Barely a blink of an eye, and another half year has lapsed between my posts. It was pretty sad, as I had much to say. I even typed out most of them on my previous company's laptop, and just before I left the company, I transfered it all into my trusty ol' thumbdrive.
Now the thing is, I can't find that blasted thumbdrive! It's not in my bags and it's not in my old office! Sheesh. There was so much I wanted to say, now I'll probably just dump it all into this post.
Let's start off chronologically. I wrote an entry on 26 Nov 2005 and mailed it to myself, and it goes as such:
26 NOVEMBER 2005...
... Of Shirt, Pants and No Black Tie
"The room was wooded in all directions; the ceiling, the wall and even the floor, in a fashion that one would rarely see in Malaysia. The place was this smoky jazz bar that I've always dreamed of playing in. Even at this time, 2 hours before the first of the night's patrons have walked in, I stand on the stage with Zal, going through our sound test the the audio engineer, I can still smell the leftover cigarette smoke that has been absorbed and have become part of each wood panel's personality."
Good evening, friends and strangers alike. About 2 years ago, I would have written an introduction like the one I've written above to introduce a night's performance at the ever classy No Black Tie on Jalan Mesui, behind Istana Hotel. The No Black Tie that I've grown accustomed to was panelled with light colored, seasoned wood, with the wall on the left racked with hundreds of empty bottles of wine. Each bottle would have its own stories to tell, as how each stain on the wood has its tales. A picture of Miles Davis stares from the stage and welcomes each visitor as they walked in.
By 9 O' Clock in the evening, the room will have already been filled, and a cloud of cigarette and cigar smoke hangs suspended in the air as if time has frozen as the room begins its journey back in time to the 1930's American jazz era.
No Black Tie has been famed for its quality in musical performances and has set the benchmark for independent and amateur musicians, with its strict quality control forcing musicians to strive for improvement and fight for the permission and honor to perform there.
Musicians and music lovers alike were greatly saddened when this performance hub closed over a year ago.
Fast forward to the present day, No Black Tie has reopened with a bang, relocating 5 doors down the road to a larger venue. Reopened barely a month, I had the honor of being 'allowed' to play there with my long time partner in crime and wonderful friend, Zalila Lee. With many thanks to Evelyn, the proprietor of No Black Tie and Reza, the show's organizer, we opened the night with a 30 minute set, playing 6 songs written by Zal.
(Left - Right: Non participative baby grand piano, Jerral, Zal)
We encountered some minor problems as we went on stage. We were given stools that were higher than the chairs I was accustomed to, and lower and less stable than the high stools that come with most stages. It wasn't exactly much of a problem, but I was conerned about falling off as I swayed to the music, but by the third song, I was able to gauge a safe 'range' for me to move around. Zal and I were also quite deprived of sleep, Zal because of her consecutive performances at La Gourmet House in The Curve 2 days prior and myself largely because of work.
All in all, though, we had a lot of fun performing as a duo again, and I made my first impromptu attempt to shush the talking crowd when they got too noisy. Quite interesting, seeing the nice, quiet and appreciative front row crowd smiling in amusement, some people in the middle helping me shush the people at the back, and the people at the back wondering what all the shush-ing was all about.
The other performers for the night were Isaac Entry with his southern bluesy style, who quite amazed me not only because of his fluency with the guitar, singing and crowd interaction, but because I knew him about 5 years ago as a drummer who didn't play guitars or sang. Reza himself walked up next, with all the women in the room hooting and cheering even before he began his music. He was quickly followed by this Chinese dude who sang primarily Mandarin songs. Can't remember his name at this point, but I think it was Steven something. The last featured act was a duo called 'Rhapsody' who just blew the crowd away with their wit, charm, attitude and last but definitely not least, the Tori Amos-ish music they belted out. To any music lovers out there, check them out if you ever see their name being featured.
Mia: Astounding the crowd with her cross legged levitation trick.
Mia Palencia made a surprise visit for the open mic segment and as always, she gave an excellent soulful performance. I shall close the description of the night with a message to Mia: My Aunt Ninny's Petunias to "I can't sing in Malay!" That was a great song!
Thanks to everyone who turned up that night, and a special shout out to Zal for asking me to perform with her, and cheers to Wei Yein, Puya, Viji, Intan, JJ, Glenda, Rubini, Michael, Michelle, Fariq 'Aminal' Halim, Fiona, Leonard and Nigel. Hope y'all really enjoyed the show, and that exclamations of "You rocked!" and "My god, that was amazing!" weren't just empty words one's obligated to say to one's friends. Good night! =)
