You Kiss You Pay

I only had some small plate of Rice and Devil Chicken Curry for breakfast Thursday morning. It was a long day after that. The classes at the Garden’s ran from 11.30 pm to 4 pm. I could not have lunch during the break as it’s only 40 minutes long and I have to write some music during that time. I thought that I could grab a bite after school hours.

Wifey called and asked me to buy some cake stuff for her at Chow Kit. Boy, am I hungry? But I had little time because I have to fetch her at 5.30 at Universiti Malaya. The Sarabat stall food next to Bake With Yen looked so tempting. But, well … No! I would not take the risk by sharing my cup and plate with gender benders.  Anybody who knows Lorong Haji Taib will certainly understands what their dubious round the clock activities going on there. ‘Kawan, China (from China not Malaysian Chinese) 20 tauuun. Okay punya. Mau?’.

Fetched the Queen and she said, we have to get something at USJ’s cake shop behind our house. There goes my lunch again. Hmm … and say, the idea of having Nasi Pattaya was really great at that time. But then we have to go again. These things are from those shops. Yes, lady.

It’s already 7.00 pm and was thinking … what if I have some food at Nita’s Tom Yam near my house? Ha? Nah … have to meet Mamat at 8.00. Better go to the studio and set  things up for him and then lunch/tea/dinner after that. Shower and off to Kampung Tengku. Setup done. Now … for that food, glorious food.

Wanted to stop at Restoren Arabia across the road, but scrapped the thought as the food, at times, can be really unpalatable there. Better go SS2. Lots of choices. Reached SS2, and my brain still reeling whether to have MCD, Pelita Rojak or Kayu Nasi Kandar. Was looking left and right and suddenly the car in front braked hard. There was quite a bump. She only dented her fender. But my car’s a disaster! Oh my God … I don’t need this. Sigh.

Called my mechanic Ah Wah. He sent a friend over and we drove to State’s Police Station. After all the procedures, I finally had my lunch at 3.00 am.

Moral of the Story?

We work for food. We dress nice for food. We lie for food. We swindle for food. Food will always a be a priority alright for me from today on. No matter what!

My Little Gremlins

They are intelligent, witty, wholesome, matured, active and cute. They can be very aloof, cunning, irritating and a pain in the you-know-where also. 8-year old Aadesh once told me, ‘Air Asia bought 10% percent of Malaysia Airlines’. Well, well, well … he was certainly not some slick exec from the bourse. Me probingly asked, ‘How you know, Aadesh?’. He told me straight, ‘Don’t you watch the News?’. I was stumped.

They are the children of the fortunate, well to do, millionaires, CEO’s! Statements like ‘My Dad owns Baskin’ Robbins’, ‘My Grand Dad Owns the airlines’, and ‘My mother Trade Money’ are quite common around here. They look hybrid, mix and re-mixed! They are the students from Gardens International School. DYMM Yang diPertuan Agung has a daughter in there, too.

Working with young kids. Lots of young kids, is rather a new ball game for me. All the while, it’s been college students who know what they need and whatever I could provide them to eked it out in the real music world. My Saturday guitar classes consisted of teenage guitar hero (and heroine) wannabees, office workers who want to unwind, housewives (who thought that learning guitar was one of the status symbol) and competent guitar students who want to delve into the mysterious world of Jazz!

Here I go again. Maybe my short co-curricular  stints last year was good enough for them that they welcomed me to teach at the school back again. The Music Head, Kate even pleaded to me, ‘Won’t you come back, Jimmy?’. Well, I just could not say no. Some comforting thought: Even that superb footballer/pundit Abbas Saad is teaching 4-4-2 there.

It was depressing dealing with these silver spoons kiddos at first. But things are getting easier by the day. After all, they are children of the world. Innocent, colour blind, pure and lovable. They certainly are the crème-de-la-crème. Obviously, the leaders of the future.

RTM Gemilang

I practically grew up listening to RTM’s orchestra. People might say that it was ‘enlightenment’ or something. But in my early teen when all the kids in the neighbourhood were screaming ‘She loves you, Yeah, Yeah, Yeah!’, I secretly worked my way through the beauty of ‘Kucupan Azimat’ and ‘Putera Puteri’. I will stop short when P. Ramlee’s ‘Dalam Air Ku Terbayang Wajah’ aired over the radio. And I fell deeply in love with ‘Jauh-Jauh’.

I do jammed with the guys over ‘Ferry ‘cross the Mersey’, ‘House of the Rising Sun’ and ‘Satisfaction’ but my Malay heart could not let those amazing tunes played by so many people with so varied aural textures go away.

So, I almost jumped with joy when last Saturday morning, Dato’ Mokhzaini (the Director of Music/Conductor RTM) invited me to their 50^th Anniversary Gemilang concert as the Orchestra’s Guest. Wowie! Would’ve hugged him if he’s In front of me. Hehe. Dato’ Mokhzaini (DM), to me, is one staunch personality with a golden heart. He is terribly funny too, if you know him that well. He said, you better come … you cannot possibly come when we celebrate our 100^th eh? Hahaha. Many a times my friends from RTM lamented to me about his ‘hair dryer treatment’ ala-Sir Alex. The perpetual tagline in that outfit will always be ‘Shape Up or Ship Out!’. Told them that it’s because he loves you all that much. He has great goals and missions to accomplish for Malaysian music. Would not you think that he is under tremendous pressure with predecessors like Ahmad Merican, Alfonso Soliano, Gus Steyn, Johari Salleh and Oii Eow Jin? All these guys work were out of this world. He also has peers in Ruslan Imam, Hanafi Imam, Jimmy Ali, the late Ishak Ali Muda, etc.  too to keep up.

Beside these, he diversifies the orchestra with ‘outreach’ programmes. Everybody will have the chance to enjoy their music. If you can’t come to us, we shall come to you, he said. Those ‘Refleksi’ program for school ensemble is rather fascinating too. The kids get to perform at shopping complex. Brilliant move that. As for himself, you can catch him performing at Bistros on   some lucky evenings with his trio for pittance. Si, he has so much humility in him.

Then, there I was … celebrating together with the Orchestra that I love so much. Hey, am part of their history, man. Enloying every minute of it. And they played ‘Jauh-Jauh’ with solo from my buddy, that awfully talented Razak Rahman.

Film Scoring 101

Mamat Khalid writes his own music in his films. He is a musician alright and plays very good piano. Although he divulges his passion for Dylan, Zappa, Pink Floyd and Tom Waitts – we share our leaning towards The Blues. We are also very receptive to all genres, too. Cool.

He urged me to be involved in writing soundtrack for movies (his movies particularly) since day one. Told him, 'I know nuts!'. He retorted, 'I'll show you how'. That was eons ago. Me, still working with MAS then, just could not afford the time. I just thought that it would not be fair to both parties, MAS and him, that’s all. But I did contribute film music in piecemeal though. Those acoustic sojourn in ‘Rock’ and that melancholic guitar in ‘Man Laksa’, e.g.

Funny thing is, I studied Music Composition (Classical) at MIA 1979-1982 but never did music full time. All the while I worked as an Advertising Exec, Drug and Substance Abuse Counselor and a PR guy for MAS – yup, three different jobs (but the transitions were uncannily smooth) and played clubs at night.

My film scoring debut started with ‘Kala Malam Bulan Mengambang’. Since, I was no longer attached to MAS.- there I was, full of gusto – gave my best. The music was ‘50s sleazy cabaret jazz. We roped in the best musicians around and everything was recorded ‘live’. Got patted in the back from my peers and the film was voted Film of the Year 2007.The soundtrack and the theme song got nominated, too. Not bad for a newbie.

‘Hantu Kak Limah Balik Rumah’ was a different ball game altogether. Neo-Classical. String quartet stuffs with a couple of Overtures thrown in. A staple dose of Rock is a must, as usual, in that kind of movie. We also ‘re-introduced’ saw music. Which was a novel idea from Mamat and I liked it very much. My left hand got numbed for a month from learning, practising and recording saw music. Annoyed abit when some friends thought that those sounds were synthesizers. Geez.

‘Kak Limah’ hit the box office with some 8 million Ringgit collected. So, without second thought, Tayangan Unggul offered me to write the music for the sequel – ‘Husin, Mon & Jin Pakai Toncit’. We are at the last stretch and the music is Hungarian Gypsy-ish.

In tandem, the music for the Crow Zero type ‘Apokalips X’ – which is Arabesque in form and nature is about complete and need only some fine tuning and tweakings here and there.

See? It will never be a dull moment making music with Mamat. We churn Hollywood music on skimpy Malaysian budget. We keep challenging each other and my best will never be good enough. We will push and strive toward excellence every time. A ‘No’ will never be a valid answer. As Mamat once put to me –‘if you are really THAT good, that ordinary farm goat can be transformed into a handsome Mountain Goat, you know’. Simply put, am lucky enough having him to learn the ropes from.

The drawback, or otherwise, is that we took a much longer time than anybody in the business to finish our products. My answer (aka one seemingly lame excuse) – we are producing Lions here guys, not Vixens. Or to be brash like Senor Director himself: 'We are geniuses, not professionals. Pros do when they are told to do, we do when we feel like doing’.  Err ...

So, hoping that Ahmad Kamal-Mamat Khalid music will be appreciated and enjoyed by all till kingdom come as do Lennon-McCartney’s, Rogers & Hammerstein’s, and certainly, Shanker-Jaikishan’s. Tschus!

You Know I'm No Good

Just when I thought there’s hope in Music and it’s safe to listen to the Radio …

RIP Amy!

Flick Fest

Invited to the Pre-Launch (?) of the 24^th Malaysia Film Festival via SMS yesterday.  Event will be held Monday. Please RSVP by today (23^rd July). Which I duly confirmed attending.

It must be ‘Hantu Kak Limah Balik Rumah’, I thought, which I collaborated with Mamat in doing the music. Do we get nominated again? What about the others? Who are in the running for what? 

Visits to www.finas.gov.my/ and www.sinemamalaysia.com.my/ resulted in this:

There seems to be a problem with the MySQL server, sorry for the inconvenience.

We should be back shortly.

Bummer ...

Death Walks Behind You

Atomic Rooster was an English progressive rock band, composed of former members of the The Crazy World of Arthur Brown.

They adopted the name Atomic Rooster in the summer of 1969 (which was the year of the Rooster in the Chinese calendar). Their genre in music is difficult to define, since they went through radical changes in very short times during the life of the band. However, their best-known era represented a more hard rock/progressive rock sound.

This song, from their second album, Death Walks Behind You, was released in September 1970.

Cornerstone

My favourite band when I was with that outfit, 'Random' during the '80s. Tho' we were out-and-out rockers then, all of us were suckers for good ballad it seems.

Gossips!

This is no pre-Friday sermon or anything of that sort. Just fulfilling my obligation as a Muslim, that's all. To my non-Muslim friends. No offence intended.

Abu Dzar (r.a.) once asked the Prophet  Muhammad (s.a.w.): “O Messenger of Allah, what is ghibah?” . He replied: “It is to mention about your brother that which he detests.”

Abu Dzar (r.a.) said: “O Messenger of Allah, what if that which is mentioned of him should actually be in him?”. He (s.a.w.) replied: “Know that when you mention that which is in him, you have committed his ghibah, and when you mention that which is not in him, then you have slandered him.”  (Muslim)

The general character of ghibah is also understandable from a hadith narrated by Aishah herself.  Aishah says: “A woman came to visit us, and when she turned to go away I made a gesture by my hand that she is short of height. “ Thereupon, he (Prophet Muhammad – s.a.w.) said: ‘You have committed her ghibah.’” (Ibnu Abu Dunya and Ibnu Mirdawaih) 

Hence, it is clear from the hadith that ghibah is not limited to linguistic expression but applies to all kind of communication.

The Prophet (s.a.w.) also said, “Do not expose the mistakes of Muslims. For he who follows (searches for) the errors of his brother, Allah will follow his errors, and whom Allah follows his errors, He will expose him even if he was in the middle of his home.” "(Abu Daud/Sahih Al-Jamee)

In Surah Humaza 104:1, Allah s.w.t. says: “Woe to every backbiter, slanderer”.

The above verse refers to those who sting others with their speech, behaviour, mimicry, or sarcasm at their backs or in front of them. They mock them and defame them with evil motives.

One student asked this question to our lecturer then, “Ustad, how are we to go about curing this disease?”. Our Ustad replied,  “Repent and seek the forgiveness from the victim, if this is possible without any chance of vicious consequences; otherwise, you must implore God's mercy for the victim.”

Pray for his well-being after every Solat? Tall order that!

Cinta Muka Buku

That event held Malaysians breathless and on the edge of their seats for a day. Hand clasping the remote, shuffling from channel to channel to keep themselves informed. So many rumours, ambigous SMSs and phone calls from out of town.

I decided to play safe and cancelled all classes for the day. Better be safe than sorry, I presumed. Well, after experiencing TWO horrendous racial riots in this lifetime (one in Singapore and another in Malaysia), I just could not take chances. The symptoms are uncannily similar.

So much for that infamous affair ...

Now, what happened to Facebook? Everybody’s Facebook? Everybody’s LIFE. Prior and subsequent to that, it has become a psy-war battlefield among relatives, colleagues and best of friends. No more what I ate for lunch uploads,  which side of the bed I woke up this morning  and He loves me … He loves me not updates. No one responded to my requests for hardware in my City! Oh no … my Allies are now 'enemies'  in that Empire. They didn’t have time to revive my Electric Roses, too. Gosh ... this social network has become very unsociable!

Profile pictures changed overnight. What colour are you macha? The new badge application came in handy, too. Anybody who can type tried to shove  their ‘doctrines’ down my throat. No statements? It’s REVOLUTION, stupid.

So, ‘happiness is my own responsibility’, fellow Facebookians.  Today, my  list of friends has been reduced to almost half. Thank you!  Always wondered what to do with these hanger-ons who amassed friends just to show numbers -  ‘Wah … you got 1,000 friends lor …’. Yeah, Blessing comes in so many guises.

Here's the hard part. Relatives and long-time friends. Mi Amigo quickly told me, ‘Tweak them settings and you'll end up smiling.’ And that’s what I did.

Confined to very, very close friends, musicians, production people and my students - my Facebook looks neater and I am a lot happier. Mark Zuckerberg designed Facebook to be this way, ain't it? Bye, bye freeloader!

No one else knows the value of democracy? 

No one else cares about this country?

This is surely an elitist we-know-what-is –good-for-you attitude. 

Just shut up, endure the discomfort and we will make things better.  

-  Zainul Ariffin NST.

While My Guitar Gently Weeps

Inspiration for the song came to George Harrison when reading the I Ching, which, as he put it, "seemed to me to be based on the Eastern concept that everything is relative to everything else...opposed to the Western view that things are merely coincidental." Taking this idea of relativism to his parents’ home in northern England, Harrison committed to write a song based on the first words he saw upon opening a random book. Those words were “gently weeps”, and he immediately began this song.


The Beatles recorded the song several times, including a version with a backward guitar solo (as Harrison had done for "I'm Only Sleeping" on Revolver), but Harrison was not satisfied. On 6 September, 1968, during a ride from Surrey into London, Harrison asked Eric Clapton to add a lead guitar solo to the song. Clapton was reluctant - he said, "Nobody ever plays on the Beatles' records" - but Harrison convinced him and Clapton's solo was recorded that evening. Harrison later said that in addition to his solo, Clapton's presence had another effect on the band: "It made them all try a bit harder; they were all on their best behaviour."


This masterpiece was re-recorded by Santana via his single "While My Guitar Gently Weeps" featuring Indie.Arie & Yo-Yo Ma.


R.I.P. George!

Imuda's Favourite

One lazy Sunday at Amcorp Mall, some time ago, my friend, actor/cartoonist Imuda, or Abdul Rahim Muda.pulled a fast one on me. He bought a stack of rare 'Johnny Winter' CDs off the stalls ... God! What do you know? This funny man is also a blues freako, man.

He conjured another trick when we went jamming with the Purple Haze Band at Duta Vista. He blows fine Harp, too! My solos went all over the place as I could not keep my jaw from dropping. Another blues harpist made a quiet exit after el maestro pulled the rug under him  ... well, keep practising, dude.

Bro Imuda ... High Five!

Girl, You'll Be A Woman Soon

I woke up rather early this morning. Reason why? Had to send Nabilla to a photo shoot at In Trend Magazine, Seri Kembangan. I HAD to send her there as, if you are familiar with Seri Kembangan and it's vicinity, the place is a PWD (Jabatan Kerja Raya) version of Mad Hatter. One wrong turn and you will be driving all the way back to KL. Or do you prefer Seremban?

I have always bragged that my days are not time-sensitive. But after 3 successive days of pinching forty-winks at odd hours, Murphy’s Law warmly wished me ‘Happy Morning’. It took me a good 15 minutes to look for my wallet, scouring for some bills and two wrong turns (God Bless  those people who put  up 'shady' road signs!) and there  we were. On time.

Along the way, glancing at Nabilla, half-believing: ‘My oh my, this girl is going to a photo shoot!’.

Wasn’t this the baby, who, not so long ago could not speak a word until she was three year’s old? And when she did talk, she was our official story-teller. No stone unturned - secrets simply not safe with her. The toddler who had trouble in maintaining body equilibrium? She went tumbling all over the back seat every time I did those ala-Hakkinen drifts. The girl who begged me to relief her of her duties as a School Prefect  just because, all of a sudden, she was in the spotlight? I can still remember Nabilla took one whole year to interact with her college mates. Well, she was brought up lovingly by two families, mine and my sister-in-law’s. Thus, the idea to co-exist with other people was really ‘Not In’ then.

And Presto! Here is one young lady, sensible, sensitive, multiple Dean’s List scholar, screenwriter-to-be and has huge penchant for 80s music (she loves 'Radiohead' and heard Alan Parsons Project's 'Eye In Sky' blaring through her minute laptop speaker yesterday). However, she won’t scrape through doing those balancing acts still. I suspect.

We celebrated her 21^st birthday last week.

Welcome to the adult world, Nabil. I will guide and protect you, no worries (but curfew will be, as usual, at 11).You will always be a baby to me - no matter how old you are!

The Ruba'iyat

Verse 103:
Suppose the world went as you wanted, then what? 
And suppose this book of life were read through, then what? 
Let me suppose a century of self-gratification left, 
Even supposing we had a century more, then what?


Verse 197:
Oh heart, do not grieve over this worn-out world, 
You are not aimless, do not indulge in aimless sorrows; 
Since it is not clear what has gone and what has not, 
Be happy, don't grieve over what was and what was not.


-  From the Ruba'iyat of Omar Khayyam, 9th Century Persian Sufi .


Note: Simply Brilliant eh?

Paint It, Black!

I see a red door and I want it painted black

No colours anymore I want them to turn black

I see the girls walk by dressed in their summer clothes

I have to turn my head until my darkness goes

I see a line of cars and theyre all painted black

With flowers and my love both never to come back

I see people turn their heads and quickly look away

Like a new born baby it just happens evry day

I look inside myself and see my heart is black

I see my red door and it has been painted black

Maybe then Ill fade away and not have to face the facts

Its not easy facin up when your whole world is black

No more will my green sea go turn a deeper blue

I could not foresee this thing happening to you

If I look hard enough into the settin sun

My love will laugh with me before the morning comes

I see a red door and I want it painted black

No colours anymore I want them to turn black

I see the girls walk by dressed in their summer clothes

I have to turn my head until my darkness goes

Hmm, hmm, hmm

The first lick that i learned on the guitar. Thought by THE guitarist of the day, Ayob Taib from The Rhythm Boys (from that A. Ramlies's and the Rhythm Boys fame). The lick opened the floodgate of licks, riffs and tunes of that era, i.e. 'Apache',  'House of the Rising Sun',  'Walk Don't Run', 'Perfidia', etc for a puny guitar toting kid, i.e. me.

The intro is rather simple actually. For wannabe guitarists, you just leave the 1st String E open and play the tune on the 2nd String B starting from the fifth fret. And voila!, you will get the hippiest, turn me on, Flower Power-ed, like, pseudo-Sitar sound ever!