MTV Sessions Featuring Kyle Patrick

When I received an e-mail from MTV stating that I had won tickets, I was really excited - I was gonna get to watch the lead singer of a band that I have been listening to forever, and also it was gonna be my first studio recording experience!

Rachel and I reached the venue just 1.5 hours before the doors opened and we were pleasantly surprised that we were second in queue.

That's me being annoying LOL.

And here's a decent photo for your sanity, or not.

Snazzy looking tickets that they didn't let us take home :(

The studio was pretty neat and the stage looked awesome. We stood right at the front and we were literally brought closer to the star of the show. I was kinda resting my knees against the stage while waiting for the man to come out. Hahaha. A little too close for comfort me thinks.

My iTouch on the stage LOL how annoying are we really.

Anyway, fast-forwarding to the recording, VJs Holly Grabarek and Richard Herrera hyped up the crowd and did an introduction whilst standing among the audience. I'm pretty sure I was captured on camera since I was standing next to Holly, and it was so awkward even though I'm a broadcast student and I've had plenty of experiences in front of the camera. Sigh, I just hope I look normal when they screen it, lol.

Handing the baton over to the band, Billy Justineau (keyboard), Kevin Rice (drums) and Jared Scharff (guitar, also guitarist of Saturday Night Live) and Kyle kicked it off with Follow Your Heartbeat. Seriously, the song was perfect as an opener. It's fun, upbeat and has such relevant lyrics ("I'm ready now, ready now, ready now" - that's the most apt it gets). He danced all around the stage and infected all of us with his energy. What a crazy ball of fun he was!

Keeping the momentum going, he continued with Wild Ways where he really impressed me with his falsettos in the chorus, and he did not falter one bit. Watching him perform is always a pleasure, because he is one of the most sincere and consistent performers ever.

He then took it slow with his rendition of Bill Withers' Ain't No Sunshine, which he quipped as one of his favourite songs. He slightly mispitched one of the higher notes but other than that he absolutely nailed the song, especially my favourite part (the never-ending 'I know I know I know...').

He then brought out his Gibson SJ-200 Custom Honey and treated the audience to acoustic versions to a few songs from The Click Five. While setting up, he conversed with the fans in whatever Singlish he learnt on his last trip here in 2011. He used chiobu and chope in a couple of sentences before saying that Singapore is like his second home, which earned him lots of 'awwws'. Aww indeed!

The crowd of mostly teenagers were obviously Click Five fans and sang along to Jenny, Happy Birthday, Empty and Don't Let Me Go. He looked visibly pleased with himself until he stopped abruptly in the middle of Empty before lamenting that even though he has played the song for hundreds of times, he still forgets the lyrics sometimes. How cute, haha! I'm guessing MTV will cut that part out though.

Spot me! (Photo credits to Aloysius Lim and MTV Asia)

The band then came back on stage and Kyle started crooning out the very emotional Baby Don't Board That Plane. The song sounds brilliant on the record, but listening to it live was another thing altogether - he put so much emotion into it and it was just... for lack of a better word, amazing!

He finished off his set with the lead single from his EP, Go For Gold! He said that the song was written when he was preparing for a marathon, and added that joining the marathon was one of the worst decisions ever. Hahaha. Anyway, Go For Gold was definitely the highlight of the whole showcase and Kyle even jumped off the stage into the crowd at one point. He also sung to me at the second chorus, and my natural reaction was to sing back. He gets bonus points for crowd interaction. Heh.

Photo credits to Aloysius Lim and MTV Asia.

He came back on stage for a surprise encore (it turned out that the production team needed him to re-do two songs) and sang Follow Your Heartbeat and Baby Don't Board That Plane again. I'm not complaining though!

My first ever studio recording session experience definitely ended on a good note (literally) and I had a blast! Kyle and his band could do no wrong. There was an improvement in his vocals compared to when I last saw him in 2010. He also looked much, much better without those long ugly sideburns he previously had. Thank goodness.

Rach and I ended our day with a meal at Aston's and camwhoring at some cave thingum nearby. Lol we never even knew it existed.

All these derp has to stop hahahaha

It was a great day! Thank you MTV Asia for bringing Kyle in! And also to Rach for the awesome company! Couldn't have asked for more. :)

For those who missed it, MTV Sessions: Kyle Patrick will premiere on MTV SEA Saturday 8 September at 11am (WIB), 12pm (SG/HK/PH) and 1pm (MAL).
Also, check out my review of Kyle's self-titled EP here!

I'll Be Your Shelter

So I've been addicted to Boys Like Girls' Be Your Everything since it came out and I'm still not sick of the song. To make things worse, Martin and Paul always seem to come up with acoustic performances of my favourite BLG songs and making them a hundred times nicer. Help.

How is it possible that they make me fall deeper in love with them each time they perform like that?

P.S. I love Martin's guitar.

Last September

Recently fell in love with this band from Canada. They are really good!

And here's their cover of What Makes You Beautiful

Didn't know they existed till they followed me on Twitter and I'm glad they did :)

And BLG's Paul is back to blogging! I can't say how much I missed his philosophical stuff.

Have a great day!

This Time is Over

So before my actual graduation on 23rd May, CMM had its own mini graduation ceremony thingum called MediaBiz Awards. I remember I went for the one two years ago where the theme was 'High School' and I dressed up as a band geek. I don't remember a single detail of last year's though. Anyway, this year's theme was 'My Superhero' but I didn't really bother to dress up. Haha. The Year 2s made cupcakes for us and attached pictures of our faces on superhero costumes. Too cute. Wished they hadn't used our admin card photo though (it's my old hair sigh).

After MediaBiz Awards, Jon, Yiyun, Stef and myself headed down to SCAPE's PlayNation for some Guitar Hero and Michael Jackson action! 'The Michael Jackson Experience' must be one of the most enjoyable Kinect games ever!

With CMM's Dynamic Duo! Fred and Bob JJ and Firdaus.

Michy and Mitchy!

Practicing my eye smile. LOL.

And here are pictures from the TP Band Committee gathering last Thursday that I totally forgot to update about. Exercising then getting fat all over again, that's the life.

Thankful for all these outings that keep me sane from my pretty much mandatory life right now. Got a couple of event jobs to work for so I am definitely looking forward to them.

In other news, I am currently addicted to a few songs.

I have been looking forward to Faber Drive's new record for forever! But I guess this first single will have to do enough to satisfy me for now. However I'm still craving for a ballad from them because honestly, that's what they do best.

This new K-Pop boy group, NU'EST (pronounced as new east) really caught my eye with the chair choreography of their debut single, FACE, which is a song about standing up to those who look down and bully you. Meaningful. And it has been ringing in my head ever since I heard it.

Also addicted to B1A4's Ignition album. Particularly This Time is Over, Just Two of Us (Baro's solo) and Wonderful Tonight (Unplugged Ver.) ugh can't wait to get my hands on the album! And I just recorded a cover of their title song, Baby I'm Sorry. Waddya think?

Gonna start attending TP Alumni band practices. Who wants to come support me for the concert? Heh.

Scars and Stories

I have been listening to nothing but The Fray's newest album the whole evening and night!

Crazily addicted to the whole album, especially Heartbeat (the first single), Run For Your Life and Rainy Zurich.

My favourite has got to to be I Can Barely Say though.

There's just something about piano + strings and chords like these. Plus meaningful lyrics and an amazing singer. I will compose an epic piano ballad one day!

Two more frigging days - then all our assignments will be done. Hang in there Michy!!

Like An Adrenaline Shot Going Straight to the Heart

Met These Kids Wear Crowns for the second time this year. They were invited to the 987FM Studios so Rach and I decided to go see them. Thankfully there weren't too many fans - can't say the same after they perform tomorrow at Celebrate 2012!

They played a couple of songs in the studios - the acoustic versions of Jumpstart and Lifetime. Poor Matt and Josh were standing behind doing nothing though. No keyboards and drums. Lol.

Here's a performance of the acoustic version of Jumpstart that Joe (lead guitarist) uploaded.

Sounds really good to be honest. I wasn't expecting much haha!

Pictures from today:

 Josh! He remembered me from the last time I met them. So sweet :')

I look like a midget beside him! Oh he said he liked my shirt. Funny that Alex said the exact same thing to me last May when I wore my orange 'Yatta' tee.

Introducing Rachy's ang moh boyfriend, Matt!!  

Didn't manage to take photos with all of them because there was too little time. Autographs were a priority though, and I got to get all of them sign the album jacket. Alex remembers my Twitter username by the way. Haha!

So to sum up my TKWC experience (including our first meeting in May), here's a collage I made:

Really happy for them that they are gaining recognition and getting to perform at such a huge event in a foreign country. All the best to them and I'm glad I got to interact with them before they become the next target of the cray cray fangirls in Singapore. Heh.

Music to Me

Check out this song by The Latency, a Canadian pop punk band. They are amazing!

Here're my two favourite songs from them:

Love their music so much!

Lost In Stereo

Had the craziest gig experience ever on the 6th of October.

Brian and I were not familiar with Wavehouse so when we were trying to find the queue we stumbled into the performance area where The Dirt Radicals were having their soundcheck. Decided to snap a few pics. We found out a while later that we were not supposed to be there. I seriously didn't know though, LOL no one stopped us when we were walking into the venue. Uh well.

During the 7 hours of queuing, I was really annoyed with the big group of fangirls behind me. Step scene kids, really. Even the Caucasian girls in front of us were visibly annoyed. It was quite interesting when they scolded this group of Malays who joined the queue at around 5pm. The embarrassment, really - a couple of them are from TK.

Went to find Nava and Mitch when they came! Eudora wasn't there because she forgot to bring her tickets and she was rushing home.

So at around 6.30pm, the doors opened and there was a mad rush for good spots and I managed to get to the first row! I chose the to be on the left side of the stage - where my favourite member, Jack, was going to be! Just in between the barricades and the stage was a small space for the security and media. But I was crazily close to the stage! Then, the worst happened - it started to rain. So we just stood in the rain for around 2 hours for the opening act to come on but everything was delayed by one hour, which obviously got everyone quite grouchy.

I was quite drenched by the time The Dirt Radicals got on stage but the crowd was revved up almost immediately! A little to revved up though - all the barricades except for the one I was behind fell. Fortunately I  was pulling back the barricade or I'd have fallen too! They had to stop the set for a little while and I got the freaking shock of my life when I saw a pair of legs sticking out from under the stage. It was one of the security guys in front and he lay there motionless while the annoying Mats were shouting at the opening band to get on with the show/get off the stage. What idiots really. But anyway, as I watched the other security guards attending to him I really felt like I didn't want a gig anymore. It was really traumatizing. I hope the guy's okay and recuperating well! :/

The organizers then decided to move the barricades against the stage so I ended up right in front of the stage. TDR then continued with their set with songs like 'Pack Your Bags' and 'Daddy's Disco Days'. Really catchy! And the drummer is crazily wicked!!

And of course, next up was the band that everyone was waiting for - All Time Low!!

When they came up on stage, it seemed so surreal! From anticipating the release of their albums and watching their performances on Straight to DVD via the screen of my laptop, All Time Low has always been a band that I admired and I swore that I would see them 'live' one day and there they were, right in front of me!
It was really amazing! And I can't recall how many times Jack looked at me with those big round eyes of his!

ATL got the crowd crazy immediately and I especially enjoyed 'Damned If I Do Ya', 'Time-Bomb', 'Forget About It' and 'Remembering Sunday'. I recall myself headbanging during 'Lost In Stereo' yeah I was lost in the music most definitely.
I was close to tears when Alex crooned out 'Therapy'. At that point of time, I really felt that my life was complete - I mean, I have already seen all my favourite artistes perform my favourite songs.

Was hoping for a pick from Jack but got a water bottle that he drank from instead.

Yeah it's on my table right now. Don't worry I washed it.

After the gig I managed to get a picture with The Dirt Radicals' drummer, Matt! Hahaha the name Matt always reminds me of Rachy.

Stinky but happy Michy.

And here are some nice shots I found on Tumblr:

Photos belong to their respective owners.

Thank you so much to Rachy's friend, Justine, for going to queue at 7am! We probably wouldn't have been able to be second in the queue and gotten right in front of the stage if not for you!

It was a great night. And the queuing was all worth it! Rian, Zack, Jack and Alex, thank you guys so much for finally coming down to Singapore! Though it would have been better if you guys came before your music hit the airwaves here. So many teeny boppers, omg. And the crowd was so bad. Still, All Time Low was amazing 'live' and I am so glad that I was finally able to watch them up-close! ♥

I'll just be suffering from withdrawal symptoms now. "Cause there's nothing surgery can't do" - I think All Time Low is wrong for once.