THE REAL STRENGTH: Sister Bastard x Tinimbang Ka, Ngunit Kulang

Tuesday, September 23, 2014

Sister Bastard x Tinimbang Ka, Ngunit Kulang

It was mid-June/July 2014 when punk artist England Hidalgo brought up the idea of doing a release show launching his current band, Diliman-based Tinimbang Ka, Ngunit Kulang's split cassette tape output with Rizal locals Sister Bastard. Initial plan was set for August 30th (It was a royal pain in the butt cancelling a work-approved leave that I took great lengths to obtain, well, fuck that.), but there was a catch: England wanted the set to be a face-off kinda thing where both bands will play alternately, resembling somewhat a cage-match showdown of sorts. This presented a minor obstacle as the Pojax Kvlt muddrafukas ain't rich trust-fund brats who leisurely use momma's credit card on whim: It was gonna cost more than our pockets could allow to hire 2 sets of equipment to pull off this show. But determined to go get shit done OUR WAY, we presented this plan to fellow skull-worshippers Dead Scene and Delusion Of Terror, who, from the get-go got our fat behinds covered. Because, in reality, that's how our scene works. With one crew lending a hand to another, no ifs, no buts.

Engineer Oca took care of the venue and equipment rentals, (Mad thanks to uncle Sharen, IDB all-around bossy motherfucker), England and Pig Champ lined up artists friends willing to front the show, Cristo Mamaw coordinating tactical SWAT expenses between the organizers, and Dead Scene, Delusion Of Terror, and Nine Iron (Bad Omen's Albert Sy's cassette tape label, who is known for his minimalist-run releases, yeah, some of his tapes have a total run of ONLY 20 copies being pressed, ever.) lending backbone support for the show.

England (Pinoy Raymond Pettibon, yes.) was able to put to good use the poster of 70's iconic action/comedy film "Ang Hari At Ang Alas", the Ramon Zamora-Rey Malonzo starrer, by doing his own take on our show's poster. See for yourself:

Prior to the show, a day ahead, on Friday, the Philippine government, in conjunction with their crime boss the US of A unleashed another tropical HAARP typhoon, affectionately named "Mario" by their puppy weather agency that devastated major parts of the Luzon region, causing massive floods brought about by the Ondoy-scale "rain" showers. We almost thought of cancelling the show due to the literal shitstorm that plowed Manila's ass heavily. Lo and behold, the very next day on our gig night, the HAARP went away. This reminded me of another Pojax-initiated show we had last year "Disharmonic Ritual" where prior to our gig date, another shitstorm HAARP was thrown our way by our lovely 2-digit IQ government. Well, no fucking shitstorm gets in our way, ever. Didn't you clowns get our memo?

This face-off theme (yeah, I've read some idiots' comment on how this show was "flip-top" styled, yung rap-rap showdown ng mga gangsta...sheeeeezas.). My brown lazy-ass homey, these brothas don't spew ill rhymes like yo momma exchanges nasty dimes, froot. This is straight up PINOY FLAVA FUCKIN POWERVIOLENCE DOUBLE-PENETRATION ASSAULT, full stop.

And hey, my man JCS-Uno, stop referring to Drastic fuckin bubblegum Noise as POWERVIOLENCE, when they clearly aren't, mmmkay? Skull love. my meth-od man.

See the vid taken by Crapsalad above. Play it. Repeat that shit when it's done. And stencil the fuck up your skull worship at your local parak outpost. In broad daylight. Preferably along Edsa.

This is Sister Bastard slugging it out Pojax-stylee with their contemporary Tinimbang Ka, Ngunit Kulang. Remember their names. It has NEVER been done before. But we fuckin pulled that shit off. Now you know.

Oh, all 50 first-run tapes have now sold out. If you didn't make it to the show and did not bother irritating both bands enough to secure your copy, tough luck, you tourists.

The fuckin poster served it best. "BE THERE, OR BE SQUARE".