KL GIGS

It's all about smoke & sweat.

Monday, January 11, 2010

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.

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