MusicA
[still not complete, but better upload it anyway]
Since I’ve owed two more tags entry, let’s start with my musical history. You’re not going to believe me that my early favorite music genre was not even close to what you know my current one.
Part I: Kid’s Stuffs
During my kiddie years, I remember that we (with my older bro) would frequently play cassettes consists of English kindergarten songs. You know, like This Old Man, London Bridge, ABC, Ba ba Black Sheep, Bingo, Twinkle Little Star, etc. No kidding. Of course most of you know all of this song, but I don’t think you guys played it on daily basis like us. We were still using the cassettes at that time. Hmm, this must be some kind of influence we’ve got at NZ. After all, we were only children, so listening to children-level song was quite fitting.
This old man, he played one, he played knickknack on my barn. With a knickknack paddy-whack, give the dog a bone. This old man came rolling home. – This Old Man.If cassettes weren’t enough, we even had a vinyl player (aka Gramaphone/Phonograph). You know, the thing you put the big black round disc with grooves and place the ‘needles’ on it…It was a time when a neighbor wanted to throw the player and all his collections of records because it was ‘past his time’, and the player was broken anyway. Abah took all of it from him and bring it ‘back to life’. I remember some of ‘weird’ collections include Kiss, Uriah Heep, Led Zeppelin and some movie soundtrack. But my favorite was…'The Thriller’ by no other than king of the pop, Michael Jackson. Yes, I was an MJ fan. I’ve heard some of the songs like Thriller, Billy Jean and Beat It at the TV, but I was ‘thrilled’ (pun intended) to have the actual album itself. When I was in standard 3 (9 y.o.), My class started in the afternoon, so I’ve got my whole morning with myself, alone, with this MJ record, while cooking and eating some Maggie, again on a daily basis, with the volume as loud as I can handle. I even got to memorize a lot of the lyrics, including the ‘spooky’ part by Vincent Price in Thriller. The only other record I listen was a collection of orchestral version of Academy Award winner for Best Film Music up until 1983…Songs like Fame, What A Feeling, Over the Rainbow, You Light Up My Life, Moonriver, Up Where We Belong etc. kept my ears ringing (I did not listen to every song, though).
Night creatures call and the dead start to walk in their masquerade. Theres no escapin the jaws of the alien this time (they,re open wide). This is the end of your life. - Thriller, MICHAEL JACKSON
Part II: Disneymania
Speaking about my bro’s, he had his sets of genres that he likes like R&B, Pop and Rap. During the early 90’s, artist like KRU, Ning Baizura, Whitney Houston, Mariah Carey etc. were amongst his collections, and I did heard it sometimes. Luckily, none of it sticks on me now, or else, you would see a very ‘different’ me, like, auu auuuu type person? Huuhu. But there’s one thing that we had in common, which we both are a great fan of Walt Disney Animation Soundtrack. What? Don’t believe me? Believe it. We liked Disney movies. We asked Abah to buy ORIGINAL VHS tape of Disney movies every time it was released. So it was fittingly that we collected their soundtrack as well. Actually, the soundtrack came out first before the movie arrived at the cinema, so when we first heard it, we kinda generated our own imagination of how the movie storyline is. My bro’s started buying The Little Mermaid cassette, then up to Beauty and the Beast, Aladdin, The Lion King (my personal favorite), Pocahontas, The Hunchback of Notre Dame, and Hercules. I even re-bought some of the cassettes in which the original had worn out (tapes degraded in quality in every playback). Darn, where the heck I put all of these cassettes? I think I have to dig into my old bags and look for my hidden treasure. I know I kept it somewhere. Starting from Mulan, my bro started to buy in CD format, and continues with Tarzan, Dinosaur, Atlantis, Treasure Planet, Lilo & Stitch, The Emperor’s New Groove, and Brother Bear. Some of you have noticed that when I go for karaoke, I would look for theme song of these movies, as it is the only song I could sing (and a few more) and not the rest of the sellout and radio-friendly songs. I think I’m still a Disney fan, although it’s been a long time I haven’t heard any of the albums. At least, my bro is currently collecting the movies in original special edition DVD, so I could watch it if I feel I want to.
But you’ll see every day, that we’ll never turn away, when it seems all your dreams come undone. We will stand by your side, fill with hope and fill with pride. We are more than we are, we are one. - We Are One, THE LION KING II: SIMBA’S PRIDE.
Part III: Purification
When I was in form 1, our batch were ‘brainwashed’ to only to listen to ‘good’ music, namely, Nasyid, by the prefects. (Some of us had to hide their ‘horn’ underneath the kopiah, only to be revealed in the latter years. :p). Every weekend, we had to sing our ‘theme’ song, “Panji Islam” (was this the correct title?) at the basketball court. I could still remember some of the lyrics…
Di timur suria mulai terang, cahaya fajar baru. Bersyukur kepada Allah yang Esa, pencipta alam maya. Kupohon doa restu malam syahdu, menghadap kiblat suci. Semoga ad-din Islam yang tercinta, gemilang dan abadi. - Panji Islam, (Unknown artist?)There were some great nasyid bands that I listen then. Most of it were bands that formed by SMAP school, while others were ‘underground’ (not so much known) yet active nasyid performers. My favorite band at that time (and still is right now) is The Zikr. I think that the factor of having a frontman with a very sweet voice (Nazrey Johani) pulles me in their realm (amende aku cakap nih?). (FYI, about 3 of The Zikr members, includes NJ, formed Raihan later on). The songs like ‘Secerah Pawana’, ‘Sekeping Hati’, ‘Mengemis Kasih’ and ‘Antara Dua Cinta’ are still my favorite, and so the rest of the songs.
Tuhan, dosaku menggunung tinggi, tapi rahmatMu melangit luas. Harga selautan syukurku, hanyalah setitis nikmatMu dibumi. – Mengemis Kasih, THE ZIKROthers that I heard include Nadamurni, Nahwan Nur, Mirwana (a play of Nirvana?), Shoutul Jihad, Suara Hati and some others that I could not remember. Songs like ‘Sumbangsih’ by Shoutul Jihad is so suitable to sing during Teachers’ Day:
Bersatu Hati Suara, Tercipta Sumbangsih Irama, Renungan Buat Semua, Tanda Ingatan Nan Mesra. Salam Yang Teristimewa, Buat Temanku Semua, Penuhkan Ilmu Didada, Hidupmu Bakal Sejahtera. Sekalung Budimu Guru, Menyampaikan Wadah Ilmu, Akan Kukenang Selalu, Jadi Panduan Hidupku. Bersama Kita Jayakan, Satu Wawasan Pendidikan, Untuk Agama dan Bangsa, Berbakti Pada Negara. – Sumbangsih, SHOUTUL JIHADAwesome lyrics.
Around form 3, there was once I went back to Tonoux home at the weekend. Tonoux, me and his family went to a nasyid concert at UPM for RM10 per pax. There was no Raihan, but some other popular ones like Brothers, Rabbani, Nowseeheart, In Team, Hijjaz and Imad…say that again, IMAD…And I sat at the second front row, exactly BEHIND Imad, would you believe it? But of course, I didn’t feel of getting autographs from him :p
Anyway, the only current nasyid band I listen to is Raihan (because of NJ, who else) and when NJ himself become solo artist. I’ve collected a couple of their cassettes. And recently, I proudly bought the ‘Memori The Zikr’ original CD by him. It’s good to hear his classics again, remixed with modern element, although I wished that there’s a lot more songs than what he currently put on the CD. I seldom hear other nasyid band as they are too modernizing with rap and hip hop, and it doesn’t sound like a pure nasyid.
Part IV: Day of the Tentacles
Those ‘soul cleansing’ period didn’t last long, as expected. Starting from form 2, after listening too much Disney and nasyid, all of the sudden, I felt…bored. I don’t know why, but I thought I need to hear something else for a change. While everyone else’s horn already piercing their kopiah, I thought that I had unleashed my inner beast inside! Hahaha…em, I was looking through Manjit’s locker, and I noticed and album…’Dookie’ by Green Day. The moment I put the cassettes inside my Walkman and give it a roll…WOW! So catchy and bouncy, never heard of anything like this before! I listen to it again and again non stop. The rolling drums by Tre Cool were the major factor, besides the catchiness of this punk band. Seriously, starting from that moment, I wanted more of these kinds of music, with heavy drums and crunchy guitars. No wonder I started to collect Green Day albums as well. Dookie, Insomniac and Nimrod were the ones during those days, while Warning on the following year.
Bite my lip and close my eyes, Take me away to paradise, I'm so damn bored I'm going blind, And I smell like sh*t. - Longview, GREEN DAY.
Maos and Tonoux then successfully ‘seduced’ me to listen to another band, which was my introduction to metal…Metallica. Surprisingly, the 1st album I heard from this band wasn’t a metal one, more like hard rock, which was ‘Load’. This was the era when Metallica became too radio-friendly aka sellouts. Originally only a few of the songs I like, but the rest of it grew on me. I borrowed my friends’ past album to hear what a metal song sound like. Eventually, I have my own collections of Metalli-cassettes, and was the ONLY band I actually collected EVERY original album until now: Kill ‘em All, Ride the Lightning, Master of Puppets, 5.98 EP Garage Days, And Justice For All, the Black album, Load, Reload, Garage Inc. and S&M. I think I’ve lost a lot of these cassettes, but then again, who needs cassettes when there are MP3s nowdays! And I’ve bought my very 1st music CD, Saint Anger (only to sound sucks with its non-solo and garbage bin lid snare approach), and now, Death Magnetic (only to sound too compressed, clip and heavily distort. Luckily, the GH3 version is fantastic, with all the dynamics and clarity. SAVE OUR MUSIC! STOP THE LOUDNESS WAR!)
The show is through the metal is gone, It is time to hit the road. Another town another gig, again we will explode. Hotel rooms and motorways, Life out here is raw. But we will never stop, we will never quit, ‘cause we are Metallica! – Whiplash, METALLICA
Back to those days, I began to listen to another punk band, the Offspring. I’ve got the cassettes from Kamen, ‘Ixnay on the Hombre’ and Kapua’s ‘Smash’. The only cassette I bought was ‘Conspiracy of One’. There’s other bands like Manowar, Nirvana (bought 1 cassettes, ‘Nevermind’), Butterfingers (English album only), Incubus, O.A.G., A.C.A.B, Guns N Roses, Cromok, Iron Maiden, Weezer, Oasis, Marilyn Manson, Darkseed etc.
Battles are fought by those with the courage to believe. They are won by those who find the heart, find a heart to share. This heart that fills the soul will point the way to victory. If there's a fight then I'll be there, I'll be there - Courage, MANOWARWhen I was in form 4, I remembered joining a gig at Ipoh with Jonoh, Brie, Pa’key, Kandos & the rest. The gig was legal (made at a hall), but the way we went there was not, as it was on Sunday (we were allowed to go out only on Saturday). There were many bands that I could not remember, but some were very significant, like Koffin Kanser and Carburetor Dung (I even headbanging on the stage with them! Gile hanyut siot)
And every day, we share our dreams. And every night, we laugh at things. Now you don't care, now you don't feel. So many friends, now where they'll be? Now you tell me... – Boo Hoo Clapping Song, CARBURETOR DUNGPart V: I Hear U Hear We Hear Everybody Hear
I wanted to expand my variety of music genres. There’s a couple of bands that I had added in my collection like Blink-182, Kid Rock, Limp Bizkit, Korn, New Found Glory, Silverchair, Foo Fighters, Papa Roach, Disturbed, Boysetsfire, Slipknot, Stone Sour, Hoobastank, 3 Doors Down, Puddle Of Mudd, Rob Zombie (?), Linkin Park (??), Evanescence (???), Eminem (?????), Gorillaz (wargh!) etc. I remembered that I’d only provided about 5GB of HDD spaces for all of the music. To fill up those spaces, I collected PC Games soundtrack also, like Command & Conquer, Prince of Persia, Pitfall, and bands from games like Story of the Year, Lostprophets (both from NFSU), Unwritten Law (NFSU2).
During my practical training in 2003, since I had too much ‘free time’ at the office, might have as well I expanded my genres. And it was so easy to do that. Using with my already available collection, I searched those bands using Amazon.com under Music categories. As usual, it will give infos about the band, tracklist, sales, cover albums and reviews by customers. It was at the part where ‘If you like band X, you might also like band Y and/or band Z’. The Y/Z band was the one I’d sampled it, for 1-2 songs first before I acquired it fully using the ‘usual means’. Those days, torrents were still virtually unknown; while Kazaa, Limewire and WinMX were my clients for download these bands. I’ve got to know a couple of more bands like The Starting Line, Something Corporate, AFI, Yellowcard, Good Charlotte, Thrice, Dashboard Confessional, Bowling For Soup etc.
Part VI: Let’s Burn ‘em Out!
Around 2004, Rashid brought his PS2 at our rent house at that time. Most of us were keen on Winning Eleven or Tekken. But there’s one particular DVD game, which only released in consoles, and also one of the best game in its genre, that caught my eyes (read:ear). Not because of the gameplay itself (yes, it IS a kick-a** game, mind you), but its soundtrack that you hear when playing the game. I’d say, WOW! SUPERB! MARVELOUS! It had mixes of all the bands that most of us never heard of. And that game was Burnout 3: Takedown.
The majority of my music collection came from the Burnout series, include Burnout: Revenge and Burnout Dominator. I mean, it was so good to hear some unknown and un-sellout bands, like we used to hear from the radio and from other friends’ MP3 collection.
These are like: Amber Pacific, Autopilot Off, Bullet For My Valentine, Motion City Soundtrack, Rise Against, Shadows Fall, No Motiv, Silent Drive, 1208, Comeback Kid, Atreyu, The Academy Is, Killswitch Engage and my favorite band of all time, Funeral For A Friend.
Why I like Funeral? I’m not so sure…it has to do with their guitar work, like dual lead, time shifts, modern/complex riff (especially by Kris), melodic chords by [ex] Darran, and harsh scream by Matt and such. This band has a very unique style that sound unlike most of others.
Tied to the testing of wills, where my heart breaks and spills. Left to the sight of the sky, in your arms I'm defined. Thrown to the wolves in the minds of your enemies, And I'm stone in the eyes of your foolishness – Juneau, FUNERAL FOR A FRIEND(talking about Comeback Kid, they were probably the only international underground emo band in my 'white list' so far that actually come to Malaysia and performed at ZOUK. I noticed all the posters everywhere at KL but I –regretfully- missed that one; I was outta cent! If FFAF want to come here, it'll be compulsory for me at the front row.)
There are some of the bands had become too mainstream since, include: Fallout Boy, My Chemical Romance, Jimmy Eat World, Avenged Sevenfold etc.
Other people’s influences also were taken account. At Kodok’s computer, he had bands like Franz Ferdinand, Andy’s have Sum 41, and Wan Amazon had the Used and tons of emos that I couldn't remember. Besides them, there’s one more that is so close to me that we’ve constantly refer to each other collections, although we never admitted it: my younger brother. I’ve got Saosin, The Red Jumpsuit Apparatus, All-American Rejects, Underoath, Boys Like Girls, Thursday, Last Second To Mars, Simple Plan (:p), Chevelle, Breaking Benjamin, TrustCompany etc from him.
They went back on us, (Closed eyes rolled back couldn't step it up), I could know him to come over when, It’s the thought that emerges, (Take back couldn't step it up), I could never love, your eyes have changed. - Bury Your Head, SAOSIN
Part VII: Power of the Core
No, I’m not talking about Intel’s current CPU architecture. The core I am talking about is like metal-core, hard-core, emo-core etc. Using the usual techniques, I’ve got more and more bands like Trivium, Senses Fail, Emery, Still Remains, As I Lay Dying, Coheed and Cambria, Alesana, A Skylit Drive, Emarosa, The Classic Crime, A Day To Remember etc.
And I regret the moments I gave you, Searching for my plans to devour you, I finally found out the truth, You sent me out in the right field, Spilled my words and disguise, We're starting a rise, Now it's so true I can't go on without you by my side, Every night we die. - Wires and the Concept of Breathing, A SKYLIT DRIVESo there you are. Now you have known my musical genre, influence, taste. My aim is to try to collect, or at least listen bands from this list. Opps, maybe I couldn't. My 30GB of MP3 spaces is almost full. Have to delete those sellout ones first...
Once again, my genre would be: Thrash Metal, Hard Rock, Alternative Rock, Pop Punk, Nu-Metal, Screamo, Emocore, Post-Hardcore, Metalcore, Progressive Rock.
NOTE: For MP3 collection, bands in green are still active and constantly in my playlist, blue is so seldom, I haven't heard it for a while but intended to keep it, orange is 'to-be-deleted' either because of their selloutness, or they haven't make good music for a long time...depending on my mood, it may change colors if they have a new, kick-a** album in the future, or if I feel listening to their past, unsellout song is much better than their current teeny-poppy album...and red is either ASTALAVISTA, get lost from my collection, you s*ck! and brown which I never collect it in the first place.
Some other 'carre' bands photos: