BING Austria was jittery when he took the 70s Bistro stage on Monday night, February 27. “I’m nervous,” he admittedly said right before he walked up on a platform where he had done hundreds of times in his long music career with Tropical Depression, Put3ska, the Juan Pablo Dream, and the Flippin’ Soul Stompers. Yet that evening, his anxiety was at a high.
Austria opened his act by mentioning the debut in 1964 of famed Jamaican band the Skatalites as their massive influence on the tiny Caribbean island spawned a multitude of reggae, dub, rock-steady and ska bands that conquered the rest of an unsuspecting world.
While the frontman isn’t suggesting that Todo Pasa is a Philippine version of the Skatalites because he fully knows that the Skalawags and Put3ska have that honor (and that the local ska scene is being kept alive by many other bands), maybe this is the kick it needs in the pants. After all, when luminaries like him and Put3ska’s Tuesday Vargas return to the stage, then who knows?
So friends, fans and the curious clapped their hands, stomped their feet and skanked to the infectious party beat. And maybe you can forgive fans for—to paraphrase Prince’s lyrics to the song 1999, —partying like it was 1993.
Todo Pasa, that new ska band that features familiar faces, made their debut. It may be a moment of serendipity. Put3ska’s old trumpet player Eldie Siochi was there. Coffeebreak Island’s terrific guitarist and singer Paul Puti-an and bassist Romel Manuel were on stage as well. And in tow were Christian Moseros on saxophone, Shuffle Union’s Marlon Palustre on trombone, Raffie Miranda on keyboards and Dennis de los Santos on drums.
Todo Pasa raced through first-wave ska and two-tone classics such as Millie Small’s version of My Boy Lollipop, Toots and the Maytals’ Monkey Man, The Guns of Navarone by the Skatalites and Too Much Pressure by the Selecter to name a few.
The second half of the 90-minute show featured a lot of Put3ska classics such as Birthday Holiday and Short Stories laced with the Champs’ party rocker Tequila among others.
Manila Girl closed out the rollicking show and left everyone spent; so much that Siochi, who was drenched in sweat, quipped that it was like he ran a marathon.
Yet even after the show that ended some 40 minutes past midnight, many people didn’t leave. They hung around basking in the afterglow of perhaps a great show.
Austria managed to laugh at their less-than-polished performance: “The rust and lack of practice showed.”
Somehow, the folks didn’t mind at all. “This isn’t going to be a one-off show,” said Vargas who has been performing with indie band Top Junk. “Todo Pasa, in its literal translation, is ‘anything happens,’ But its metaphoric meaning is, ‘when something happens, you should let it be’. When I reconnected with Bing and some old friends, it reignited old passions.”
And believe it or not, that reconnecting with Vargas happened only a few weeks ago.
“I would check the waters to see if ska is viable for me again,” chimed in Austria who has been performing with his globetrotting Flippin’ Soul Stompers (they put out a record in Germany entitled Rosas Epektos).
He intimated that Vargas phoned him a few weeks ago and was laughing while they talked, and then it happened. Blame it on a festival in Baliuag, Bulacan and Noel Salonga of Skabeche that they eventually got together to rehearse.
“Twenty years will do a lot to a person, so we [have] all changed,” clarified Vargas who said Todo Pasa, despite its Put3ska-flavored set, will not be out to be a copycat band.
“We have defined ourselves as people over time. We have experienced more in life. So we will eventually create more authentic music to who we are now. I mean, if you look at Bing, he has been playing a lot of soul, Motown… So you can be sure that influence will find its way into how we write our new material,” she told this writer.
Austria summed up that Neighbors would still be around, as well as Skabeche, Coffeebreak Island, Buzzer Beaters, Mobster Manila, Dandimites and Skaface, of course.
He said in Filipino that perhaps, people still pine for the sound they have established; thus, it is still here—as Vargas put it: “Todo Pasa na ito.”
1 comment
Nice article sir