Reflection

My team is all but dissapeared, today. I'm the only one in the office. The rest of them have gone out for product training on one of our new clients, leaving me with... well, not much to do. Then again, it's only midday and a host of job reqs could end up on my desk by 6pm.

Sigh... this sure has been an eventful start to 2006. And with all this time on my hands (albeit momentarily), I feel compelled to recap the events of the past few days, starting with:

The Bad: Black Metal Bollocks

The whole black metal issue at Paul's Place is one that's seriously bugging me. I've been following the newspapers as the story unfolds but it looks like the English papers are going to be talking less and less of it (although kudos to them for putting out pretty fair articles) whilst the Malay papers are jumping with joy at the thought that there are more of these black-shirted kids to write about and cause panic in the hearts of parents everywhere.

Like the Harian Metro, who today printed that the gig was not a black metal gig. Although it was on the front page, it was hidden from prominence by headlines about a local artist arrested for drugs and 'ghost candy'.

What the fuck is ghost candy?

Mastika will probably follow this up with their next issue, another tabloid magazine brimming with absolute stupidity.

And whilst the rest of the 'scene' are reacting to police mistreatment and poor reportage, my main worry (and Saiful's too) is a different one:

What's gonna happen to Paul's Place?

This is a venue that helped launch dozens of acts. The only venue in Malaysia that would not discriminate, regardless of genre. Being 'somebody' meant nothing to Paul. You play music? Come play it. That's it. The be all, end all. The man built the place out of his own pocket, for fucks sake. And once the dust settles, will Paul's Place still exist?

What I don't want is a rehash of the black metal incident years ago, leaving the music scene empty for months before someone dares pull off a gig and the whole black metal issue unresolved. And most of all, I don't want Paul's Place to dissapear.

So what does one do? What indeed. I haven't a fucking clue, myself. I've been trying to figure out the angles with Saiful and we're still stuck behind a brick wall.

On top of that, we now need to get our drummer (a different Paul) in Y2k to change his mask, just in case. It's a frickin' devil mask, for fucks sake. The Malay press will go right past the poppy music and go straight for the damn mask.

The Good: Creative Juices

Whilst the whole black metal thing is a serious downer, I do have a couple of things to be happy about. I've finally finished the final mix of the Y2k album, adding a few tweaks here and there from the last mix (a longer intro, a hidden track, a tweak of spacings so that the album flows a bit better). Saiful came to pick it up yesterday to send off to our mastering man. Fingers crossed, y'all.

I also went through the UK footage last night to discover Man Meth' managed to find someone who looks like a young Clive Owen to play Brit gangster Neil in the movie. Every time the dude smiled after a take he looked like a real pretty-boy pleasant chap, but once he has the frown this dude is supremely badass (unfortunately, I don't even know his name). And although there won't be any establishing shots of Big Ben (to explain that the scene is taking place in London for the benefit of idiots who have no other frame of reference) the scenes are unmistakably English. My leave for next week is confirmed, leaving me with the opportunity to edit at normal human hours (although I foresee myself editing 48 hours straight by next Friday).

It also looks like jobs are coming in for my soon-to-be-fulltime video production. On top of the usual weddings (I'll even do weddings. It's money in the bank, is it not?) one of Eddy's friends has approached me to do a music video for him (thanks for the hook-up, Ed!) and, for once, it's not a rock group. This'll be a fun new challenge: a slick, Usher-like R n' B music vid. I wonder how much ass I can get away with?

Add to that the recording studio nearing completion and bands waiting to record, 2006 should turn out to be a good, albeit challenging, year.

I just wish this Black Metal fiasco didn't start up again. I have a good mind to go over to Harian Metro and take a dump on the editors desk. After a bowl of sambal.