to is addictive. The over-sharing thrills you. I know I’m hooked. Don’t you hunt through your friends’ walls looking for any scrap of information that will produce that warm tingly schadenfreude feeling?

Facebook is our own personal reality show and our friends are the stars. What else besides “American Idol” or “Project Runway” allows you to be so judgmental while wearing pajamas? If people stopped revealing ridiculous stuff about themselves in their status updates, “Rock of Love” would be your “guilty pleasure” instead. You know you’re dying to discover your college roommate lives in a trailer in his mom’s backyard. I literally cried from joy when I saw that an ex-boyfriend was sporting a comb-over.

5. I’m Soooo Over Facebook: Come on. You love Facebook for exactly the reasons you pretend to hate it … it’s the Big Thing. And we’re not falling for that ironic distancing pose you’ve been adopting lately. We know you spend hours looking for former girlfriends or that guy who you loved from freshman psych but didn’t have the courage to talk to. I tried to act all Margaret Meadish when I first joined Facebook (“It’s a classic example of mass hysteria inspired by our collective need to be famous. Blah, blah, blah.”) But everybody knew I wasn’t on there doing social anthropology. I was on there because I wanted to snicker at that girl I went to elementary school with who reports every single one of the eight pomegranate martinis she drinks every night.

6. And I am Soooo Not Competitive: We don’t just want more friends than everybody else; we also want the highest score in Word Twist and the most virtual Easter Eggs. I recently spent nearly 24 hours playing Scramble on Facebook until I had a higher score than my friend Dough Dough. Why? Because I knew Facebook would send him a note that said; “Raina has beaten your personal high score on Scramble.” When he commented on his complete and total defeat, I just said; “I didn’t know Facebook would tell you that. OMG! LOL!” We love Facebook because it allows you to gloat to your heart’s content and hide that self-satisfied smirk on your face behind the wall of the Internet. By the way, if you have a Scramble score higher than 147, don’t even think about friending me.

7. Facebook is My Friend: No, it’s a business (albeit one that has yet to make money). Everyone knows casinos hide the exits and pump oxygen into the air to keep you gambling and get all your money. Facebook is doing the same thing but with avatars and Food Flings. They want to trap you behind their dotcom walls so they can attract advertisers. Think about it. If Facebook really loved you, they wouldn’t run those “5 Friends HATE you!” banners on the top of Scramble. And have you ever had a friend try to take ownership of all the posts and baby pictures you sent them for who knows what reason? Nor has a “friend” ever taunted me with ads that implied Obama owed me $12,000 in personal-stimulus money.

with all that being said, the main reason i hooked on to facebook is because it became SO big here in malaysia. because of this, everyone’s on it and thus it makes it a superb networking and marketing platform =] it’s particularly useful for bands in malaysia as well, seeing that myspace didn’t really take of here locally. though i must agree, u do get more spam than genuinely important stuff =]

sunburst 2009: will you be there?

do u remember sunburst 2008? i do vaguely, and apart from the rain it was AWESOME! to me, this was the closest that malaysia would get to an OZFEST or any sort of all day music festival and the organisers pulled it off pretty well i must say though hiccups are always present.

now, what went wrong in sunburst 2008? just a few things, not significant enough to ruin the day but worth nothing.

1. the waiting in between bands – now the organisers did something very good to prevent this from happening. they put 2 main stages side by side, obviously so that when 1 band finished at 1 stage, the other band can start at the 2nd stage with minimum delay. somehow this didn’t seem to work. either that, or bands are still doing what they do best: waiting for the crowd to swell before starting. now if you’re gonna do that, why put 2 stages there in the first place? 1 huge stage would be able to do that much better  i reckon.
2. the choice of performers – i think they were going with we-want-all-kinds-of-musicians-so-that-we-can-attract-all-kinds-of-people-to-come concept, but i think they did it a little too widely. from rap to funk. from acoustic to r&b. from rock to hip hop. looks like every genre was represented! besides the harder stuff though, which maybe because this event is supported by the tourism ministry. no head banging, heavy metal stuff, which is sort of a good thing, i think.
3. unequal treatment of musicians – well i don’t know how true is this, but this is what i heard. did any of you guys notice that the main band, incubus, actually played before their actual slot? right after john legend we were suppose to be entertained by estranged before incubus came up. i actually was looking forward to seeing estranged, but obviously when i heard incubus start, that feeling just went away =P which actually brings me to another point. once incubus started their set, suddenly the cameraman and the lightings all seem to be so much better compared to before. the lights were very nicely queued in. the camera panned superbly. i think this happens everywhere. the main guys always get the nice stuff. it even happened during the switchfoot concert. but anyway getting back to sunburst, apparently incubus came, got interviewed, and wanted to start their set immediately. so our lovely malaysian organisers who could’ve told them what they told everyone else, that every band has to wait for their set to play, instead just happily bumped incubus up before estranged. sounds harmless right? not for estranged though. once incubus finished, everyone assumed it was all over and left. including me. not because we don’t like estranged, but because it was the end. so yeah, that wasn’t too cool of the sunburst people =\

apart from all this, everything else was goood. food vendors, although a little lacking, was good food. tuborg was good. john legend was good. incubus was good. the roots were good. local bands were good.

so now. sunburst 2009. labelled by one of my friends as suckburst. just look at the lineup and you’ll understand why.

nerd. indo bands. malaysian bands. that’s it. hmm, only 1 international act? well technically indo bands are “international” right? it looks like sunburst is converging toward an indo fest, which i can totally understand why. if you guys out there in malaysia are complaining at the lineup, its all your own doing. its all your fault.

indo/malay bands are the biggest, most hugely supported bands in malaysia. that’s right. that’s why its very logical for the organisers to go toward this direction. when your an indo band, or model yourself like an indo band, the fans here actually buy your albums. the fans here actually come to your gigs. the fans here actually scream and sing along with you. that is the power of the indo scene. the fans love them. whether they’re a local band, or a real indo band, the fans love them. just like how we love paramore, u2, coldplay, foo fighters, etc. but what about the equivalent local bands who sound like these guys? musically we have bands that i dare say are as good as these big names, but they don’t get any support. or very little support at least. we simply label them wannabes, posers, bla bla bla. there’s no love for them coz we call them copycats. it seems that the only way for a local band to make it big these days is for them to go indo. to start singing malay. meet uncle hussain did that, and it worked

nerd… nerd… why nerd? i think they’ve never been on malaysian radio… never been on malaysian tv… ok maybe never is a very strong word… but i cant recall any nerd followings here, except for their popular single lapdance, i don’t know anything about nerd… maybe i’m ignorant… but a main event band is suppose to be more widely appealing i reckon…

me? i won’t be there. definitely. unless i get a free pass *hint* even then i will seriously consider giving up the pass to someone else. yes, that’s how bad it is. even a free pass might not get me to go. i guess the only way i will go is if i were playing =D

tu dabel ow naine

1st thing u would naturally do, try to recall past resolutions though most are usually forgotten before they are even made. i somehow only remember making 1 though, coz i thought that if i kept it at just 1 then there was a higher possibility of it materializing. but it didn’t =P

so now the strategy has changed, now we’re going for QUANTITY! now this way, i’ll at least since i have many resolutions, in probability terms i will have a higher chance in at least achieving 1. right? right? right? i know i’m right.

the reason i’m writing this all down here is that i am giving you, the public, yes you, the authority to become my motivators/reminders throughout this next year. that’s right, now anytime you see me and you have nothing to say to me, you can at least remind me about my resolutions this year!

here goes, in no particular order:-

• work out – now for the uninformed i have recently changed my jobs and right now although i never saw this coming, i am a service engineer. yes engineer, though bluntly speaking you can call me a factory worker / technician / plumber / carpenter / despatch / etc. now there seems to be no tie between an engineer and working out right? wrong. not going into detail, but i do have to carry heavy stuff in my new job, and i mean heavy. so apart from being a good ego booster, i do need to be stronger for my career’s sake
• sleep less, no more naps – 2 reasons why. 1, if i take a nap its harder to fall asleep later at night. 2, if i sleep too much i get migraines. so i’m trying to train myself to sleep +/- 6 hours per day which i heard is the average sleep amount for someone my age.
• be more hygienic – no more going to bed without a shower (unless its too late to shower), no more leaving the bed sheet on for half a year, no more using the same towel for more than a month, you get the picture
• be more creative – its kinda hard to believe it, and it makes me sad to say this. but in 08 i didn’t really practice my music much. didn’t really learn anything new. didn’t really improve a lot. so its time to change that =\ did i mention i haven’t written anything in the last 3 years? =[
• say no to laziness - as you can see in previous posts, i am known to be addicted to things that ppl don't usually get addicted to because i'm lazy. the best example would be minesweeper and solitaire =D now i've recently removed it from my pc. yay! but now i'm hooked on igoogle's pacman =P so yeah, i need to realize how precious time is, and that its not like i dont have anything better to do =]
• quiet time every morning –
• debt payment – i hate ppl who borrows money and taking their own sweet time paying it back. i hate ppl who think they are the only ones who have money problems. i hate ppl who tell you they have no money but only the other day you heard from a friend of theirs that they were out clubbing and he opened 2 bottles of chivas. worse, i hate ppl who keep doing this to everyone around them. yes i know a lot of ppl in the world in this category. too many in fact. so because of this, i always repay money i borrow though not as fast as i hope to, but always as prompt as i can. so if i owe you money and somehow its been quite long and maybe i forgotten, pls remind me
• be reliable – i remember someone telling me this. “whenever anyone is cf has a car breakdown or running out of petrol, call lenard or dwong”. was quite nice to know. i wonder if i’m still that reliable now. i also wonder who do these ppl call now that lenard and dwong have graduated =P

okeh, off to work out now =]

happy new year!

boredom

it makes you do weird things…

yeah i know, its not that quick, but its my fastest so far =P

and she’s coming!

now to find a free ticket…

even ppl outside of malaysia find the “conditions” crazy. how are u suppose to perform without jumping and shouting? i guess beathesystem would’ve been banned 7 years ago then =P and underheadlights will be soon-to-be banned…

maybe malaysia is a post-rock govt eh? they certainly don’t shout and jump =]