Rocking electric from the ashes of the acoustic scene of a few years ago, Overtone has come a long way to become the ultra-fun punk band that made such a commotion every Thursday night at the now-defunct Yaku. They moved their legendary Thursday night madness to Il Ponticello, but vocalist/bassist Norby David, vocalist/guitarist Jay Padua and drummer Frank de Castro still feel that they’re just starting out, despite playing music together since they were 16 years old.

Overtone has just released an album, From Inside the Fishbowl, that either makes you want to jump up and down, or raise your fist in tribute. Their brand of Pinoy punk swings from sounding like a raucous party to being quite emotionally moving. Aside from Ponti Thursdays and other gigs, they were also the regular house band for Rivermaya’s much-publicized teleaudition, Bagong Liwanag (NOTE: This interview was conducted before the ‘Maya search ended).

PULSE.PH: How old were you when you and Jay started playing music together? And how did Frank come into the picture? How different was it back then?

NORBY: Jay and I had our first band when we were 14. The 3 of us naman started playing together when Jay and I were 16. Frank’s 2 years older. We were still in our senior year [in high school]. But that wasn’t Overtone yet. It was a pop-jazz band ironically named Overture! Overtone got together in 2003 after all of us went our separate ways; Frank and I joined other bands while Jay started a 9 to 5. Little did we know that we’d have a band of a similar name in the future. Yun nga, pop-jazz yung Overture, so it was totally different back then. I played saxophone for that band and now I play the bass. Another difference is may lead vocalist kami back then. Backup lang kami ni Jay noon. Now both of us are the co-frontmen and we take turns doing lead vocals. Tapos we play rock so if back then the vibe was nice and steady, now it’s fun and rockin’. He he.

Your blurb on MySpace says you’ve reformatted and the result is Overtone. What did you reformat from?

NORBY: Parang evolution of man ‘yung transformation ng band. Overtone kasi started out as an acoustic act back when Paolo Santos was starting his climb to fame. Wala pa si Frank noon, and we played the more laid back pop-alternative stuff. When Frank jumped in, he even had to learn the cajon because that was the trend in bars (well it kinda still is). But after about a year or so, we decided to try going electric at one of our regular venues. I’m not sure where that was. But it seemed to work, and Frank definitely enjoyed playing the drums more than the cajon.

So we decided that we’d go both ways: electric for bigger venues, acoustic for the small bars or as the client specifies. Pero pop-alternative pa rin yung music. The jump into punk happened when we had this gig where the audience was having so much fun that we kept on extending our set and wound up running out of songs to play. So we went with songs we all knew from memory. Ayun. Ramones, Descendents, Green Day. We had so much fun with those songs, they became a permanent part of our repertoire. From then we kept on adding more punk and heavier rock songs onto our list and started shelving the sappy pop-alternative stuff. If you watched us back then and left the country or something, you wouldn’t imagine we were the same band if you came back now to see us. And most of our audience witnessed that transformation.

Where did your punk influence come from? Some say punk is more an attitude than a genre of music, how punk are you guys?

NORBY: I can’t speak for the others, but my influence is the old school punk. All, Descendents, Ramones… I had a punk band in college and that’s where it all started. As to our level of “punk-ness,” I don’t think our lifestyle is at all punk aside from our refusing to get real jobs. Hehehe. Yes, we enjoy our individuality and hate boundaries but we don’t go around protesting about “the man” trying to take us down. We are most punk when we’re onstage. We are impulsive, spontaneous, non-conforming. Hell, we never get onstage with a plan. Basta tugtog lang. Haha!

FRANK: My main influences in punk are old school too. It’s only recently that I got into “new” punk and had to learn the differences, which apparently are plenty. As for lifestyle, the most punk we are is what Norby already stated. We don’t even look punk if you see us. I really think our doing punk music is more because it’s fun than anything else.

JAY: Mine sort of evolved, I was more into Alternative Rock back then, I started listening to a lot of pop punk after that, then later on a lot of the new school punk. The influence was really fueled by the gigs, since we started doing pop punk covers, I just really enjoyed the energy and it was fun. A lot of purists may think otherwise, but the punk slant in our music is really because we just really like it.

A friend of mine once predicted a glam revival, and it seems you guys had already been playing Bon Jovi in Yaku and Ponti, am I correct? Can you describe the vibe of those shows? I hear they were packed.

JAY: It happened sort of like an accident. Back in high school, we were really into glam, since that was the current scene at the time. When we started doing the acoustic gigs, we sort of tripped out and just played those songs from memory and we all had fun with it.

NORBY: Yeah, there’s a clear example of how spontaneous we are. We sometimes fool around with glam during our sets. Actually kahit anong kanta we pull it out of memory when we’re in the mood. Kahit Backstreet Boys binabanatan namin ‘pag tinopak kami. Depende talaga sa dala ng audience eh. Yaku was a big turning point in Overtone’s career. That place was always packed to the brim pag Thursdays. Sobrang saya non! Sa sobrang sikip, we don’t even leave the stage during our breaks unless we have to go to the bathroom. Tapos if you go to the bathroom, 30 mins or more yan kasi you have to squeeze through the crowd. Doon lumaki yung pangalan namin. Sobrang daming raket nakuha namin dahil lang sa maliit na bar na yan.

To this day, when people find out that we were that band that played in Yaku, their faces light up in excitement and nostalgia. When news of Yaku’s closing got around, we were getting calls left and right. Bars were literally battling to get us to bring that Thursday crowd to their business and we also noticed other bars suddenly coming up with Thursday events to capture that audience. That’s where Ponti came in. A lot of our regular Yaku audience followed us there and we made new friends too. Saya rin doon. Lahat ng tao doon kahit bagong kilala lang, parang old friends agad. Tapos ganon din, nasa kalendaryo na nila yan. Basta Thursday, Ponti. Overtone, andyan. We still play there till now.

FRANK: But for the record, going back to glam, it never went away. It’s just that younger kids are only now picking up on it.

Who writes your songs? I really like the Tagalog songs, they’re very moving. Was it easier to write the Tagalog or the English songs?

NORBY: Thanks! Mostly si Jay yung nagsulat. Ako nahirapan ako writing in Tagalog kasi yung influence ko is mostly foreign music. There’s this one song we wrote for a soap campaign that I originally wrote in English, but the client wanted it translated into Tagalog. Tatlong araw akong walang tulog para lang i-translate yon! But I think dahil tinutukan ko yung pagsulat nung Tagalog songs, they turned out to be the better ones. So parang naging blessing in disguise.

JAY: Salamat din! We all had our take on writing songs. If one of us writes a song, the whole band gets involved with some of the lyrics and of course the arrangement. At first we thought we would have a hard time writing the Tagalog songs, but when we started to write them, I guess they just flowed. We all did our part in the song writing process, so every song on the album is really bits and pieces of us.

How do you determine who sings what?

JAY: I think it’s sorta cool that there is no one singer, it sort of brings the attention to the whole group rather than just the front man. Sometimes we can easily determine kung kanino mas bagay yung song, it doesnt really matter who wrote it, but then again the one who wrote it usually sings it since he already knows how to sing the lead for it, para lang mas madali.

NORBY: Yeah, palitan kami ni Jay. Depende kasi eh. Mostly ang nangyari is kung sino nagsulat, siya yung kakanta. But there’s one song na we trade places with lead and backup vocals. Wala lang, para nakakalito. Kasi it’s a serious song, but we still wanted to inject our playful side into it. Hehehe.

Which of your songs in From Inside the Fishbowl resonate most with your life?

NORBY: Lahat eh. Lahat ng topics ng mga kanta nadaanan ko at some point in my life, kahit na hindi ako yung nagsulat.

FRANK: I’m sure if you listen to the album, you’ll realize that at one point or another in your life, each of the songs will apply to you.

JAY: All of it! He he, our songs have very common topics naman that I’m sure everybody has experienced one time or another. Its very personal to me since, most of what I’ve written really happened to me, hahahaha.

If I remember correctly, Mark Escueta’s first band was with you, Norby and Jay. Can you discuss your early experiences and how it all comes full circle now that he’s produced your album?

JAY: Yeah that was the start of our musical careers, hahah. We were first year high school, and the higher batches used to call us “The Smurfs” since we were so tiny, you wouldn’t even see Mark behind the drum set, just his sticks flying in the air hahaha.

NORBY: But our band’s name was really called Feedback. Tukso lang sa amin yung The Smurfs. Sobrang liit pa namin non, mas matangkad pa yung bass sa akin. That’s what sparked my love for this career. At our very first gig, pagsampa ko sa stage it just felt so right—it felt like home. Mark didn’t produce the album. He engineered lang and we recorded it at his studio. But he did help us out when we had creative slumps and when we couldn’t resolve arguments. hehe. Sobrang laking tulong ni Mark sa amin. He’s been helping us promote the album. Sinasama kami sa mga promo shows ng Rivermaya, kahit di kami tumugtog ina-announce niya na bilhin yung album namin. Tapos lahat ng kaibigan niya in the industry, he recommends us to them para kunin kami sa show.

JAY: It’s great that we all remained really good friends till this day, we just all kept in touch, even when Mark started with Rivermaya, we would all still hang out as a barkada every so often. Mark has been very very very helpful sobra! Salamat sa yo Mark!!!

NORBY: He’s also the one who hooked us up with the show Rivermaya: Bagong Liwanag. Kami yung backup band ng mga contestants.

What are your thoughts on the hopefuls in the Bagong Liwanag audition?

NORBY: These guys all have a future in this industry if they chose to pursue it. Ang gagaling. Kahit hindi sila yung makuha, makikita ng buong Pilipinas yung talent nila. So kahit papaano, pwede silang magkaroon ng career because of the show.

FRANK: Actually, they can form their own band if they want. They have enough talent in there for that.

What are your next plans for Overtone?

NORBY: Well we’re already doing the paperwork to get the album into record bars so that it can reach more people. Nauna pa nga yung international market namin. We’re on iTunes store na eh. As for immediate plans, banat lang to give the album more exposure. Medyo sikat na kami sa internet because of our MySpace and YouTube pages, pero outside of that hindi pa eh. Radio guestings, press releases, mall shows, mga ganon. And the Rivermaya show is good exposure for us also. We’re also planning a campus tour with a few other bands. Sana mabuo yon. If anyone wants us to play at your school or whatever event, tawagan nyo lang kami. Hehehe.

Aside from Overtone, what else do you guys do?

FRANK: Once in a while I sideline as a computer tech or as a writer. Though these days with the busy schedule I’d rather just kick back when possible.

JAY: I’m a freelance web designer, I build home theater PCs and I write computer tech articles for a magazine.

NORBY: Ako ito lang. Music for life. Daming nagtatanong sa akin kung bakit ayaw ko magmodel dahil sobrang gwapo ko daw. Eh I don’t like makeup. Hahahaha! Joke lang!

Photos by Eric Fernandez. To see what the modeling world is missing out on, visit Overtone’s MySpace page. They would also be glad if you’d add them on Friendster, too.