09.26.2007
CALIPH8, NEON8 AND PASTA GROOVE: THREE DJs MIX IT UP
RECREATE, REINTERPRET, REPRESENT: JOELLE JACINTO TALKS TO A TRIO OF ADVENTUROUS ELECTRONIC MUSICIANS WHO WANT TO EXPAND YOUR MUSICAL HORIZONS
Once upon a time, I boldly ambushed Malek Lopez for an interview for a now-defunct music webzine, and asked, "So what's electronic music anyway?" Of course, my ignorance pissed him off, and for years I couldn’t muster up the courage to speak to him at gigs. (That changed recently, but only because I’ve convinced myself that he's forgotten that I'm that stupid journalist from way back when). I know a lot better now, of course, but it's always a treat when I get a chance to learn more about DJing, electronica, and all related matters, like DJs' once-secret life outside of raves that seems to be getting less and less secret as time goes by.
This Friday, Jack Daniel's is kicking off its Jack Mix Series, a special bar tour that involves the creation of new music by its participating, collaborating performers. While the rest of the tour over the next few months will be held in different bars, within different productions, and will mostly feature bands of different genres paired together—such as punk and dance, with Hilera and Chicosci collaborating with Pedicab and Taken By Cars, just to name one crazy night that's in store—Jack Daniel's has decided to launch the series with a group of artists for whom collaborations are second, or rather, first nature: DJs.
The Jack Mix Series opens with three sets of DJs playing off each other: Ann Barcelona and Lady Trinity, Mike Cons and Neon8, and Caliph8 and Pasta Groove. Caliph8, a.k.a. Arvin Nogueras, tells me that he's always been impressed with Jack Daniel's initiative when it comes to promoting new music, like that time they brought in Treva Whateva, a British DJ whose aesthetic sense runs many miles away from the mainstream. "Of course, the party people started thinning out after a few tunes, but there were people who were introduced to and became interested in this new kind of music, and they probably would never have heard of it otherwise," he shares. "Kami, backstage, we were having a blast."
CALIPH8
Caliph8 has been doing collaborations most of his artistic life. He formed Down Earf with Jay Roy and DJ Arbie Won in '96 and released perhaps the first indie EP in the Philippines. He also did collabs with Jun Lopito when he was with Reggae Mistress, Third World Project, WDOUJI, Tropical Depression, Betrayed, NTOTN, Radioactive Sago Project, Rubber Inc., Flow 44, and jammed with the Eheads on their last gig, at the NU Rock Awards. He's now an official member of Drip and the hip-hop-electronic collective AMPON.
He once told me that he's accepted that the masses will never get his music, but he continues to create music for himself and people who are willing to listen. Hip-hop DJing would probably never advance beyond drunk and stoned kids grinding with strangers on so-called Hip-Hop nights at places like Pravda, Mars, Whereelse, and recently in Prince of Jaipur, without Caliph8 keeping the fire of non-conventional hip-hop burning.
"Those hip-hop nights just play mainstream hip-hop. We don't stick to just hip-hop, we also do old music like funk, jazz and soul, which are the roots of hip-hop," Caliph8 explains. "I guess you can say we're music snobs, but it's great that different performers who are not in that league are being heard. Our market, it turns out, are those who are into electronic."
The Jack Mix Series will be launched at Alchemy in Silvercity mall, where they also hold Hip-hop nights every Mondays—but it's a different brand of hip-hop, this time. Who attends? "A lot of like-minded ‘heads, and it's surprisingly growing," Caliph8 relates. "I guess more are becoming well-informed because the scene is flourishing. Not like 1996, where it was depressing, we were just playing our music and hoping somehow that there would be some who would hear us."
Caliph8's main influences are Organized Confusion, Large Professor, RZA, and Lord Finesse. "When I was younger, I used to listen to mainstream, but I had friends who started to feed me stuff, my much older neighbors. This was the '80s and I was 9 years old. It was '86, when the mobile was still the scene. Anyway, my neighbors owned a mobile crew and as a kid, nakikigulo ako. They had crates of vinyl and I would see all these names. Then I lived in the States for five years, and that's where I understood what my art is."
It took him time, and the trip home, to actually participate in his art. "I became an enthusiast, supporting subculture, but I didn't really contribute myself until I got back here," he continues. “There, I was just an observer. Here, I started meeting Masta Plann and FrancisM. You know, FrancisM used to have a radio show on 89.1 and the music he played there is surprising. He was teaching kids what hip-hop was. I'm not a fan of his music but I admire what he did with that radio show.
"In the States, I had a vague idea of what my role was, though that's when I got into graffiti and then into visual arts. I was also rhyming and getting into turntables, but really, they were baby stages. When I got back, I started DJing, rapping, producing, but primitively, karaoke destruction, you know crossing jacks and wires and figuring how I can make new sounds from that. Almost all enthusiasts go through all that.
"Then, I went to art school in UP and started to really mature. I began to compartmentalize. I mean all these things are related and connected but you have to learn how to compartmentalize them all to get a better understanding of what you want to do, so that it comes out solid when it came to actually doing it.
"I met a lot of like-minded people in the band scene, these are the left field rock heads who hung out in Club Dredd, those who were looking at the fundamentals but looking for more. I sought to distort hip-hop, so I found other forward thinkers to collaborate with. In '95, we formed a band called Loudwater, which is the first breed of rap metal, long before the recent rap metal bands who made it big. It was rap metal that was funk-based. There were a few of those bands back then, such as Marben (Romero) of Badburn, he was in a rap metal band back then called Lethal Injection.
"DJ Arbie Won, Jay Roy and I formed Down Earf, which lasted 2 to 3 years. We produced an indie EP titled Knowin' is Half the Battle. We manually pressed our own tapes, and did our own cover printing. This was '97, wala pang indie noon, kami lang. We recorded in Jim Paredes' studio, which is now Circus Studios, and still has the analog equipment we recorded with. We pressed 300 audio tapes, and CDs and tapes were mass produced for college radio in San Francisco. We have a friend, Hase from Sacramento, who believed in our material and said if we gave him the master, he could bring it to the US and produced under a label. The label was college based and we made it to #7 on college radio. Jay had to go back to New York, so that was that.
"In '99 onwards, I was active with collaborations with different people, such as Third World Project, WDOUIJI, we would have gigs and prods in Big Sky Mind. Solo, my drive was video and audio and putting out true school hip-hop."
"It doesn't matter if it's old or new, as long as it's true," quipped Pasta Groove, who is quick to acknowledge Caliph8 as one of the big movers of true school hip-hop.
PASTA GROOVE
Pasta Groove is Paolo Garcia in real life. He's much younger than Caliph8 and Neon8 and says he spent his formative years under Arvin's wing. "I'm rooted in hip-hop—when I was 12, I was writing rhymes, and by the time I was 15 I was DJing in clubs and guesting on the radio. My influences, there are lots. From James Brown to Bob James, Quantum Spectrum, Common Sense, who's an artist, an MC. The DJs that I admire are Cut Chemist, Jazzy Jeff, Bobbito Garcia who's a DJ in New York, and locally, I really have to give props to Arvin Nogueras. I accumulated my tastes from all these DJs who were in the scene. Hanging around Arvin is a good breeding ground. We're on the same wavelength, which is why I'm excited about the collabo with him for the Jack Mix Series."
PG is living proof that Caliph8's efforts in getting their music out there were not in vain. "I heard the message," PG nods. "I'm grateful I got that chance. I was surrounded by artists such as Caliph8, Down Earf, Artstrong. DJ Arbie Won was the catalyst. They helped my preferences by giving it direction. It's a small scene, where we feed off each other. In college, I had isolated myself and made music, but I wasn't getting it out there. It took Arvin to get it out."
Aside from the weekly Monday hip-hop nights at Alchemy, called Subflex, PG is busy dabbling in video production, editing, sound design, scoring indie films. "I'm also going to put out an EP, which is a collaboration with different live musicians who'll be riding over my beats," PG shares, then shies when I ask him which musicians. "They're just good friends of mine, it's going to just be a labor of love. Release? Sana end of this year or early next year. The EP will have collabs with Arvin as well."
"People think we're DJs where we just spin music and that's it," PG adds. "What I do is different, it's the reconstruction of old songs, in the analog format, which people may think is primitive, but for us, it's vintage. Analog is actually an icon in hip-hop production. It's different from DJing because we don't play music, we recreate it."
"We reinterpret it," Caliph8 affirms. "We create different patterns and put a texture over it. What we do is live sampling, live manipulation. We sit down and let people hear it first, before we mix it live."
"The music we play, we try not to stay in a box," PG continues. "We look into different genres, different eras. We put old music into the set and mix it with the new to make it palatable. We remind people of the old music and how it's connected to the new. Our main purpose is to remind people of where the new music comes from."
"So, it's a cycle, this reinterpretation," Caliph8 explains. "Most hip-hop DJs just play the hits, the Top 10, what's familiar. We try to use the most obscure music we could find and let people listen to that. It's like feeding meat eaters vegetables, like ampalaya and broccoli. It's good for you."
Back when PG was still accumulating his own tastes, Caliph8 and his DJ colleagues put up prods in Malate, particularly in Chemistry and Verve Room. "There were explorations," Caliph8 describes. "Merging with other people's projects, it was an eclectic scene. Collabs with other genres were possible, not difficult. We had no questions, we had no explanations, we just jammed. I think people are open to music now, I see a lot of other acts commissioning music from hip-hop DJs. I have to question the intention though, are the DJs meant to be be just as an accessory or is it an honest collaboration? I'd prefer a challenge, give me the piece and let me see what I can do with it."
Neon8 beside him nods and adds, "Or yung may DJ lang sila onstage, gusto nila concept lang."
NEON8
Many of you may now know Neon8 as the guy with the laptop playing for the "Nyko Maca band." He shares an anecdote of how his father calls PlayGround (which is essentially the band that backs up samba vocalist Nyko Maca) his "combo." Nyko Maca + Playground may be getting more and more popular these days, but when it comes to what he does, it's still hard to explain. “It's hard for people to look at what I do and place it in the band context, though I'm a composer above everything else.”
Madz Abubakar in real life, Neon8 is a solo progressive house live act. "I'm not a DJ, I do live production performance, original compositions," he clarifies. "Actually, Nyko Maca helped explain what I do somewhat. Since you have live elements, people understand right away that 'this guy is doing something else.' Instead of just being concerned about the music, I'm also concerned with software, what to do, production questions and theories. Nyko Maca and PlayGround has given me the opportunity to up my prod skills. It's not 100% me, it's a mix of everyone's influences.
"Lately, I've been doing remix projects for bands, and I did two songs for Karylle. I'm also remixing a song by Dice and K9. Working with these people, offering different music, it tests my flexibility as a producer."
Neon8 began his fascination with electronic music in the late '90s, where there was a hyped up rave scene. "Naaaliw ako," he remembers, "I was thinking, how did they come up with that music? I learned about synths and drum machines. Then, I went to Chicago, where my uncle was a DJ, he did weddings and parties for the Filipino community. My cousin, his son, introduced me to a whole bunch of equipment and that's where it really started."
He continued this discovery of equipment back home. "I also discovered different kinds of music software. Ian Magbanua [a.k.a. Morse] introduced me to Tutti Loops. I was literally doing all this on our family's computer, yung PC sa bahay, yung may project ng kapatid mo, nandoon yung files ng Dad mo. Ganoon.
"During that time, I joined Electronica Manila, a forum where we exchanged ideas, anything under the electronic umbrella. My first ever electronic gig was in Alabang, I brought my family computer and I could only play one song. Kasi kung may isa pa," he laughs, "magha-hang na yung computer."
Neon8 would continue to bring his family computer to gigs for the next 3 to 4 years, but asserts that "It was good in that there were gigs. In Gweilo's Carlos Palanca, there was a regular Wednesday night gig. Kami kami lang, from the Electronica Manila community, yung nandoon, kami kami rin lang yung kinikilig sa ginagawa namin. It was a good learning experience for us, it laid the groundwork, our nature of asking each other how to do all these things started from there.
“The audience caught on din naman. The first year of Fete de la Musique (which had its own venue for electronica artists) walang tao, pero the next year, marami na. Recently, nawala yung electronica sa Fete de la Musique, but tuloy tuloy na yun for the individual artists."
It was in 2005, after the last Fete gig, that Mark Lacay and Malek Lopez encouraged Neon8 to act as the beats person for Nyko Maca. "It was my first time to interact with a live artist and it was a flop." He laughs. "Sabi ko kay Nyko kelangan mag rehearse, sabi niya hindi daw. And then, after the gig, sabi niya sa akin, 'Oo nga, Madz, kelangan nga.' Hindi ko pa alam paano sumabay eh, but those were learning points. We did eventually get it. Every gig now challenges me to do more."
They started to write original songs together as a band, starting with Neon8's original "Turn My Head." "It's a techie deep house track and I gave it to Nyko to put words into it. Nagsawa na din ako sa orig, so I rehashed it, now it has its own identity. It's an ever-changing process, every gig is never the same. A song can be slow in one gig, then fast on another gig, and slow on the next."
When asked what he listens to, he says "More progressive dance music. My influences are Global Underground, Kompakt, I mainly listen to breaks or house. Mark and Malek said I had an ear for beats. We in PlayGround [with sax player Alvin Cornista and guitarist Rick Sanchez] do remixes for other bands too. For Nyko, the process is, we three sit down and create a song, give it to Nyko for lyrics, then we change it up."
Neon8 shakes his head at the general DJ scene, but offers a positive side. "The fun part is there's always new things happening every weekend," he opines. "The scene may not be big, but at least there's music, music in various areas, and demands for music. Listeners will actually look for more. Now it's easier, there's the internet, and it's easy access, and people still ask for more, though they have to also think more for themselves, look for something new or listen to a different genre. In this way, also, I am able to reinvent myself and my music."
What are his goals in the future? "More of my goals, I plan to move dance music further. I want to get dance music prods on its way, hindi yung rave-type, pero gigs with dance music. I also want our local artists to get outside our shores. Raves, kasi, it's mainstream dance music. Dance music naman depends on where it's being played, who the audience is, pareho ba ng wavelength. I want to elevate our taste."
Neon8 is optimistic about the collaboration with Mike Cons this Friday. "We plan a mix of breakbeats. We'll have an elaborate set-up but we won't really 'rehearse' what we're gonna do, at most, it's a technical rehearsal, make sure everything's working. We're going to have a thousand songs ready but use only snippets. Put it all together like an orchestra," he smiles.
"Mike Cons is more into soul and I'm more into modern breaks, so we'll meet halfway sa breaks ni James Brown," Neon8 laughs. "It's good that we'll be testing each other's skills. We may have different tastes in music, but we can come up with something. Something tasteful."
Catch Caliph8, Neon8 and Pasta Groove at The Jack Mix Series launch at Alchemy, this Friday, Sept. 28, 2007, and find out first hand what they all meant by elevating taste. You can also find out more about Electronica Manila here.
TAGS: caliph8 neon8 pasta groove
