THE night before supertyphoon Reming threatened (but spared) Metro Manila, a group calling itself Dakila – Philippine Collective for Modern Heroism invited ONE PHILIPPINES editor-in-chief Ces Rodriguez to take part in “Himigsikan ng Rock and Roll sa Lipunan – Isang Gabi ng Talakayan at Tugtugan.” Dakila is a collective of performing artists who advocate social awareness. Its core members include comedian Tado Jimenez, Parokya ni Edgar bassist Buwi Meneses, Radioactive Sago Project frontman Lourd de Veyra, and veteran stage and film actor Ronnie Lazaro.

The Himigsikan event, held at Conspiracy Garden Café in Quezon City, hoped to “tackle the magnitude of the evolution of Pinoy Rock in relation to the influences of the context of Philippine Society (‘70s to 2000) to the music scene and its impact to the generation of that time,” the Dakila brief read. It all seemed scarily serious, especially as an equally forbidding “discussion guide” was emailed to participants. But Ces threw in her few cents worth and found herself in the company of protest singer Susan Fernandez, punk rocker Bobby Balingit of The Wuds, producer and sometime artist Robert Javier of The Youth, Patrick Reidenbach of the seminal rock club Club Dredd, Aia de Leon of Imago and Aimee Marcos of The Dorques. What follows is the essay version of what Ces gabbed about that evening. And why Ces? Well, she once edited Jingle Chordbook Magazine.

Define Pinoy Rock.

When I first saw this question, I said, utang na loob! Ayokong i-define ang Pinoy rock. Mahirap. It’s like asking ano ba ang meaning ng life or ano ba ang Pinoy art.

Ito na lang. Ikukuwento ko na lang kung anong nangyari sa kapatid ko nung nag-exhibit siya sa Berlin at the time the wall was still up. Medyo disappointed yung mga Aleman sa mga ginawa niya. Wala raw silang nakikitang magde-define na Pinoy ang art niya. They were expecting bamboo installations and ethnic chuvaru.

So sa liga man ng Pinoy rock, I think we’re way past discussions of whether the language or the kind of instruments we use (indigenous or not) have any kind of bearing on whether something can be called Pinoy rock or not.

Siguro pwede na lang natin sabihin na may sensibility ang Pinoy rock na nagpapahiwatig na atin nga ito. The Juan de la Cruz Band began by aping their Western heroes pero in time natumbok rin nila yung feel na Pinoy. Ano yung feel na Pinoy? Isang immediate connection. Isang kurot sa singit.

Pero maski walang kurot, weno ba? Hindi ako kinukurot ng Drip (a local trip hop group that sounds like Morcheeba) pero super type ko sila.

Sa madaling salita, Pinoy Rock is as diverse as each of our individual experiences as Pinoys…or even as hyphenates (Fil-Ams, etc). What Aimee Marcos’ goes through is day to Bobby Balingit’s punk rock night. Ergo, iba ang gagawin nilang musika. Pero Pinoy Rock silang pareho.

The only thing Aimee and Bobby need to do as Pinoy Rockers is to be true to themselves and their music. Everything that comes after – the effect, the adulation, the kurot sa singit – are only byproducts of the music itself. And maybe the byproducts are also just figments of the public’s imagination. Tayo-tayo lang naman ang gumagawa ng meaning, di ba? Or not…

So ang sa akin, musicians should simply create. The sensibilities will out. They shouldn’t worry too much about meaning and context. They should simply tap into their wellspring. Fish out what’s simmering in those burbling depths. Hold them to the light. What happens after is happenstance. The song connects, it doesn’t, it soars, it thuds, it reinforces what we know of the world and of Pinoy rock or very radically stands our preconceptions of the music on its head.

How was the scene then?

In the mid-Seventies to the mid-Eighties, when I was with Jingle, and then later when I ran A2Z Records with my partner Les, the scene was totally exciting. Maybe because we were personally immersed in what was happening. It was exciting to witness how groups went from old school Pinoy rock as espoused by groups like the Juan de la Cruz Band to new permutations handily described as punk and new wave.

Economically and politically, the country was in the pits. It was martial law. We were muzzled by storm troopers. Without political expression, a few kids turned to music to express what they could not out in the open. It seemed especially fitting that local punk bands flourished just before Marcos was ousted, at a time when people who had the means were fleeing the country in droves and those without the resources and connections (like the rest of us) could only brace for what I believed then would be an impending civil war. Not in the provinces where it was already happening but in the city itself. So music became a way to get the confusion, the fear and the anger out in the open.

The Eighties punk band, Urban Bandits said it best in their song, “No Future sa Pader.”

Before punk exploded in the Seventies, rock was a big bloated bore. It was all about slickness and an antiseptic studio sound. Talagang corporate rock. Nagta-trabaho ako at that time for the international labels of Vicor Music Corporation. Its library teemed with blues, reggae and this new sound that was then coming out of the U.K. called punk rock. But no one would touch these records. They were a bit too out there to make respectable bucks. Or so the record execs who wore ties thought. It was really all about Rod Stewart doing disco, and technically proficient but robotic rock bands like Boston and Foreigner making a mint.

As for radio, it was mind-numbing. When the broadcasters’ group mandated all radio stations to play at least four OPM or Original Pilipino Music per hour, nagalit ang mga taga-radyo. Kulang na kulang daw ang pondo ng OPM. At sabi naman nung iba, what was currently available didn’t fit their (rock or jazz) formats. They were right, actually.

Radio station DZRJ was the exception because they solicited demo tapes from unsigned acts. Yes, tapes. There was no such thing as digital recordings then. Lahat, naka-cassette. You needed to steal from your parents so you could afford the stratospheric hourly rates charged by recording studios.

As for mainstream musicians, then, as now, they were an exploited lot. Then, as now, the big bucks came off the talent fees of live shows and concerts and not from the actual sale of the records. Royalties were pitifully unroyal. Even a mega, true-blue international seller like Ka Freddie Aguilar’s “Anak,” may issue din sa royalties ang kanta.

Our scene

When my partner Leslie David and I opened our record store A2Z Records on January 1,1984, things got way better.

A2Z was actually borne out of a) our love for music, b) our boredom with what was currently and locally available, and c) a need to justify the outlandish sums we threw at the imports we hunted and hoarded. So A2Z carried everything that you couldn’t find elsewhere. Initially, we called ourselves Abba to Zappa but later, A2Z meant everything from the Modern Jazz Quartet to Hotdog’s first album (containing “Ikaw ang Miss Universe ng Buhay Ko”) to Johnny Cash to the Velvet Undergound to a U.S. indie album from a group called PsiCom featuring a Pinoy guitarist named Vince Duran (who actually gave us the album himself) and Perry Ferrell, who would go on to front Jane’s Addiction and stage the Lollapalooza shindigs.

Ang dami-dami at iba’t ibang klaseng music ang nbagaganap kung saan-saan. Our customers were as excited to share their musical stash, introducing us to the ethnic and the radical and allowing us to dig the underground past and everything edgy and shamelessly trendy. Walang Internet, walang download. We tracked and stashed new vinyl like it was contraband. Our musical table was full to groaning. We swooned.

Do you think that Pinoy Rock reflect social realities?

Only insofar as the music reflects the social reality of the songwriter. Which is how it should be. Maybe the torturous musings of a college kid tell us more about what he and his ilk are undergoing better than a full-on “message” song. Maybe lang ha.

Ayoko kasing ina-agenda ako pag nakikinig ako. As I said, kwento me. Don’t tell me what to think or do. If you’re really good, I’ll get it.

And even if I don’t, that’s fine by me as well. Kasi I also subscribe to the motto: the more the messier. Let’s not limit what can be said.

What do you think
of the current rock scene?

I love it! I love that there are bands I can’t stand. That nagkakagulo sila sa entablado. Na kinasusuklaman ko ang mga videos nila. Na wala silang saysay sa buhay ko. I love it because they’re around. Because lalabas at lalabas ang mga gifted child, kung meron man. Pabayaan lang.

Is the current Pinoy Rock Scene apathetic? Are musicians today politically indifferent?

Apathetic to what? To Manny Pacquiao? The Millennium Development Goals? To the latest SWS survey? Maybe most of them are. But I have no doubt there will be political flagwavers in the mix. Or maybe meron na, maybe yung mga punk subcultures sa Cavite, etc. Di lang natin alam. Or baka alam niyo na. Baka naman may mga hidden meaning o political undertones sa kanta ng Orange and Lemons, hindi lang natin nakikita or naririnig. I’m serious ha. I can read social realism in tripe. So that’s really not the point.

The point is, it’s music. It’s not propaganda.

If there’s something you want to say that’s not out there, e di magtayo ka ng banda mo. Or magsulat ka. O maging political commentator ka. O mag-rap ka. Or, like this forum, punahin mo. Maraming paraan.

Does the emergence of “revivals” reflect empty musicianship?

Not at all. It’s just commercially expedient. Uso lang. Kamikazee could write their London Calling tomorrow and use “Dobidoo” as their takeoff point.

It’s a lot like copycat bands. Pinoy Rock actually started by sounding and looking like everyone from Mick Jagger (Pepe Smith) to the guys from Grand Funk Railroad (Red Foxx which would later morph into Hotdog).

Thing is, this is actually what separates the good from the mere mimickers. After a while kasi, yung mga good, naa-assimilate nila yung pangongopya until it’s tranformed into something that becomes truly theirs.

Classic example yung Sex Pistols. Sila yung boy band nung panahon nila. Created to sell a clothing line. Kaya lang ang tindi ng dating nila sa mga manonood. They conveyed a sensibility that electrified their audience. They became the catalyst for genuine bands to form and snowball into a true-blue movement. The bands that followed in the wake of the Sex Pistols were truly galit sa nangyayari; they weren’t around just to purvey shock value para lang makabenta ng T-shirts.

So like punk, what’s musically trendy like revivals of old APO or Hotdog songs simply becomes the medium with which musicians find their voice.

Kaya okay lang ang uso, no matter how brainless. Kopya lang ng kopya. Lalabas at lalabas din ang himig natin.

What do you think
are the prospects and challenges of Pinoy Rock?

With niches, subcultures, technology, always angsty kids, and people like Joey Smith bravely gigging away, Pinoy rock will flourish. It always has, it always will. Bukas, pag nauso uli sina Ariel Rivera, nandiyan pa rin ang Pinoy rock and its permutations. It may be less visible on TV or heard less on the radio, pero nandiyan pa rin ang Pinoy rock.

It will simply change according to where the wind blows, to what’s uso or not. Which will keep the music fresh and hopefully, compelling.

The biggest challenge of Pinoy rock is its audience. Are we willing to go where its evolution takes us? If not, then we ourselves can always pick up the guitar and invent the future we want for Pinoy rock.