First Blood SEA Tour @ One Cafe, KL

Alright, so Saturday finally arrives and we're all ready to go for First Blood's gig. After a tiring morning of rugby, Nin & I bashed away our exhaustion for excitement as we headed to One Cafe to meet everyone else. After an hour of singing "Okelah Kalau Begitu", we finally managed to get our entry into the venue.

Medusa opens the show with an enthusiastic 'pow!' into the air. New to the scene and new to One Cafe, they succeeded in bringing in the crowds lazing outside to moshing within the dinghy disco lighted room.

Asthalin were the second band, but the quality of their sounds should've placed them later into the night. Of course, I have a crush on the bassist (LOL!) so I enjoyed listening to the vocals mixed in with Kuys screaming. Bestnyeeee. Did I mosh? I think I did. A bit. Haha.

Stayed around while Burnout performed, a punk influenced hardcore band that played songs less than two minutes long. The crowds were ballistic here, crashing onto the stages and pulling the microphones away from the frontman. But we stayed out of the moshpit charging up our energy for Daarchlea. Plus, the DSF kids were way too violent for my liking. CHILL LA MOSHING IS NOT TO HURT PEOPLE ASSHOLES!!! :)

Daarchlea came on, and everybody went CRAZY with headbanging. Nindy couldn't keep up with the fastpaced ones and it was pretty funny. I felt her slowing down beside me but I was too into the music to acknowledge it. Plus the afro guy beside me was headbanging so much I had to join in hahaha. Firdoz syaitannn! :P

Next up was Cassandra, but I stayed out of it because Nindy had motion sickness so we chilled with Jijol and Fahmy instead outside, whilst Moe was in charge of my camera.

Next up was Deadscore. After making their mark at Trunkers, they made their mark in One Cafe, blasting through their set and injecting energy into everybody. GOSH they were goooooood. After them was the long waited ALCATRAZ! I was fucking awed by the vocalist, who was so light on his feet despite his big size. Trashing up the stage with furious stomping, I was so into their music, and I think I was one of the few who actually knew the vocalist of First Blood was playing the guitar for Alcatraz. Mental stuff, really.

After Alcatraz was Maghrib break, and we went out for a quick break only to hear The Padangs start their set. Lajunye, eesh! Rushed back in, and I realized the sound macam kureng. Went to the keyboardist and saw Paul having problems with the technical side of One Cafe. He couldn't start up the Korg and after lots of cellotapes and twisting of cables, they managed to punch through successfully with Whats Wrong With You.

creepy picture of Harry hahaha!

Bleeding Mascara trashed Rock the World and now set their power on One Cafe, pulling through the set and pushing away all exhaustion, paving a thunderous path for Restraint. The vocalist of Alcatraz even joined the crowd during BM's performance, that's how amazing this gig was. Everybody was part of the gig, and there were no differences of status. :) Restraint was probably a band that sounded similar to First Blood, with the endless singalongs and growls from Ijam's side. Epicccc dohhh. Like always, I enjoyed their set, and enjoyed laughing at the kids who always end up on stage with the band, unable to resist the temptation to exert the adrenaline rush pulsating through our bodies.

And now. FIRST BLOOOOOOOOOOOD!!! After a longggg soundcheck, they finally propelled in with "The Next Time I See You, You're Already Dead" playing right into the self titled "First Blood", just like the beginning of their album Killafornia. Best dohhhh. I couldn't stop moshing and moshing, running back and forth from the front of the stage to the crowd.

Favourite moment of the night?? :)

Me: *Screams* CONSPIRACYYYY!!!!

Carl First Blood: *looks directly at me* You want Conspiracy? Alright, we'll play Conspiracy, for all of you guys, and our friend right there, and *points at me* my partner in crime, right here.

Me: *melttttttttttttttt*

GWAR SHIT I ALMOST HAD AN ORGASM! Hahahaha.

It was awesome, everyone went crazy with that song, singing along and trashing up onto the stage, reliving the Restraint moment. Carl First Blood jumped in a few times into the crowd and joined in with everybody enjoying the songs. When we requested Armageddon towards the end, Carl was up for it (Duh, he didn't even need to sing) haha but the rest of the band was too tired for the song, so they ended the show with a Sick of It All cover instead. WHEEEEEEEEEE.

Photo session!!!

Went to AG Hujan's studio to record our song, and then went back home. NICEEEE.

Celine would love more First Blood gigs.

New Year Rendezvous @ One Cafe, Jln. TAR

Sore and aching all over from the day before, I woke up two hours past my alarm clock. It's a good thing Malaysian gigs always start late, or else I would've been totally shitted. Malu doh, pergi gig lambat if you're media. Haha. Anyway, met Nin for a while at Buddies before going to One Cafe. Moshi, Apit, Mia, Anne, Azzreen, Luk and Syuk jumped onto my monorail a station away from One Cafe and we headed to the venue together to find it...uhm... unhealthily quiet.

After an hour of waiting for the gig to start, we were starting to feel a bit weirded out by the lack of crowd. I mean, come on, The Padangs, Asthalin, Widuri, Restraint were performing for god's sake, where was everybody!? In the end we just decided to stick to an imaginary idea of it being a private gig, to make up for the lack of crowds. We were the only hardcore kids there, I would presume. Hot damn...

Makcik One Cafe

The gig opened up with Blowzy Lazy, who were just aite, giving me tinges of Nirvana as well as Peter Pan and Muse, too, from all the guitar effects and whatnot. They were mediocre, but still pretty alright for an opening. Maybe due to the lack of crowd, their showmanship, too, was a little dull, and a lot more movement could've spazzed things up an inch more. After them was Flicked Minds, with good music but heckkk the vocalist's voice was sooo sharp! Gwar! It was like listening to a teenage ditz singing. Seriously.

After that was Senoritas. DUDE, Mr. Organizer... we're at a gig man... Having Senoritas thrown into the setlist along with Restraint is just.... unethical. Haha. No comment on them. One word: Pussycat Dolls.

Walked around a lot, tried to keep myself awake during Arti Beat's performance because they were playing such melodic tunes it made me all nice inside hahaha, so I just decided to stalk everybody and take pictures here and there. Nguh!

Next up was a surprise for me. It was already a surprise having Aifa message me going "I saw you!" then seeing her at the side of the stage, but it was more of a surprise seeing her go on stage with Lead and Achin to play with Manis. It was a friendly performance, friends with friends, so everybody just... layan je laaa :)

7 Colours was a shock. Imagine Phantom of the Opera covered in a gothic metal sort of way. It was... cool... but uncanny at the same time. And it's awesome when you have a vocalist who can pull off opera, but not when it's 3-4 songs straight of high, choral like vocals. Nu-uh.

But what FINALLY punched some excitement into the air was Half-Asleep! Having seen their drummer Raimi perform at Grido Studio before (Mari Bergonjeng), I was excited to see this band perform, and definitely their music contradicted their name. I was energetic all the way through, and jumping around (not as manic as the boys were tho haha!).

After their set, the MC (who was reading off cue cards LOL!) said "Are you guys still up for gigging some more?"

We all stared at him and I said: "The gig only just started!"

HAHA! :P

Went out during the 7pm break, and chilled. I kept moving around tables to talk with the Asthalin guys, then Rath (why were you sitting so ffarrr, eesh!) and back to our gang LOL!

Headed back in and it was time for Sepatu 69 to perform. Not bad laaaa.... Disappointment was Vermillion though. We were all hyped up for a female-screamer fronted band, but the songs ended up just being.... hmmm... Too slow to 2-step to, and too fast for breakdowns. So how?!

Widuri were good though. I personally forgot that Aiman (organizer) was part of Widuri as well, so I was like "oo him!" hahahaha. Widuri's female vocalist was really amazing and had a powerful voice. Their songs were great to headbang to, and a few moments where we could really here the metal influences coming out. Their screamer was strong too. Enjoyed their performance!

Sangap tengok awek HAHA!

The Padangs! Best, lah, what else to say about them? Having them perform to what seemed like only us, that was a pretty hot feeling. Moshed like crazy (coz we had all the space!!) and again heard their new song ("This is our new song!"... us: dah dengar laaaa! HAHA!). Finally I had sweat emerging from my body. Seriously, going to a gig and not sweating is just... wrong. Haha.

Excited to have Asthalin on stage, I was already ready to throw my camera back into my pocket after a few shots to mosh and mosh and mosh. Whee! Really tight per usual, and ecstatic tunes aplenty, Asthalin did not disappoint us, and was really worth the watch. I guess the jamming the night before worked out! :)

And finally, RESTRAINT!!!! :D I love them even more now for granting us the two encores at the end. Haha, Ijam was like... "Ah what the heck, why not". xD Solid, wild and furiously pounding with hardcorehardcorehardcore, these guys really know how to put on a good show, whether it be to a big crowd or a minimal crowd. Always equally good wherever they are, it was a real pity there was not a lot of people to appreciate their performance.

Went out after the gig, to sit at One Cafe's CAFE for a while, and everybody was just SILENT... why? Hujan was on TV performing at AJL. HAHAHA! :P Hilarious shit, everybody was just paying attention to the TV. Ngeeheehee. Hujaaaaan! Waktuuu dukaaaa, dulu kita laluiii bersaamaaaa!

More crowds would've made Celine even crazier than that.