Early Reflections (notes)

 

First released in 2011, the album contains 10 selected tracks from the original 18-track cd. The songs in this album was recorded around 1996-1998 on an analog Fostex 380s 4-track cassette recorder. At this point I already have a home studio on my living room with no acoustic treatment. I had a premier drums set with sabian cymbals. I also had a good selection of mics which I experimented to get the best results. For drums I used a Fostex dynamic mic on the snare, (this came free with my purchase of the Fostex 380s Mulitracker. I used a stereo electret condenser pencil mic for the overheads which I bought cheap in raon since the store says nobody wants to buy it as it has 2 tr plugs which karaoke users are not familiar with. I used a “fifty-peso’ mic for the kick which gave me good results. The thud I achieved was probably because of the hard diaphragm of the cheap mic. You cannot get this results on expensive mics having more sensitive diaphragm.

The Fostex 380s Multitracker was the heart of the recording. It featured a responsive 3 band equalizer and two effects sends on each channel strip. I did a lot of bouncing to make all my instruments fit on the mix. Drums and bass is usually bounced into one track, then guitars on another, keyboards or backing vocals on the third track and the main vocals on track 4.

There was no compression done on the drums. With the bass I used a sansamp bass DI. I made it a point that all the signals were good when recorded so that I would not do any more processing while mixing. Guitars was feed using a zoom 3030 effects pedal. The main vocal mic is an electret condenser pencil mic which I found responsive to my vocal range. As early as this time, I already knew I should be avoiding low frequencies for the vocals. The pencil mic just did that without the need for an effects. I had a half-rack Boss SE-50 which I used for hall reverbs on the vocals. In some tracks, I used a Boss DR 550mkII Drum Machine.

In 2023, I remixed all the songs as everything can now be done on a PC. I didn’t like the drum machine in the original recording so I did some redrumming using addictive trigger to make it sound more realistic. I was able to get the raw 4-tracks and split them using stem separation software RipX. So now I have the unbounced bass track separated from the drum. The new mix is now what you hear on streaming platforms. Here is the story for each song:

• Jam Groove – This instrumental piece was composed when I was playing with the drum machine. It started with a groove and a bass line which made it obviously funky having nothing else on and no vocals to reserve space for. The guitars came later and accented with some synth stabs and melodies. The song was a good introduction for the album. This was intentionally composed as a first song for the album.
• Sa ‘Yong Karanasan – This is probably one of my first attempts to tackle the subject matter of a violence victim in a song. More like an observation of a tormented soul. Trying to push for more positivity yet not forgetting the lessons you learned from experience. I was experimenting on tremolo effects on guitars with this song.
• Innosence – The intro of this song was inspired from Ella’s “Permata Pemotong Permata” (a malaysian singer) where the bass did a melodic part over accented down beats. There are three guitar solo portions in the song, each with different effects. The song is about a young innocent crush.
• Hope You Do – Composed in Tacloban city while I was on vacation. The groove of this song was created with the help of my uncle who is also a musician in a band. He actually created that bass line. I just added bass solo towards the end to make it different from the usual guitar ad libs. This started as a jam with a drum machine where I do the guitar strumming and vocals while my uncle did the bass. The song is more about realizing mistakes in a relationship and hoping they could make up.
• Tatakasan – This song is about leaving a relationship which may or may not work. I was heavily influenced by synth pads on this song.
• Give – A “We are the world” type of song. This was composed when Live Aid and all those feed-the-world thing was popular. Although it became a melancholic song, this was never my intention. Wanted it to be more of a song inciting people to help out.
• Atup – A crazy song on experimental music techniques. In a multitrack cassette player you can reverse the play of a song from end to start. Thus this song was created. This was recorded on an acoustic drums (Premier ATK). I do not intend to insult or hurt anybody with this song. It was just a play of how a song can be delivered.
• Tabi Po – A ska rhythm song that will really make you jumping and dancing. I really missed putting a horn section on this (this was fixed in the Late Reflections – Nolit covers Nolit album). The song is actually more about conceit where the singer feels more self important. He thinks a girl is running after him and he just pushes her away.
• Echoing Cries of the Silent Children – The introduction of this song is supposed to sound like teardrops rather than raindrops. Still experimenting on bass as a melodic instrument in lieu of the guitar, the bass line is more riff laden. The song is all about unborn children.
• Di Minsan Lang – Another experimental song, this time playing with tape speed. The guitar solos were actually recorded in slower speed and was speed up to create the impression of fast guitar picking. The song is about being played on by his partner in a relationship.

If you have noticed the heavier songs were not included in this album. A lot of the instrumental pieces including the filler “Oxygen” taken out to make the album more pop and appealing. Those songs are included in the “Other Reflections” which we will review next.

The Journey of My Solo Album: Early Reflections, Late Night Decisions

Since I have released on streaming platforms all my songs from my first solo album I will need to tell its story and this post will be the perfect place to understand everything about the album. 

 

In 2011, as music streaming via the internet became the in thing, I got the courage to released the album to the public for everyone to hear. Only 10 tracks were included in the release and it was titled “Early Reflections, Late Night Decisions”. The songs were made available on spotify, deezer, Tidal, Youtube music, amazon music, applemusic and a lot more digital music platforms using the original cover art. This was released under the Indiepinoy label. 

In 2023, I rerecorded some instruments yet retained the vocals and the arrangement of the songs. This was made because digital redrumming was invented and I didn’t like the obvious sound of the drum machine used in the original recordings. Stem separation was also invented and now I can split all tracks and mix them properly. The original recordings were done on 4 track, thus I had to do a lot of track bouncing to bypass that limitation. The tracks were remastered and this is what you hear now on the streaming platforms.

Then came 2025 and new technology in digital music arrived. I then decided to rerecord and release the 8 remaining song which was not included in the first release. I included 2 more songs which were originally recorded by LVNA in the 80s for which I was the bassist at that time. I then called it “Other Reflections”. This will be available on all streaming platforms starting July 2026. 

Artificial Intelligence became controversially popular in music in 2026, and I tried my hand on it. I made AI covered the 10 songs in the first release trying to maintain the arrangement as much as possible. At first I had it for my own listening, but I was really amused by the results and so I released them on streaming platforms as well. This was now called “Late Reflections (Nolit Covers Nolit)” with an album cover which is also an AI version of the original art.

 There are more songs from my “demotep” collection, 40 in total. Plus there is more in my “cattleya” notebooks, some melodies are still in my head. I will then make other posts about each album and every song in it, including the “demotep” collection. This post is just the introduction. I hope you enjoyed reading as much as I enjoyed writing about it. Please do listen to the songs here in these albums. They are on all music streaming platforms. Just search for my name and it will all pop out.

Getting Back On Track

 

It has been a while since I last posted on this blog. I am coming back on since its a new year and I think I need to channel some of my ideas off my head. This post will be a trial post to see if the plugins work. If they don't then I may have to decide to fix the site, remove wordpress and instead use the blogger service as my blog. That we will have to see.

A lot has happened during the past few years while I refrained from posting. After posting a political topic, I received a message from someone I do not know but seems legit. I perceived it as a threat to my life so I distanced myself online and became more private and security conscious. Then I just let all things pass. In the last year, I was faced with several challenges. The studio couldn't recover after the pandemic as a lot of equipment had to be fixed or updated. My gigs became less common, which means I had to tighten the belt as finances became scarce. My dad died mid year of last year. And so I had to go to our home province every month to look after my mom. My wife had 2 operations. LapChole and Lazer to remove kidney stones in the ureter. And another procedure to remove the stent after 2 months. I too had 3 eye operations in the later part of the pandemic.

What is in store for us now? I plan to do a lot of reviews of old albums especially those independent releases of indiepinoy. Most of them are still available on web stores and hopefully with a proper review we can promote them. I also plan to showcase what is happening around me. As well as new techie discoveries especially on the sound recording field. I also have to post some activities I missed to post like a couple of trips to Dubai for the Dubai Expo 2020. And also the visual arts exhibit which I participated.

For all music lovers, I will also be writing about some music discoveries, especially 80s stuff for which I will be sharing as a continuation of my Search me series.

All of these your have to watch out. So, stay tuned.

How I Met Ka Heber

 

I first met heber in the early 90s when I went with a musician friend to visit him at his house which was then in New York st in cubao. It was also his gallery and his work area where we found him busy painting on the canvas. We discussed a few things, mostly on art, music and philosophical stuff which I am acustomed to after spending years under Ibarra dela Rosa’s class in college of Fine Arts in PWU where discussions on philosophical stuff goes on for hours.

I heard of Banyuhay ni Heber in college listening to a lot of pinoy rock. And when I got into an art organization who does stage design and visual art performances in concerts for a cause, I was able to watch the band perform several times. Notable was their performance in Quezon Memorial Circle where they had that powerful line up – brothers Heber, Levi and Jess along with drummer Flor Mendoza. I admired their songs as it was different from most pinoy rock ditties. Theirs was always about something social and political.

My visit to his pad in cubao became frequent. We later on discussed several issues about the music industry, this time in his office. At this point he was running a music label called Akasha Records and I thought I wanted to learn about how the industry works. Ka heber would then bring me to several meetings with people in the industry. Sometimes leaving me there on my own at Club Filipino, representing his company in front of CEOs and GMs of various record labels. He would also bring me to recording studios where I acted like a look out making sure that things are done right. I remember going to Abbey Road – not the studio in London, but the one in Makati. I also met a lot of his artists including one member of Mga Anak ng Tupa who made an album under his label.

My frequent stay on his office did not last long as he had to move to Banlat in Tandang Sora which was too far for my convinience. I would later on become busy with my band and we would seldom meet.

After several years, I found myself running a record label of some sort along with some muscian friends. I would later realize that it must have been Ka Heber’s ideas and our discussions which influenced me to formulate Indiepinoy, a record label for independent artists.

We would later meet again when Indiepinoy was expanding its network with organizations in the music industry and Ka Heber was organizing Malayang Ugnayan sa Industriya ng mga Komposer ng Awit or MUSIKA. We would get together to discuss issues on musicians rights and welfare. We would even go to congress and sit on a congressional hearings when musicians rights are involved. Our meetings were held either in my house in Sampaloc, Manila or in his place in Banlat, Tandang Sora. Most of our discussion now were more concrete than those we discussed before in New York st., Cubao. With the help of Skarlet we were picking up pieces of the puzzle to formulate a stronger guild that will represent the musicians and the composers. Ka Heber tried to convince me to join his group MUSIKA and give it a strong leadership but he knew I was already busy with Indiepinoy and understood my cause. So he did not really insisted as we can work together anyway. But I felt that he was building MUSIKA to be more than an organization, maybe a CMO of some sort or probably a guild. He had with him personalities in the pinoy rock scene along with a group of new breed songwriters and singers. I felt he wanted me to help him expand his group with the same extensive number of members Indiepinoy had at that time.

We did organize a few concerts including one held at the Rizal Auditorium’s Concert at the Park. This was to commemorate Bonifacio’s 150th birthday. A few more meetings were held here and there, including one organized by atty Rod Domingo, the lawyer who was able to win a class suit and recover millions for Marcos victims. This was attended by really influential personalities and the agenda was quite radical especially having in the attendance, people who had first hand experience of corruption and brutality in the music industry. Ka Heber showed me how the industry really looks like. The good and the bad.

This is how I met Ka Heber. We were both organizers and we both have visions of how the industry should work and to whom should it serve. Most people will see the genius of his songs. I see how he felt about the people who make such songs. He was ahead of me and he knows more than me. Even if I would deny it, deep inside me I know he was a big influence.

Later on I would here several stories from different people about Ka Heber. Including that one story Emil Sanglay told be of how they had an argument with Ka Heber and left him in the middle of the grassland. I am not the one to judge about those stories I heard. He is only human anyway.

But I will surely miss him.

Not an Ordinary Day at the Office

(This article was a seat work in an English literature class in PWU around 1989).

She entered the office along with her mother. It was almost noon and most of my office mates were down at the cafeteria eating their lunch. The office is almost bare except for some medical equipment we use to service the needs of workers from various industrial firms in Manila.

Here I am standing in front of them. Her mother did most of the talking. I was as if she could not speak. The mother introduced her daughter as elena, a 16 year old factory worker from a large textile factory in Valenzuela. According to her mother, elena was abuse by her employer less than a week ago.

"Elena was fired when she forgot to load a fresh spool of thread into the machine she was assigned to handle." Explains the mother. "She pleaded for mercy and her employer agreed to hire her as a maid in his home instead."

"During the first two days in her employer's home, she was locked-up, beaten and raped. It was such an ordeal which affectedalmost every inch of her body and mind. It was a good thing she was able to break free when sympathetic neighbors heard her screams and notified the police."

I could not believe such things actually happen. I looked at her bruises. They were almost everywhere. But then she does not react whenever her mother touches her arms. It is as if she could not feel a thing. Her eyes blank. Her nostrils were big and pulsating. I think deep inside her she was crying.

Then I stood up and told both of them to wait inside a room. I have to call the doctor who will attend to their needs.

How to clean Toilet (sic)

(This article is a school seat work about linear process explanation. It is a group work by Nolit Abanilla, Ma. Jeremiah T. Balbuena and Ma. Alma P. Duron for an english literature class in PWU sometime in 1989.)

Cleaning the toilet is always a drag. You must degrade yourself, kneel down and do the scrubbing. But before that, you must consider somethings.

First, see to it that your windows are closed. You don't want to let your handsome neighbor see you in your most humiliating position.

Then you must use an appropriate detergent. Do not use your imported "floral scented" soap on the white porcelain just because you want it to smell good. A good active cleanser with deodorizer will do. Dash a few of these into the john. You might need some strong acid or toilet bowl cleaner. Pour some of these generously, and set aside for a few minutes.

Now you can start scrubbing. Scrub very well and do not leave any space unsubscrubed (sic). Make that brownish gray "holy seat" look sparkling white. And feel the glory of that miraculous change.

After scrubbing, you must wash away the soap. You can wipe bowl (sic) with a clean rag if you wish.

Finally, your toilet is clean. Now you can call your 5-year-old brother to sprinkle the toilet with god-knows-what in a manner most playful little boys do.

(Apparently the teacher did not like the story as she gave the piece a low grade of 2.50 with a note saying "topic is very ordinary." But I think she should have given us a better grade as the purpose of the seat work was to demonstrate linear process explanation, and we did a good job on it regardless of what topic we choose. Well, you cannot please everybody.)

Combat Apathy

(Unpublished article intended for Philwomenian in 1988)

Apathy has always been an obstacle to Social Development. In this world of conflicts, apathy is never absent, serving its own interest. Such a selfish path one would take.

Apathy is defined as one's avoidance to be involved in any struggle or conflict. Apathy include liberalism which follows the reconciliation philosophy. We all have heard people say "We must be fair, we must listen to both sides of the story, there is always right and wrong on both sides, If we could only get people to talk to one another and sort out their misunderstandings and misconceptions, conflict could be resolved." It sounds like a genuine concern for fairness and justice, yet later we will find out that liberalism stands for unprincipled peace.

NOT ALL CONFLICTS CAN BE RECONCILED

We must take in mind that not all conflicts are based on misunderstanding and must be reconciled. In some conflict, one side is right and the other is wrong, one side is being unjust and oppressive and the other is suffering injustice and oppression. Thus one must take side. Being Christians, we are not supposed to try to reconcile good and evil, just and injustice. We are supposed to do away with evil, injustice and sin.

Neutrality is not always possible. In cases of conflict due to injustice and oppression, neutrality is totally impossible. If we do not take sides with the oppressed, then we are unintentionally taking sides with the oppressors. Since being neutral hides the nature of the conflict. The injustice continues and everybody is made to feel that the injustice doesn't matter because the tension and conflict have been reduced. It keeps the oppressed quiet and passive and brings about a kind of pseudo-reconciliation without justice.

It is wrong to assume that tension and conflict are worse evils than injustice and oppression. It only shows one's cowardliness to confront conflicts. They are those who are not convinced of the need for change and lack of hope. They rather flee to escapism from the realities of injustice and conflicts.

Thus, it shows that being liberal is being apathetic to realities, and being neutral is a way of siding with the oppressor. In a conflict if one side is right we must recognize this and side with them, just as Jesus sided with the poor. If the other side is wrong and in power, we must oppose them and dethrone them from power. We must realize the real root of many conflicts - The oppressive structure being implemented by the rich. God didn't actually hated the rich. What he simply meant, is that he wants to pull the rich and powerful from their thrones, from their position in the society, because the structures of the society are unjust and oppressive (Luke 1:52:53)

God said "Love our enemies." This does not mean for us to convert the rich and those in power to stop the oppression. The only effective way of loving our enemies is to engage in action that will destroy the system that makes them our enemies. In other words, for the sake of love and for the sake of true peace, we must side with the poor and the oppressed and confront the rich and powerful, and join the struggle against what they stand for and what they are defending.

Remember, God wants peace that is based on truth, justice and love and not the superficial peace and unity that compromise truth, covers over the injustices and that is usually settled on for thoroughly selfish purposes.

Advance peace based on social justice and not on apathy.