Philippine Rock/Alternative Bands
Rock has invaded the Philippines not long after rock invaded USA. Almost immediately after the onslaught of rock in the Philippines a lot of Filipino musicians turned their energies to the mentioned genre. It did not take long before we had our own famous rock persona like the guy entitled Elvis of the Philippines whose real name is Eddie Mesa and Bobby Gonzales considered to be as one of the first to become famous in the world of rock in the Philippines with a big hit single called “Hahabul-habol.”
Eraserheads the reunion
A lot of aspiring rock bands emerge, many of whom were talented and good musicians but there are only a few rock bands that made it to the top and fewer still are the rock bands that stayed on top of the game for reasonably longer times. When this “rock phenomenon” first started, the first rock bands got their influence from foreign rock styles but eventually turned it into something which we can call “authentic Filipino.”
Below are just some of the famous Pinoy Rock bands that rock the nation:
The Dawn
This band is one of the most enduring rock bands in the Philippines that had continued to garner support for more than 20 years. The band has a very rich collection of songs that made it to the top. Although this band has suffered devastating losses and some drawbacks the most heavy of which is when one of the founding members of the band, lead guitarist-Teddy Diaz was stabbed to death, the band continued to push on and kept on rocking. On 1995 they disbanded because Jett Pangan their vocalist wanted to walk a different path but after four years of silence the band was back again together although with some changes in the line up, they still carried the same banner when the band first came to be.
Eraserheads
The Eraserheads or E-heads is regarded by many as the Philippine Rock icon for the 90’s. It was the dawn of a new kind of Philippine rock, a new torch in the music scene of the Philippines when this band grew popularity and they carried the match that started the fire. The band’s success is evident when their popularity out grew from local to international, especially when they got the “Moon Man” trophy because they won the MTV Asia’s Viewer’s choice award of 1997. The band also was vindicated when their third album Cutterpillow went Platinum for eight times.
River Maya
The band that was founded in 1993 can be regarded as one of the most influential and one of the most celebrated bands in Southeast Asia. The band’s line up history although full of changes and conflicts did not deter them from producing singles and albums that drawn a lot of crowds not only from the Philippines but also from other countries like Malaysia, Singapore and Thailand. The band release have release 22 albums so far since it’s first album called Rivermaya back in 1993. It was just last year, May 2007 that the band’s only surviving member of the band’s original line up broke away from the band. Trivially the band still exists with a completely different line-up from it’s first years.
Recommended website: http://www.livebands.com.ph
Livebands.com.ph belongs to a company that is dedicated to assist clients both local and international in looking for musical artist here in the Philippines to perform for them. The website serves as a terminal wherein the at one side the client will give a list of what kind of artist they think is appropriate for their event and at the other side the company will sort out who among the many great Filipino artist will fit for the job.
This website is a very useful to tool for talented aspiring musicians to getting exposed not only nationally but also internationally.