As part of BusinessMirror’s campaign to promote everyone’s safety and well-being during the global health crisis caused by the COVID-19 pandemic, we have invited established and independent artists to perform at least one song in their own homes while urging everyone to stay indoors.
There are not a lot silver linings brought about by the Enhanced Community Quarantine brought about by the COVID-19 pandemic. One of them is spending more time with families and loved ones in the same room. Another is unearthing “lost treasures” while doing some general cleaning or just looking for things believed to be misplaced somewhere in the house.
In the case of seasoned musician and record producer Rhany Torres, it was a rare recording of a radio guesting by his most celebrated band, Ethnic Faces as well as other mementos from the band’s salad days.
In 1989, Ethnic Faces found mainstream success after their recording of what would become their signature song, “Golden Boy” became one of the most popular tracks in the bestselling new wave compilation album, 10 of Another Kind. In addition to its engaging hooks, “Golden Boy” was known for two things: the lyrical mention of two bands namely Lost Boys and Ocean Zoo that merged to become Ethnic Faces and the final, hilarious line, “Ang tatay mong kalbo” that is totally unrelated to the rest of the English language ditty.
Despite the success of “Golden Boy,” it wasn’t until 1995 when Ethnic Faces finally went on to record their first full-length album, the critically acclaimed but criminally underrated, Dekada. As part of the band’s efforts to promote the album, the band had a guest stint at the now-defunct rock station, NU 107. During this guest stint, the band performed several songs including, yes, “Golden Boy” which was already a given for their every performance by then.
Rhany, who earlier graced SoundStrip Live & n Quarantine with a performance of an old chestnut by the Lost Boys, kept a recording of that NU 107 guest stint and remembered where he kept it during the ongoing lockdown. Rather than just submitting the audio file of said recording, which incidentally was never released commercially, he also asked his 19-year old daughter, Lavay, to create a looping slideshow video that featured all his Ethnic Faces mementos (i.e. photos, flyers, magazine articles) that he was able to recover while doing some home cleaning.
Since all of this happened while Rhany and his family are in “quarantine,” here now is the finished product, exclusively for SoundStrip Live & in Quarantine.
Aside from Rhany Torres who played bass on “Golden Boy,” Ethnic Faces also consisted of vocalist Jack Sikat, guitarists Ariel Policarpio, keyboardist Ed Ramos and drummer Jayvee Torres.
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