The Coven

I don't know why that is, but whenever a foreigner talks about the Philippines, we immediately become interested in whatever he has to say. This certainly was how I felt when my boss forwarded me David Byrne's account of his long visit to the Philippines. I found myself comparing what he knows with what I know of my history. And getting interested despite myself of what a foreign pop musician has to say about my country. It certainly seemed incogrious to say the least. I mean, David Byrne (of the freakin' Talking Heads!) has been biking around Manila, taking in the sights, riding tricycles, jeepneys, and buses in the provinces. Can this country get any more surreal? I guess not. And he apparently agrees. Anyway, do I have a point in this entry? Maybe nothing. Then again, maybe everything.

Ka, been wanting to tell you about this book I was reading before school started. The Lecturer’s Tale by James Hynes. It’s about this down and out literature professor who, on the day that he’s fired from his job, has a freak accident that causes his finger to be severed. When it’s sewn back, he discovers that he can make people do his bidding if he touches them with his re-attached finger… oooh! ;P He uses his new powers to get ahead in the perfidious, backbiting world of the English Department, and here the fun begins. The characters are so wacky and pathetic, it makes me wonder if Mr Hynes really just made them up. They certainly sound crazy enough to be real people! If I were tasked to find a den of dementeds, surely an English department is one of the first places I'd look. Eheheh ;P

Hello World! I'm back from exile--or temporarily at least since it's the weekend ;P Am taking this chance to post some funny shots taken the last time we had dindin at the mall. As usual, Ben was out to make life difficult for nanay and his ninangs. But never mind, we luv him pa rin!

Like Isa, been thinking a lot about music lately. Mostly because I'm in the process of putting together a music issue of the magazine. It's a long hard slog, lemme tell you, folks. It's almost done and I'm just waiting for the final pages to be colorproofed before I put it to bedie-bye.

Anyway, that's the reason I have music on my mind for the past month or so. In any case, it should prove to be an exciting February issue for MANUAL. Lots of great stories--the 10 movers and shakers in the local music scene is guaranteed to provide contentious debate among people, we have a short piece on the 10 most influential Pinoy albums, how to be a music snob, books by or about musicians, cindy kurleto, the singer Sheree etc. It promises to be a most interesting issue. Lots of hardwork, though. Especially booking the personalities for the 10 movers and shakers for a shoot. Most of the personalities were really nice once you get them in the shoot, but getting them there is where the nightmare starts. One thing's for sure, it's a good thing this only comes around once a year. I don't think I can deal with it if we did this once a month!

What got me through the whole process were really great CDs that I'm now listing down for you. Not that I'm trying to get you to listen to them, but hey, why not? I was basically chained to my desk day in, and day out and these were my sanity savers, in no particular order:

1. Killer Tracks, various artists. Twenty songs that will remind you of how New Wave by way of England sounded back in the day, by artists as diverse as Morrissey, Stereophonics, The Libertines, Bloc Party, The Prodigy, Feeder, our very own Orange and Lemons (whose contribution, "Strike Whilst The Iron is Hot" fits right at home in this motley collection), and other artists. I play this for times when I'm madly writing an article that ought to have been written eons ago. The perfect accompaniment to a pounding keyboard.

2. Strike Whilst the Iron is Hot, Orange and Lemons. Very Brit-pop sounding Pinoy band with a totally infectious sound. I didn't like them at first; I thought they were pretentious. They may still be, but what the hell, the music grows on you and in the end, that's what matters. Perfect for after-dinner lattes at your computer trolling the blogs while waiting for the proofs to come in.

3. Get Behind Me, Satan, The White Stripes. The WS is not for everyone. They're not very accessible musically, methinks. This is not relaxing music. But I remember a college professor once told my class, "There are books you read for the language, and books you read for the story." I think it's the same with music. There's music you listen to because it's relaxing, and there's music you listen to because it makes you think. This is music that makes you think.

4. Eraserheads Anthology, Eraserheads. Because. Two discs of the quartet's best songs, written when the band was at the peak of its fame. Great for crunch times when tempers are frayed and blood threatens to spill at any moment. Play "Maselang Bahaghari" and watch everyone calm down and start humming. My only beef: This should be a four-disc set, at least.

5. Ultraelectromagneticjam, various artists. A laudable effort by various musicians to interpret the best of the Eraserheads. Not as effective as #4 at calming the waters, but still pretty damn good. My only beef: This should be a two-disc set, at least.

6. Halina sa Parokya, Parokya ni Edgar. These guys are a riot! What can you expect from a band that used to perform in their moms' old dresses and had album titles like Kangkhungkerrnitz (their first), Buruguduystungstugudunstuy, Gulong Itlog Gulong? They kinda remind me of neighborhood tambays, with a bottle of lapad, a guitar, and an old tattered copy of a Jingle songhits regaling the neighborhood with their singing. This latest album is a concept album with the songs sequenced a la Sesame Street or Batibot and the band members having alter-egos--e.g., Chito Miranda (the vocalist) is Chito Matsing, Buwi Meneses is Pedro the Basura Man, Gabriel Chee Kee is Uncle Gab and His Lucky Seven Club, Vinci Montaner is Mr. Suave, and Dindin Moreno as The Ordertaker. Totally hilarious. There's a song here, "Telepono" that tells the reaction of a guy who gets a dawn phone call from his girlfriend who just found out she's pregnant and is now breaking the news to him. The arrangement is like any sentimental love song, but listen to the lyrics. It will crack you up, guaranteed. Basically, I love Parokya. And this album is vindication that these guys are geniuses. Play when you need people to laugh out loud simply because there are worse ways to spend your time and sometimes laughter makes everything bearable.

Thanks to Terrie's odd question of the night two posts ago, I've now been listening to Fool's Garden's Dish of the Day album for two days in a row. It wasn't a hit when it came out a decade ago (yes, it's been that long), but Lemon Tree did get quite a bit of airplay. My personal opinion is that it is a nice album, not great, but nice to listen to.

I just realized that I've been so out of touch with the current music scene. I remember the time when I would just be listening to the radio and current CDs a lot. These days, I listen to the radio for a bit and realize that I don't know what the song are and who are singing. I wonder if it's a sign of aging that I no longer am tempted to listen to newer bands. Or it may be because of the songs that I hear on the radio, I don't hear any that hits me the way the older songs used to. Oh, there are still some nice ones, but not as much as before. Nah, I think I'm just getting older (I still like loud music, though!).

I think I'm going to get an Audioslave album...

"Hanging out with my friends on a sunny Sunday afternoon..."--"Hanging Out" in Luha by Kapatid

That's what I want to do right now. Instead, I'm in the office--on a sunny Sunday afternoon, no less--attempting to get all my proofs in so my February issue can be printed. I hate my life!

I'm suffering from Lost withdrawal. It's been 6 days and 3 hours since I finished the last episode (including the special featurette) of the first season and I can't wait to watch the second season. This is all Carrie's fault for luring me to the island! I've even began to seriously consider getting cable just so I can watch the second season as it unfolds, instead of waiting for the discs from our friendly neighborhood fake dibidi suki. The fact that I'm not at home most of the time except to sleep, indicates how desperate I'm becoming. It's embarrassing to admit but sometimes I'd even find myself running over plot points and possible scenarios in my head at odd moments. It's ridiculous! I haven't been this obsessed with a TV series since The X-Files' first two seasons more than half a decade ago (has it been that long since Mulder and Scully got the whole world tripping on aliens and conspiracy theories? Good Lord!) when Monday night was sacrosanct because I had to get home in time for the show! I now understand why Adel, my former boss, was so eager for us at the office to watch the series when it first came out so he'd have someone to discuss it with. He'd even volunteer to download episodes off the Net! Where is he when I need him? I lent my DVDs to an officemate and now she's getting ensnared by the series as well. This is good. Now I have someone to discuss theories with...

Odd question of the night: Heard a song on the radio on the way to work this morning that goes: "I wonder why/I wonder how...(something, something)...blue, blue sky and all that I can see is just another lemon tree..." I swear I know this song. I've been humming it for the whole day but for the life of me, I can't seem to remember the title! Anyone know the title and who sang it? Put me out of my misery and email me! And no, I don't want to google it. More fun this way...

Now that the MMFF is over, I'd like to get this off my chest. I watched Mulawin over the Christmas break and let me tell you, it's...well, it's...let's just say it's baaad! Yeah, yeah. I know. My friends (including the three who share this blog) will no doubt be wondering why I even bothered to spend hard-earned pesos on a local flick. Well, it made a lot of sense at that time.

For one thing, movies in Davao (where I went on Christmas break) only cost P55! And that's in the good seats already. Secondly, my nephew wanted to see it, so he dragged his poor tita (that's moi) to watch it with him. And third, I'm an optimist, and hence, I was hopeful that the movie would turn out to be worth watching. I'm not a snob. I'll always give Pinoy movies a fair chance. But at instances like this, I always end up wondering if I should give up on local cinema for good.

The concept wasn't bad, really. Engkantadas, bird-men, lost stones of power, a power struggle, a love story...ideas that'll make a good movie--if done right. But Mulawin wasn't. First off, there was a lot of subplots that it was hard to untangle them to understand the basic story. Two, Richard Gutierrez can't act to save his life. His version of acting is opening his eyes really wide! Three, Angel Locsin, supposedly a sugo (savior, I suppose) as well as Richard Gutierrez's love interest, doesn't know how to move. She's supposed to be a warrior but she can't even manage a straight kick! And fighting with a sword? Good lord! I wanted to take the stuntpeople aside and give them a good scolding. Why didn't they give her more lessons to make her more believable? And four, they're supposed to be bird-people, right? So why was the big battle scene taking place on the ground? It doesn't make sense! Then it occured to me that they couldn't do an airborne battle scene because our special effects suck. So why make an effects-laden movie in the first place? Good question. Wish I had an answer.

I don't even know why it got an "A" or why Annabelle Rama was ranting about why her son Richard (who plays the lead, Aguiluz, one of the sugo of the Mulawin) didn't get the Best Actor nod in the festival. It's really simple, ma'am--he can't act! This movie really makes me fear for local cinema. I know we have great filmmakers but we're not making the movies we ought to be making. Oh well, I know my snob-friends-who-refuse-to-watch-Pinoy-cinema are wondering why I'm even wasting space on this. At this point, I don't even know myself. Perhaps I'm just sleep deprived. Or maybe it's an attempt to get something out of my P55! Or maybe, it beats writing about Ako Legal Wife: Mano Po 4? You want a review of that? Thought so.

There's a new gadget in the office. In an attempt to curb theft and unauthorized persons from going into our offices as well as to digitally record our time-ins and -outs, the company administration installed a fingerprint-scanning whatsit at our lobby. Now, you can't get into the offices if your thumbprint (or whichever of your fingerprints are recorded) is not recognized by the scanner. Pretty cool, huh? Then again, someone pointed out that the money used to install the gadgets could've been used to give us new PCs (or my dream, a Mac!). Oo nga naman! But my office is made up of 90% women who have a sly way of making their disapproval known. A lot of them used the middle finger as their identifying fingerprint. Up yours, indeed!

CDs I'm listening to: Demon Days Gorillaz and All About the Funk Brand New Heavies. Not new albums, but they're fun to listen to on hectic days like this. They sort of set the pace to my day. Sweet!

Book I'm reading: Heavy Water by Martin Amis. A collection of short stories. One of them, "Career Move" is this amusing tale in which screenwriters are struggling with their "art" in small coffeeshops and get published in obscure little magazines while poets live it up in Hollywood doing prequels and sequels of their poems. Haven't gotten to reading the title story, which I'll dutifully report once I've read it. But so far, this book is quirkily fun!

"Wala na nga tayong social life, hindi pa tayo kakain ng maayos!"--My acerbic comment last night to officemates, which got all of us giggling, although it wasn't really funny. Or maybe, because it was so true, it made it funny, I don't know.

Anyway, there we were last night at the office--a bunch of editors, all holding down supposedly glamorous jobs (we're in lifestyle magazines, after all!), when the truth is, it's a lot of hard work. I was emailing all my contributors to remind them that deadline for the March issue was fast approaching, while correcting a stack of proofs, and checking pages that have been colorproofed. A few feet away from me, our style editor just got in from a full day's pull out and was busy organizing the clothes she'll be using for her shoot tomorrow. Next, she'll be putting on masking tape on the soles of the shoes that the models will wear. Another editor, over at another cubicle, was frantically editing articles while ranting about a memo she recieved that morning.

Welcome to the glamorous life! How come it's not the same in TV and movies? Just for once I wish they'd portray editors realistically. I never see Carrie Bradshaw do anything but hang out with her friends while typing the occasional column and reflecting on her and her friends sexual and relationship (mis)adventures. Jennifer Garner in 13 Going on 30 had time to dance to "Thriller" while overhauling a whole magazine and getting rid of her conniving best friend, not to mention traveling through time, in less than a week!

Which is why, feeling bad that we were in the office Friday night, we ended up eating at Old Spaghetti House in Libis for pasta, melt-in-your mouth porkchops and onion rings. After which we headed to Starbucks for macchiattos and cheesecake. Bliss! We may not have a life, but we can certainly treat ourselves to great food!

Book I'm (re)reading now: Rosie Dunn by Cecilia Ahern. Recommended to me by another editor. People who know me would laugh because the book lies squarely in the category of chick lit. The cover is pink, good Lord! I took a chance on it because I needed some light bedside reading. Surprisingly, this turned out to be a really good read. Funny, poignant, and given the genre, romantic. But not nauseatingly so.

CDs on rotation: The Libertines The Libertines, You Could Have It So Much Better Franz Ferdinand, Highly Evolved The Vines. Visceral. Lethal...Magic!