ARA Fest KLIBR09 @ Bukit Kiara Equestrian Club

Love Ride Not War

Okay, let's go by day yeah, paling senang.

Day 1:

Rainy, grey, and empty. If you arrive at a gig late and realize there's still nobody, it's not good news. Perhaps it was due to the rain, but the failure to promote the festival to it's best potential was probbaly the reason for the lack of humans. Went with Haziq, and spent the day just sitting by the stands, ordering Pasta from BigBoys (seriously best doh) and Otai burgers....

Left to Shah Alam when the stage started playing extremely cringeworthy tunes (come on, they covered Matta's "Ketahuan"... WHO COVERS THAT!?). Haziq had to pick his dad up for a meeting, walked to his house and realized his dad was gone, so took a car and drove back to Ara, hoping we didn't miss Republic of Brickfields.

We didn't! Well... sort of. Went back in time to catch their last three songs, including the favourite 'Emansipasi'. By this time, there were actually a satisfactory amount of crowd, and as always, Republic pulled off a spectacularly chilled out performance that sent fans fantasizing their cigarettes as ganja.... Shhh...

Next up: Purevibracion.

It's amazing when you have reggae bands one after the other, and nothing beats putting both RoB and PV together. Playing songs like "Ms. Kinky" and "Love", they really got the crowd skanking to ultimate orgasm. Okay, that's an exaggeration. :P

All in all, despite the not-so-awesome start to the fest, the night ended with an upturn, except for the cancellation of Job 2 Do's performance.

Walked towards the car and were stopped by the trancing music from the buskers playing near the entrance. I've seen them in Bukit Bintang before, it was like a percussionist group. Played extremely awesome tunes, almost starting joget-ing to it. LOL.

Day 2:

Day 2, and it's Ara Fest with MOE! Waiting tanpa kesabaran for him to come with The Bum (more commonly known as a MyVi), which he JUST GOT!!! :D - we went early to Ara Fest and searched for Moe's dad to lepak with. Best gila, his advices. Anyway, walked back to the field where all the bikes were already parked, MORE than there were the day before and got some food to eat, while awaiting the start of the band performances. Awal2 pun dah dapat a call from Ein Second Combat saying he's lost, LOL. Walked around and looked at all the booths of all the bikers, and of course, oggling at the bikes. Sumpah sexy, the wheels, the engines, the handles. WAARGH.

Kolep made a surprise arrival with his friend, and we grabbed a drink just as the bands started to play. The first band up was a reggae band - continuation from the yesternight, perhaps - of whom I forgot the name... All I remember were the awesome tunes they played :)

Tapi. Tetiba, Tuhan nak berseronokkan situasi kot, nak bagi sikit hujan. Aduhhhh.

Rushed under the tents, couldn't meet Second Combat when they arrived because of the rain... yerr. But luckily, as Kolep predicted, the rain stopped soon and we headed to SxC's merchandise booth. Met Ein alone, tak tahu where the rest of the band was, stole a CD hehehe. No lah, courtesy of Ein. :)

Went back to check out the bands, and we were given the surprise of having The Times performing with us. After the reggae band, Bottlecap were introduced to us. All-girl band, rock n roll, and a typical cliche of having "I hate myself for loving you" as part of the set list. Next up was Second Combattttt. Whoooo. They had to cut out a lot of songs due to the small time span allowed, but despite the dead crowd, they still managed to play with enough energy and got some people singing along (bikers standing next to me were singing along LOL). I think a night slot for them would've benefitted a lot more, because the heavier sounds got louder and louder towards the night, featuring Silkhanaz and whatnot.

Bottlecap

Second Combat

The Times were next and as always, they played "Tunjuk Perasaan". The usual la for them, not much I can describe, this blog post kan isn't a copy-paste from my reviews I write for magazines so tak yah rajin sangat... :P HAHAHA.

Then followed by them, were some band called The Radius, covered songs from other groups, and we decided to walk back to SxC's booth singing along to Creedence Clearwater's Have You Ever Seen The Rain... haha.

Vocalist: "Lagu ni lagu hujan..."

Us: ....Huh???

Cheh... Moe left to go back to Selayang to do some recording for a band, and I chilled with Ein and watched the sky go dark. Had a nice conversation about SxC's tour in France, and their lifestyle... We got bored, decided to walk around and found his group of friends and band members, as Ohchentaku was performing. Lepak'd, chilled with Ein and got introduced to Pali (malu jugak, tak ingat nama dia time jumpa xD). Sat down, and watched Khottal come on. Sumpah best gila. From where I sat, I could see a group of bikers from KapChai watching the performance and totally enjoying it. Ala, bangga :) Singing along to the 'Woo Song' was fun, sang along and made Pali & Ein think I was probably retarded. xD

After Khottal was a band called Bau, tak best sangat, the vocalist tried to pull a Faizal Tahir by stripping to his jeans, showing off his body, and getting people like me going 'ergh'. LOL. No pictures, sorry, my battery was dying, had to save. After them was a break followed by a fashion show selling off Harley Davidson merchandise, followed by Silkhanaz. One of the otais in the oldschool metal scene in Malaysia, they rocked the tyre off bikes and got some crowds moving. Following up was Silent Scenery, possibly one of my favourite performances of the night. Like the vocalist had said, while Silkhanaz played music for the bikers to ride to, Silent Scenery played tunes for the bikers to rest to. Ambient, instrumental post-rock. What else do you think can make me love music more? :)

Silkhanaz

Following them was the arrival of Moe and a presentation for all the bikers to come on stage and receive their KLIBR09 participation certificate/logo thing... I dunno, probably something to stick on their bikes. After a loooooong monotonous shake of hands and muttering of thanks, the performances were back on.

Lan and the Typewriter. The comeback of Meet Uncle Hussain's ex-vocalist, a well loved voice amongst the local indie scene. Looking forward to this performance since this afternoon, I was not disappointed by the sounds I heard. With even more opportunities for him to show of his voice, Lan showed us new songs like "Lipstik Plastik Cosmetik". Good on you, man, I'm glad you've not been lost completely.

Then the time arrives, and the stage lights are dimmed, for the one and only... Search. Hell yeah, we were plunged into the atmosphere with an entre of a drum solo, followed by an instrumental from the guitarists when the lights came on. Topped with a beret, Amy Search wins the heart of the audience by acknowledging them with the trophy of the mic stand in his hands. Playing only 4 songs, they still managed to rock up the night to an awesome end, by giving us the two ultimate favs "Isabella" and "Fantasia Bulan Madu"... Kickass stuff yo... Oh not to mention the cute moments when his kids came running on stage. Haha.

Went to BB after this but left early because a few kids pissed me off. Ngeh.

Celine loves good endings.

Black Territory Album Launch @ One Cafe, Jln. TAR

There's no better start to a gig than listening to the sound-check over a cup of 'milo ais'. Though the event had been running a liiittle late for the past couple of hours, when you're in Malaysia, there's only so much you can expect of punctuality, kan? But that aside, what's there to get frustrated about at a gig sprinkled with crazy bands celebrating a crazy release?

Black Territory purges out their debut album, "This is Black Territory" with hardcore style, allowing us to relish within the throngs of metal (except for the slightly disorientating disco ball spinning on the ceiling), and we are introduced, finally, to the opening act, This Sunday. Line-up including BT's manager, Wong (thanks for everything, bro :]), as guitarist, a suddenly flash of Avenged Sevenfold pounds into the crowd's ears as they hit the first song, but the combination of the two vocalists brings us back to the former sounds of The Used. When you've been sitting around to a long and exhausting wait for an event to commence, an energy booster is what you need. Both hands up, This Sunday were definitely that boost we needed, both performance-wise and of stage presence. Their music was well arranged, and performance solid. The only mishap, again a repeated fault throughout, was the sound level of the microphones, which were overshadowed by the eruption of instruments that were shooting at the crowd's adrenaline.

The next three bands roared through the hour; Dying For Autopsy, Ana Four Craig and Asthalin did the honours of warming up the fans for The Padangs, the final performance before prayer break. DFA were a large division from This Sunday, bringing us Lamb of God-like vocals, along with some mental metal riffs. However... the melodies didn't quite blend tight enough and the vocals were disjointed from the rhythm. AFC were a step up, they got the crowds moving a little more, but they themselves perhaps needed the warm up. What is with the stand ups? No metal band should be seen still for even a second, dudes, take this to the road. Asthalin gave us a full on blow to the heart, with firm vocals and music that tainted a bit with Love Me Butch. But more work on the timing of the drum rhythm would touch up flaws.

The Padangs. They peaked to as loud as the sound system could allow them. Despite the abruptly minimized sound exerting from the speakers, their performance was ace and they definitely did their reputation well to bringing the house down. A tight four-tracked set, embracing the every aspect of metal, before the crowds were given the chance to recollect breaths after the break. Moshi left me, and I was left alone (Azam was busy being a good photographe :D). But hey whatever, made new friends, which is the best part about gigs, in my opinion.

We re-enter the scene with Massacre Conspiracy who entertained us with a neatly covered tune from Cradle of Filth. Their double vocals strong, driving their solid fanbase to hysteria, they were followed swiftly by Arsonist and Daarchlea. Whilst Arsonist gave us a raw - perhaps a TOO raw - performance that lacked in the dirty, dinghy qualities of a metal band, Daarchlea smashed through with ecstatic energy and drew together a string of songs that were well arranged and moshable to the max. I left the crowd with a screwed up finger.

We are left breathless as we welcome Kids on The Move to the stage. They are derived from perhaps a much more punk sound, the vocalist even admitting that they trail away from the metal trend of the day, but they still captivated the crowd nonetheless, being one of the uprising bands in KL. However, it came up to the point when all the kids needed a real energizer, and KOTM sounded a bit monotonous towards the final song.

With ants in their pants, the crowd waited for the band prior to BT. One of Malaysia's best since 2003, Cassandra were welcomed with a quick spark of enthusiasm and they plunged down a flawless set, disallowing the slowly fading and exhausted crowd to dishearten their spirits. It's always the one risky thing of being the band before the last; people want to get their energy recharged and stay out on your performance, which was the case with Cassandra that night, unfortunately for them.

Haziq arrives in time for me to sneak him in, and the hour strikes for the hugely anticipated band of the night and Black Territory jumps onto the stage, enduring cries of impatience as they set up their instruments. And there we have it, a pitfall down to the dark sounds of metal. They played their parts in crushing grace and bringing out the roughness, but they dwelled too, on the metal clichés, giving us predictable acoustics - which sadly, the we-want-mosh crowd did not appreciate - as well as a slideshow of their journey through the music scene. Everybody give an 'aww'...

BT gifted us with amazing guitar solos, as well as the first song they'd ever written, riffs symmetrical to Avenged Sevenfold's Chapter Four. BT's vocalist did a good job in communicating with the crowd, but again, the microphones are to blame for the minimal and flawed sounds. There were points when people began dragging their feet and the minutes seemed endless... we were crusading our way towards midnight, and one could tell the knackered everybody were already thinking of home.

But the atmosphere picked up and the final song ended in a crescendo, leaving us with the breathless air of climax and swirls of Search flashbacks and Dragonforce tunes lingering in our heads. There was a feeling of satisfaction and success that leaked from One Cafe as the gig-goers poured out of the area and what had begun as a poorly delayed gig ended with the reputation of a gig to remember.

Celine needs to brush up on her mosh-stamina.

Rockaway '09 @ Capsquare Mall, Jln. Dang Wangi

It’s not everyday you get to see a show inclusive of big homegrown bands like One Buck Short, Pop Shuvit and Estranged... for free. But this was indeed the delicious taste sponsored by Jack’nJill Roller Coaster that was greedily indulged by the crowds of Rockaway ’09. An event in courtesy of punk-rock band One Buck Short held at the easily accessible Capsquare Mall, which is one of the blooming gig-houses to date; the rumors that crowds would’ve flocked to the Pesta Malam Indonesia concert was stamped out, when the gates were (finally) opened for the attendees and a stampede of blurred skinny jeans and band t-shirts rushed through towards the stage. The place was filled in just a matter of seconds. Havoc was everywhere, potato chip packets popped and contents scattered, fire crackers randomly bursting and the smell of cigarette burning up the open area. I arrived about two hours before the show actually began, sitting around finding the place to get my media pass and meeting up with my friend One. Arul was there to with his group of friends.

The stage came alive to an impatient crowd therefore opening act Car Crash Hearts was eagerly accepted with wide open arms. CCH was a kick starter and it’s only fair to say they did a pretty kickass job in bringing up the hype to a higher level. They performed 4 songs, all equally power packed, and perhaps it would’ve been a nice round-up to their performance if they’d switch around their last song with the second last; ending with a slow song kind of pumped down the energy of the crowd. Their second last song had a funky dancerock end to it, which would've coalesced with the crowd's energy.

Medusa roared through the next set, with rather confusing arrangements of instruments and vocals. They seemed to already have a solid fan base, like any other hardcore ban, really, but they stuck out as being new to composing songs that work. The drums were tight enough to bring on the headbanging and moshing up to a slight craze, but there was no need of comparison if you put them besides the other two hardcore Malaysian bands who were there at the event, too. Cassandra was officially announced as “the best hardcore band in Malaysia”, and they proved themselves worthy of the title, indeed. Everybody joined together to witness Cassandra give a full-on performance, and no doubt to venture within the circle pit; including girls who wore shorts and tight-fit t-shirts. 

Similarly to this was Restraint, an ever-growing band with an ever-growing fan base enough to storm the place down. The mosh pits kept splitting and joining up, and the signature “Wall of Death” pit was enacted by the fans, leaving people bruised and even some to the point of almost fighting with each other; one group of men kept trying to fight throughout the whole event – pointless. They played two encores for the yearning crowd - the peak point of the event. I almost got suckerpunched by those fighter cocks; I had yelled "Ey, korang datang sini gaduh ke nak dengar musik, kalau nak gaduh pegi dekat Chow Kit ke ape la!". Yes, my mood was extremely utterly bad that time.

By that time, I was with Moshi, Chaom, Ayen, Alif, Azam, Kolep, Sher, Din... etc etc. It was not a very usual hangout group that I would mix together, but it was pretty nice. Moshi was like "Relax, relax..." Bahaha, weird hearing that come from a guy who's always ready to bite someone's head off.

Love Me Butch was, as usual, a great set to watch and gifted us with three new songs from their upcoming album. Unfortunately, the majority of the crowds were exhausted from the aftermath of Restraint and Pesawat, and it was more on the headbanging and less on the moshing. Love Me Butch deserved much more than that, though. But I did my part in singing along whole-heartedly to Barricade and Reconcile. Estranged was luckier on that point, having their set midway through the list, drawing the crowds in with tracks from their old album, like ‘Velocity’.

Pesawat’s also one band we watched grow up throughout these years, having recently done a video shoot at KLIA airport for their hit single ‘Mirage’. Playing a solid set of 4 songs, they rocked the house down the best they could, despite the several faults with the sound system; the speakers were a little problematic, a fault we could depict clearly as well through the performances by The Times and Sevencollar T-shirt. However, mere system errors are not enough to pull back The Times from getting their fans to rock out and shout along to the songs with full force, this time playing a new song “Spektakular”, which they dedicated to their fans. I watched Pesawat on the screen in the VIP tent, and heard Sevencollar from afar. The technical problems were depictable, but their performances still sounded and looked 'wow'.

Indie favourites like Couple, Bittersweet and Bunkface pulled it all off easy, being the ones in most demand (A lot of people came just for Bittersweet’s set, leaving straight after), and they did their share in adding catalyst to the event. The crowds were fanatical throughout their performances. I could see the fans from beside the stage through Bunkface's performance. I curse Ayen for getting all lost around the area! I missed Bittersweet because of him, doofy! Grr. Me and Chaom walked back into the venue to witness the fans leaving. Sucks. And for the first time in my life, I had to say "fuck Couple!"... not because they were bad, hey, I LOVE Couple, but after the fall out with my boyfriend (personal infos whoops), I ventured back into the crowd only to have Couple sing "Pergi, jangan kembali, sampai sini saja, kita berdua". Oh GOSH!
For the non-Malay speakers: "Go, don't come back, this is where the both of us finish"... Ouch, right?

Pop Shuvit were the ultimate entertainers of the night before One Buck Short’s performances; they’d been busying away from the scene for a while now, therefore everybody had to admit Pop Shuvit was greatly missed – the crowd was crazy and every song was sung along with whatever was left in the audience to split their throats for. One Buck Short finally came out and launched onto a big thanksgiving speech to the audience and sponsors – we’ve heard it all before, now bring on the music!

Performing favourites like “That Day” and “10:04”, OBS knew how to pull the crowd up out of the exhaustion clouds to plunge straight back into the fresh wave of energy that wrapped the crowd up tightly with the music. The crowd finally dispersed with the background music of OBS playing a final song to send the crowds back home.

This day was the day we Malaysian rockers went all out in front of a surprisingly large number of foreigners who had attended and found an equally surprising amount of fierce energy in the crowds, proving that our love for music is a die-hard factor. Anyone who walked out of the gates that night un-bruised or un-sweaty just did not rockaway hard enough. As for me, I headed to Bukit Bintang for a night chill with friends that matter when the stage lights turned off.

Celine hated and loved this day altogether.

From Heart to Crowd UNITY Gig @ MCPA Hall

Just like any other gig held at MCPA so far, the queue grew before the instruments were set up. From Heart to Crowd brought to us a triple mix of Metal, Screamo, Punk Rock unity. Hence the name being "UNITY". After a hot trip from home to KL Central to Maharajalela by monorail, I found myself sitting in the familiar mamak stall outside MCPA Hall with Moe and Nas P.O.H.

Headed in to the hall with the only two P.O.H members of the day and sat outside while they practiced. Bangga la Moe, dapat pegang guitar Nas! HAHA. Nas was evidently breaking into a sweat from the nerves; it was their first time ever putting on an acoustic show, and Plague of Happiness usually known to be a fun ska-punk band, one could not help but fret how changing ska-punk to acoustic might sound. Arul came down to meet us for a while - he was busy being part of the crew for the day - and Chaom arrived to MCPA as well. The group was growing.

It was a pity that I missed The Padangs, but my mood was not particular lifted enough to plunge myself into a heavycore gig yet. I headed in during the second performance (WHY PUT THE PADANGS FIRST, GEEZ) and met Kak Miela, friend and organizer of the gig. Also, I would like to say thanks to the guy who recognized me as KL.Mosher (a.k.a owner of these gig blogs). That's a first. :) Made me feel all warm inside. LOL.

Sat with Chaom, Moe and Arul for the first part of the gig, and checked out some T-shirts and CDs that were piled out on tables at the back of the hall, as usual. Headed to the front of the stage to check out some bands. I particularly enjoyed the third band, though I didn't quite catch their name. Gosh. Pathetic.

But this band was well equipped to become something good. Solid, and I mean solid drumming from the drummer, and there were snitches of Joe Green Day caught in the vocalist every now and then; maybe it was the mic, or maybe truly his voice. There was not a moment when I took my eyes off the drummer; even if I did, it was to look at Chaom, who had the same stunned expression as I did. Great, great job guys.

The rest of the bands went by in a tizz, I was mostly zooming in and out of the crowd, up and down the stairs, in and out of the hall. As I headed to the toilet in the middle of the performance before P.O.H's, I saw Jarrod walking into the hall. What a frikin' coincidence that was! Haha! Went to wash my hands and headed back to join him to head upstairs. Took him to where Arul, Moe and Chaom were all standing.

Next up. P.O.H!!! :) They played altogether 6 songs. Right? If I remember clearly. Five or six. But enough to send me dreamy. It was definitely a real honour to have been able to witness this actually, because I doubt there's going to be a POH Acoustic style in a very long time. Of course, I knew from the start that "Malam Ini" was going to work extremely well acoustic, which it did, and so did "Hasrat", Nas's song to his wife. :) He was always emphasizing on the apologies on boring the crowd with the acoustic set, but somehow he got the crowd hooked. Everybody was sitting about, or standing around, listening to the performance of just vocals, one guitar and one saxophone. I loved it.

After the performance, Moe complained again for the umpteenth time that he was hungry, so what to do? We headed back to the mamak, all 5 of us, and chilled around for close to an hour. It was fun. But Moe had to leave, sadly, to head to N9.

Went back to the hall and saw that the crowd was finally growing more. Moshi was on his way to MCPA, and I was amusing myself greatly with watching Jarrod fall asleep. Yes, indeed, he was falling asleep through a hardcore gig. Priceless.

Then the craziness started getting worse and Kids on the Move went up to the stage to perform. My gosh, I doubt I will ever get used to the "hardcore moshing"... ew, I can't even bring myself to say it. What they do is NOT moshing. If you want to know why, or argue against my point, tune in to my other blog (klmosher.blogspot.com) for a new post which I can hopefully get done by tomorrow regarding what mosh is all about. Hmph.

But frankly speaking, KOTM wowed me with their performance. It was obvious the majority of the guys were there for them, and I was absolutely thrilled to see the crowd participation and the way KOTM allowed everybody to just rampage the stage. It was cool. Great performance and stage presence.

But simply put; moshing isn't about synchronization, choreography and purposefully whacking and kicking other people, looking like you've got a cramp up your ass on on your shoulder. Moshing is freedom.

Moshi came after Kids on the Move while we sat down waiting for Dewata, the next band, from JB to set up their instruments. My mosh partner dah sampai. Haha. Dewata started playing and damn was I impressed. They were absolutely headbangable! And if the crowd was larger and I was in better health, I would've been moshing my bloody ass off. Moshi had me in the mood to start headbanging like crazy, and only when we started moshing did I tell him I had to pull out because I wasn't feeling well.

After Dewata, which pretty much was one of the best bands, we decided to end the gigging and headed downstairs. Said goodbye to Jarrod, Moshi and Chaom, who decided to leave, and went to chill with Arul by the fountain before he sent me home. All in all, one good show. A few more good hardcore bands would've boosted the crowd number though; say, Second Combat, Eleven and/or Restraint.

Celine wishes she can turn back time.