...result in me, here in the office, at 8am, with nothing to fucking do. But we'll get to that later.
To say yesterday was hectic would be an understatement. Yesterday was so jam packed you could put wheels on it and call it a bas mini.
(
For the unitiated in foreign lands, this translates to a 'minibus', which in Malaysia was a small commuter vehicle whose conductors were always adamant that there was 'room for one more', no matter how packed it was. Then again, most people around the globe know about how that's the same in Japanese trains. Should've just said Japanese trains. Now I've wasted a whole paragraph trying to explain a tiny facet of Malaysian life which I've added merely to point out a fact which would've been pointed out just as clearly and without this lengthy explanation if I had used a more universally known example. But I've got time. And space. Hah, I waste your time yet again...)
No sooner did I arrive at work a ton of jobs came a dropping onto my desk and 90% of them were due for the next day at 10am. Which is kind of why I'm here at 8. But more about that in a bit.
The last batch of jobs I did before I left was for an inane cigarette brand intent on marketing itself to pill-popping clubbers by using the words 'funky', 'groovy' and 'cool' a lot. I hadn't worked on this client for awhile, and awaited my briefing, which happened at around 3.30, maybe 4.00, whereupon I was bombarded with so much information my brain decided to take a holiday, somewhere in the rectum region. The best bit?
These were the jobs due the next day. My superior asked why I didn't just tell them it can't be done so soon, but I was pretty sure I could do it. In fact, I know I can do it. It's just so mind-numbing. Brands like this come pre-packed with a long list of guidelines and rules from head office as to how it's presented, how it's designed, how it's written, and it leaves little room for actual thought. In effect, it's like being in a smaller box inside of the box you'd usually think out of and think out of that box. The smaller one. Am I making sense?
By 7.15pm, in a mad rush, I managed to finish all the copy, briefed the designer and told her to call if there were any problems. I also asked her (quite specifically) to e-mail me all the designs once done so that I could proof-read it before it was sent to the client. Deep down I was thinking 'maybe I'll pop in later, after the gig, to make sure everything's ok. Then I can come in late the next day with a plausible excuse...'
An on to the gig. Left my Y2k mask and pedals at the TTDI house, rushed there to pick it up and... I can't open the fucker. The padlock, has it been changed? Did some fucker change it?! Of all the fucking times...
...oh. I didn't know you had to be gentle with a padlock.
Grabed my shit, got to the gig, played the Y2k and Triple 6 sets, sat in amazement at the speed of
Alberts rubik's cube skills (one minute forty seconds, and half the time he wasn't looking. I have video proof. He also wrote about the gig in
his little corner of cyberspace), broke a string during Triple 6's 'Almost Famous, Never Famous' and sweat a lot. A helluva lot. Yaya (my ex, who I invited) was there together with the bassist from Oblongata (whose name I haven't a damn clue) and trying to have a conversation with Yaya was suddenly just like how it was when we first met.
"So what's up?"
"Nothing."
"How've you been?"
"Ok."
"What're you doing these days?"
"Nothing."
"How're your sisters?"
"Ok."
Before anyone asks, when I was going out with her, she eventually quit the one word answer thing and we'd have some decent conversations, fun times and near-death experiences everytime she decided she wanted to pinch my legs whilst I was driving my manual Kelisa. On my clutch leg (to tell the truth, it was an almost accident that got us talking normally with each other. True story.)
After playing the set, seeing her there brought back some odd feelings. Understand this: she was never into my band as much as she was into One Buck Short (especially the drummer, Imran, that pretty-boy-John-Mayer-crooning-cunt) and many other bands, and I guess deep down I've always felt a need to prove that I'm in a band that kicks just as much ass and is just as cool than any of those other bands. It's sad and childish, I know. A lasting remnant from my days of confusion and non-ass-kicky-ness. But seeing her there brought out the urge to do it again.
If anything, she was like a litmus paper too me for whether or not a band could hit the major demographic: teenage kids. And last night, seeing her (and after seeing Oblongata's set on Sunday, which was quite kick ass, I might add) made me realize one thing: no matter what band I play in, it'll never be the type of band that would hit that major demographic, not as long as I have some kind of influence. Y2k may have a chance, but I'm not so sure about Triple 6. Think about it. I'm in a pop-punk band during the time where most of the punk bands I know have turned emo and the rest of them still think Sid's not dead. I'm also in a retro-rock band which seems to appeal to musicians but the only members of public I know who really enjoyed it (apart from one or two friends) live in Terrengganu. Those guys could even spot our influences, which feels pretty damn good, I might add.
But the major demographic? The Klang Valley kids who'll dress the dress, talk the talk and walk the walk? How? The most widely accepted band I played in was Khaimano (which was not the tightest of bands) but in that band I went for the lowest common denominator - dick jokes and piss takes. Sure, some of the songs were actually witty, but it was a very loose band who you could only enjoy if you understood the lyrics, and not many places we played at understood what the fuck we were on about, whilst the other places were often offended.
One night I was talking to Jay about this and he replied,
"You're always going to get that. You write lyrics that require an actual brain to deciphere. But they're good lyrics, you shouldn't dumb down."
(
The above is a loose translation of what was actually said, which I actually can't remember, but was along those lines. Come on, when's the last time you heard Jay say "dumb down" or "deciphere"?)
Another thing I noticed at the gig: I don't have many friends.
Actually, let me rephrase: I don't have many friends who are regular citizens.
The majority of the crowd that night was there purely for 'Flip Rotation'. The place was packed with the bands playing that night, and all of Flip Rotation's friends. At the most, I've had two friends come to a gig I've played at one time. And all the rest of my friends are musicians who I've shared the same billing with, so they've seen me play more than enough times.
But the thought was kind of depressing and amusing at the same time: when is the term 'I have no friends'
not depressing, I ask you? But it was amusing to know that the majority of my friends were people with same interests, goals and dreams.
Speaking of musician friends, Az, you didn't come last night. As such, no CD for you. I blow raspberry's in your general direction! And I can't make it tonight due to other engagements. Sorry, mate!
So after all the musings and thoughts, after Yaya left with a smile and a wave in the distance, after a call to Diana to see if she's ok and find out she's not (nothing serious, mind), I thought I'd go back to the office to proof read any copy that required proof reading.
"Dude," asked Saiful, " when can I get the flyers for Singapore?"
When do you need them?
"Tomorrow."
Night?
"Day."
Ah.
So, stopped by my house first to finish up the flyer whilst Rahul hung about looking for a cable and reading an article entitled 'Victim of the Cucumber' (I'll post the illustration for that story sometime this week... fucking hilarious) and saved everything to disk when it hit me: I'm fucking knackered. After all the multi-tasking I'd been doing throughout the whole day I began to understand why Microsoft windows crashed so often.
This called for Nescafe. Plenty of it. We made our way to 'Penang Mari' and I asked Saiful whether he'd like to join us there so I could pass him the disk. Thought I'd tank up on caffeine before going to work.
But it was no use. I was too far gone, and so was Saiful, who almost fell asleep in his soup and replied to a question concerning websites and current working environments with "is that the one Dragonred played?"
So I went home and decided to conk out on the bed, hopefully waking up early enough to do all my work tomorrow early in the morning. Horror upon horrors, the caffeine kicked in. So now my body is too fucking tired to move but my brain is working at four times it's regular functionality, repeating lyrics to songs I was listening to in the car and coming up with crazed ideas on how to build a papier mache mask that may or may not look like a hernia with eyes.
Then I woke up, went to work, and discovered that nothing's been e-mailed to me to proof-read. Some fuckers gonna die today.
