Stomptastic

For as long as I could remember I loved doing percussion, even before I knew the word existed*.  From beatboxing to strumming my fingers to tapping my pencil or drumming on my desk.  My taste for aesthetic sounds lay not in tunes from strings nor the striking of keys, but the tap of wood and/or plastic.  I was also fascinated by tap-dancing, because it sounded cool and looked easy.  You didn't need to be accompanied by outside music, lug around tape/CD players or looked crazy if you were only hearing the song in your head, because w/ tap-dancing you literally made the beat up as you went along.  Watching Sammy Davis Junior or Gregory Hines in action was mesmerizing.

I even considered taking lessons in drums and tap-dancing, but as childhood dreams go, laziness and a lack of drive did not make it it happen, along w/ becoming a comic book artist and a radio DJ.  I also changed my mind when I found out that my fingers could move faster on the drums than when I used the drumsticks.  Basically I lacked coordination in using the latter. (This is where drum lessons would have helped, come to think of it.  Oh well.)

I liked beatboxing because one the sounds it emulated was drums.  My favorite was the snare drum (w/ a bit of cymbals), and I was one of those few who'd drop a beat in the shower instead of singing in it.  It was only when I listened closely to Bobby McFerrin's Don't Worry Be Happy did I realize he wasn't employing any musical instruments other than his own voice.  This song was constructed like a cartoon, w/ repeated notes replacing repeated drawings to give the impression of movement, only this was actual movement in the form of vibrations to create sound and form music.

So imagine my delight back in college when I caught Stomp accidentally on television.  I can't remember the channel but it was probably on a Just for Laughs segment of the Montreal Comedy Festival.  When I saw them perform w/ brooms and tap-danced I thought it was the coolest.  Thing.  Ever.  Here were these guys performing in public (and probably getting paid to do so) doing stuff I would do to just pass the time. i.e. making rhythmic sounds out of everyday objects.  Holy $#!+, I thought, I could do that! Why can't somebody discover me and appreciate my hidden talent?!?  (Insecurity was also something I had before I knew the word existed.)

By this time old classmate Tim Yap was already in the social scene, pre-party planner phase.  Not knowing how to get in touch w/ him (even if we were phone-pals back in grade school), all I could do was wish that he would use his connections to form a local version of Stomp, or better yet produce their concert here in Manila.

The next time I saw them it was in a Pringles commercial (upon watching it again on YouTube I'd have to say it does not do them justice), then when I got my own Ebay account every other auction search was for a Stomp Out Loud DVD.  Eventually my brother bought me a copy for Christmas (albeit an imperfect reproduction from Hong Kong) and I couldn't wait to pop it into the player (and that's where I discovered that it was an imperfect bootleg).  I played the Basketball and Kitchen scenes over and over.  I thought it was cool that during the Brooms number when one of the performer's brooms broke a backup broom was immediately at hand. (More on that later.)  

But as time passed so do some tastes and fads.  My fascination w/ Stomp gave way to Blue Man Group, whom I thought of as a surreal Stomp w/ a coordinated uniform and color scheme and also used unusual instruments.  I was wrong, of course. These guys marched to their own drummer beat.  Literally.  I first saw them perform on The Tonight Show, and when they stuck that camera tube down Mel Gibson's throat I was hooked.  Couple of years later they performed with Dave Matthews and then they felt lame.

Even if my interest in both groups waned, I was still excited when I found out that Stomp was coming to Manila for a week of shows.  I almost didn't get to see it, too, as my kuripot personality tended to override my desire to watch concerts.  I balked at the TicketWorld prices and was ready to give up, but fortunately Visa was offering a 10% discount promo. Then a week later an even better promo came out: 25% off tickets for the first 2 shows.  After Eileen agreed to watch w/ me I snatched 2 tix, and last night we watched their gala performance at the CCP Main Theater.

I partly expected the show to just repeat some of their acts from the DVD, but when I saw a sign that said that the performance was going to run 100 minutes w/o any intermission I was, in the word of Jane Austen somewhere, delighted.  The DVD show was only about an hour, so I knew I was going to see at least 40 minutes of new material.

In the weeks leading to the show I found myself irritated when the media was describing the show as a comedy.  Idiots, I thought.  Just because they use trash can lids and broomsticks as musical instruments it doesn't make their act any less "legitimate."  These guys are trained dancers, so there is choreography involved. There's going to be fun moments, but not funNY bwa-ha-ha ones.  Again, I was wrong.  The show was both.  It was performance art and they had a "clown."  He was playing for laughs but also played the instruments as well.

Speaking of the instruments, while the conceit of Stomp is in using everyday objects in non-traditional ways, in one act I was bewildered by their use of giant inner tubes that look like they were meant to be inside some giant truck tires.  While the beat was cool, how where these things "everyday objects?"  Also I realized not all everyday objects should be used to make music, as when they come out walking on giant oil drums --like on stilts-- and used long "drumsticks," it sounded more obnoxious than rhythmic.

Fortunately those were my only problems w/ the show.  New acts for me included the matchboxes, the noisy bodily fluids, the chairs, the rubber pipes, the sanding of the floor and the "trash bag/ grab bag." During the Brooms act one the brooms broke.  I started thinking maybe the breaking that happened on the DVD wasn't accidental.  But then throughout the performance broom after broom broke but was quickly replaced w/o them really skipping a beat.  Yup, this percussion thing ain't easy.

In the audience participation act Eileen asked why I wasn't clapping along.  After hearing the audience miss the beat several times I told her we apparently need more practice.  Clearly the audience was doing too much anticipating (and jumping the clap) and not enough paying attention.  Eventually almost everyone got it right.

All in all it was 100 minutes well spent, and as such Eileen and I still had plenty of time to grab dinner at Teriyaki Boy.

*First heard it from Gary Valenciano on his Gary V. Live! concert (on tape) when he was introducing the band.