10.15.2006
CONFESSIONS OF A STAGE
GIRLFRIEND
JEFF BUCKLEY COVERS, PEANUTS CARTOON FLASHBACKS AND ATTEMPTED ROADIE WORK: BETTY TIANCO, THE GIRLFRIEND OF PINOY SOUL BAND SINO SIKAT?'S GUITARIST, TELLS ALL
In my Friendster profile, the line corresponding to occupation reads “architect, stage girlfriend, and hopeless idealist.” The first is a legitimate profession, recognized by the government, at least after months of studying and my finally passing that damn board exam. The last is not really a profession so much as an outlook on life that colors everything I do and makes actual work (especially in the corporate world) that much harder. And the second… well, the second is just a tongue-in-cheek way of excusing myself from feeling guilty for spending more time on my boyfriend Nick’s gigs than I do on any actual work.
Nick plays guitar for the, er, almost famous band Sino Sikat? (And no, that sentence isn’t a question, it’s a statement, but the band’s name really does end with a punctuation mark, so it can get kind of confusing.) Anticipating that people who keep seeing me at the gigs will say something along the lines of “hay naku, kinakarir ang paggiging girlfriend,” I’ve decided to beat them to the punch. So there.
Now, before names like Rita Wilson and Lynn Spears start running through your head, let me say that while I enjoy bandying about the phrase “stage girlfriend” (as in stage wife, or stage mother), I sincerely hope I am nothing of the sort. In fact, I am so not anything like it that I sometimes wish I was more involved in the “biz,” if you will. While I would like to indulge you with racy stories of sex, drugs, and rock n’ roll, my “confession” is actually the simple admission that I know nothing about the music industry, that I am a squeaky clean person who is more at home in a bright, climate-controlled, hushed library than in a dark, smoky, noisy bar, and that while I know who Jimi Hendrix is, I wouldn’t recognize any of his songs if a boombox playing them dropped out of the sky and knocked me square on the head.
So what am I doing sitting in front of the stage, listening to Sino Sikat? Lead singer Kat reach the frenzied conclusion of Erykah Badu’s “Penitentiary Blues”—especially when I complain that sounds past 60 decibels make it difficult for me to hear myself think? Honestly, I don’t know. Ask me again when my ears stop ringing.
“PARA ASTEEEEG”
Chalk it up to love and a genuine admiration for what they’re doing. While I would make a lousy commentator on the popular music industry, being stuck back in the time when popular meant being British, wearing eyeliner, and dressing all in black (hey wait, did that ever go out of style?), I do at least like to think that I know how to appreciate good music. Whatever genre it may be.
The fact that my listening selections are based on a sort of sound intuition and not on personalities, singers, bands, or musical genres makes it difficult for me to follow the conversations Nick has with his bandmates. What relevant (or, more often than not, irrelevant) pieces of information I know, I pick up from Nick. But bits of trivia an intelligent (or even nominally correct) conversation do not make. I can hear it in my head:
RELI: Pare, gawin natin yung Everybody Here Wants You ni Jeff Buckley.
NICK: Wag yun, gasgas na yun. Last Goodbye na lang. Para asteeeeg. (Turns to me) Kilala mo ba yun, Bi?
ME: Is that the guy who died with a squid in his shirt?
Usually Nick ends up digging up the song from the hugely disorganized bunch of MP3s on their computer, I listen to it a couple of times, I decide I like it, and the next time they have that conversation it goes this way:
KAT: O, gawin natin yung Last Goodbye ni Jeff Buckley.
NICK: Sige asteeeeg.
ME: (Nods knowingly) Oo nga.
ALMOST USEFUL
NICK: Nagustuhan mo?
ME: Yung third song, maganda.
NICK: Alin?
ME: Di ko alam yung title e.
NICK: What did it sound like?
ME: Di ko na maalala. Basta alam ko nung narinig ko, nagustuhan ko siya.
Needless to say, my input was pretty much useless. But it was nice of him to ask, anyway.
Eventually I borrowed Nick’s study—a CD with the songs they cover, which he uses to practice. I loaded everything into my iPod, and started listening to the songs in my car. Now I can give fairly intelligent feedback. I can tell when Kat goes flat (which I must say, just so Kat won’t whack me, is not very often), when something sounds discordant, when the guitar, or the bass, or whatever, is drowned out by the rest of the band, when the sound in the house is good, as compared to what they hear on their monitors. And Nick, bless him, still asks. His faith bolsters my confidence, and begins to spark my delusions of becoming a useful member of the entourage.
ME: I can be a roadie, para may silbi ako.
NICK: Sus, hindi mo na kailangan no. OK lang 'yun.
ME: I can carry your amp.
NICK: Wag na, ako na.
ME: (Tries to lift amp) Oooof. Sige, ikaw na lang.
TECHNICAL TALK
As if the music itself weren’t enough, there’s also that occupational hazard of every, well, occupation: technical jargon. I mean, I can’t even get the basic words right, as evidenced by an innocent conversation with one of their bassist’s lady loves:
CAMILLE:Gusto ko talaga ang baho.
ME: Hah?(In thought bubble: Allen smells fine to me… maybe it’s a pheromone thing…)
CAMILLE: Baho.Bass.
ME: Ah. Ok. (In thought bubble:Buti na lang di na ‘ko humirit…)
NICK:Is the wawawawawa better than the wawawawawa? I was thinking of wawawawawa a wawawawawa and just adding a wawawawawa.
AYA:Well, the best sound comes from the wawawawawa wawawawawa, but if you add a wawawawawa you can get a wawawawawa. But the problem with that is wawawawawa, although you can fix that by wawawawawa.
ME:(Brain matter leaking out of ears)
Nor can I figure out what to do with myself when I’m surrounded by expensive-looking equipment, since I’m always worried that I’ll break something or maybe manage to strangle myself with all the wires, which leaves me uncomfortably standing beside amps, afraid to sit, and painfully aware that I must be in somebody’s way.
So gigs are spent awaiting the inevitable point when Nick gets up and announces that they’re going to set up now, the point at which I have to restrain myself from whining like a little kid on the first day of school: “Don’t leeeeave meeeee!”, although I’ve gotten much better at it with practice: I now just sit quietly in my chair, trying to look as unobtrusive as possible. Occasionally I get a sense of belonging when they hand me a beer stub meant for the band, which then allows me to sit quietly in my chair, nursing my beer, still trying to look as unobtrusive as possible. Maybe one day I’ll take up smoking so I look like I’m doing something while I sit and try to look unobtrusive. Or not. As Nick likes to say, “High is out, clean is in.” It’s become something of a standing inside joke with the band: ang pinakamalinis na rock star sa balat ng lupa. And his equally clean girlfriend.
STAGE BOYFRIEND
The three-day hell that was the exam was also at least punctuated by little episodes of me reverting to stage girlfriendhood (girlfrienddom? Girlfriendishness?): the first day we went to the pier to look for guitar parts, and the second day they had band rehearsals at a grand old house in the more genteel parts of Manila. I remember walking in and being greeted by a round of “O, kumusta ang exam?” and “Pasado na, architect?” from everybody.
So yes, even stage girlfriends have lives of their own, and it’s nice to get reminders that people do know I have a day job. And about the rest of it... shhh... don’t tell them I’m not cool at all. But they already know that. And they’re cool about it anyway.
Visit the band's MySpace here and sign up at their mailing list here. Betty Tianco is a licensed architect and freelance writer with a degree in computer science, so she is, in all likelihood, smarter than you. She blogs about life and meaning at Seekers Anonymous.
TAGS: CONFESSIONS STAGE GIRLFRIEND
