Hi Julian

 

 

 

https://bit.ly/2J9o1Dh

 

 

 

 

 

 

Gig update: Alexis Bistro - 18 and 19 July

Hey everyone,

My sincerest apologies for not publicizing our gig at Bangkok Jazz recently, I've been swamped with work since I got back from New York... and yes, I'm back from New York for the summer holidays.

We did a kick-butt gig at Bangkok Jazz two weekends ago. Daniel Foong replaced Vincent for one set on Friday night, and kicked butt as well, he held his own real good. The second night was also a killer night, with Lewis Pragasam sitting in on one tune on the second set, as we did a Kenny Barron tune called Voyage. We did a couple of new tunes in addition to our existing hardbop repertoire, and we had a ball doing it too.

Anyway, here's a plug for our upcoming show:

BOPLICITY Live! @ Alexis Bistro and Wine Bar
Date: 18 and 19 July 2008 (Fri and Sat)
Time: 10.30pm onwards
Admission: Free (but call to reserve seats so you don't have to stand!)
Venue: Alexis Bistro and Wine Bar, Great Eastern Mall, Jalan Ampang KL

Hope to see you there!

SUPPORT LIVE JAZZ!

JC's One Nite Stand on Youtube

Here are some videos of BOPLICITY's performance at Bangkok Jazz for my farewell gig on the 13th Jan 2008. The featured clips are courtesy of Ben Lee and Ivy.. thanks to them for bringing their video camera!

Enjoy!

BLUESANOVA - part 1


BLUESANOVA - part 2


JUNE BUG


I will be adding at least one more soon! So stay tuned!

Apologies

- NOTICE -

Hi everyone,

First and foremost, I would like to express my sincerest apologies to those who might have tried to attend our Saturday show at the Top Room, and only to find the place closed. Due to unforeseen circumstances, our show had to be cancelled on that day! I hope this won't happen again! My apologies for the inconvenience caused, and thank you for your understanding.

- Julian

Gig updates:

I've managed to get two more dates confirmed for the next several weeks. One will be the end of this month, 29th November. We'll be playing at La Bodega, Pavillion, but with a slightly different set-up due to scheduling difficulties with some of the members of the band.

And there's Rick's Cafe Casablanca early December.

So do stay tuned and I'll be posting more updates soon!

See ya.

Updates - November 07

Hi all,

It's been a while since I managed to update this blog for the band, and my sincerest apologies for that. I've been so swamped with a variety of things, and also some personal issues that I've had to try to settle over the past few months. It's also been a while since the band last played. So, here we are back again, after a 4-month plus hiatus since our last gig at Chill Wine Bar in July.

We've been confirmed for four dates so far, two of them are in a weekend in November at Top Room, and the other two are at this new live jazz joint called Rick's Cafe Casablanca, for its live jazz on Thursdays. It's located at one of the shophouses on One Bangsar, Jalan Ara, a pretty cool spot to be at, too! This new joint serves some really nice Mediterranean food and some fusion. As for the live jazz bands, that credit falls on my trumpet player Eddie Wen, as he's consulting for the owners of Rick's Cafe, where the live jazz entertainment is concerned (kudos Eds!). It's quite a nice cozy joint, and so far admission is free for the live jazz on Thursdays.

Anyway, it should be a blast, so here are the dates:

8 Nov (Thursday) - Rick's Cafe Casablanca, One Bangsar.

16, 17 Nov (Friday and Saturday) - The Top Room @ Top Hat Restaurant.

6 Dec (Thursday) - Rick's Cafe Casablanca, One Bangsar.

Anyway, check out this cool new poster I made using Pages on iWork on my Mac (I love this program.. easier to use than Photoshop!). It was my first time using Pages, and I had to stretch my head for several hours trying to do this. I hope it's nice!

Venues:

The Top Room @ Top Hat Restaurant
7 Jln Kia Peng, KL
Reservations: 03-21428611

Rick's Cafe Casablanca
One Bangsar
63C Jalan Ara
Bangsar Baru KL
Reservations: 03-22871618

Cancellation..

Hi everyone,

Due to some unforeseen circumstances, our performance at Top Room on the 3rd and 4th August has been cancelled.

For updates on what will be happening there, please visit the Top Room page.

We apologize for the inconvenience.

Speechless...

What do you say when you know you've got one of the BEST jazz bands in town?


.... NOTHING!!....


Because there's nothing than can be said that can describe how I feel about my band members! If anything, I can say that I'm a very, VERY blessed musician... to have the opportunity to work with 4 of the most amazing musicians, and to have them in my band... OUR band!! It goes to show for me, that a successful (and potentially kick-a$$) band does not need all-star players for it work!

I've learned so much playing with this band for only these 7+ months. I'm also grateful, that we also got a lot more opportunities to play a lot at these various jazz venues in town, making us play a whole lot more over the past 7-8 months... Top Room (DG+JD *wink* thanks!), Chill Wine Bar, Bangkok Jazz, Groove Junction, and some others..

Anyway, just to write a short account of our last gig at Chill Wine Bar the last two nights..

The band was smokin' on Friday night! We had Junji Delfino singing the two nights with us... so having Junji on board is always a pleasure, it's always plain fun, and also musically fulfilling! What can we say when we have basically the best female jazz vocalist playing with us?? For some strange reason, I felt like I was on overdrive these two nights. Of course, being so at home with these guys, playing was like riding a magic carpet!! One of the more interesting things on Friday night, was when we started playing, the usually-non-attentive-EH-LAKS-SIS-type crowd also sat in attention and started to listen and see what we were doing. We commanded attention.. and it was something I've always intended to do when we play! And I'm glad we did!

Last night was also good! However, on Saturday night, we had Justin, Daniel and Wee Jon replacing the original cats for two sets, on piano, bass, and drums, respectively. Those cats played exceptionally well doing Boplicity material, but without rehearsals! When the original cats came over the the wine bar, we played the last set with the original line-up.. and I think we basically smoked the house down! We played really crazy the last set, and I think it was evident, that the chemistry of our working relationship as a musical unit really stood out! We only did three songs in the last set - Bluesanova, Love You Long Time, and June Bug. In the first tune, we really stretched the tune much more than we usually did... and everyone really did take it to the fifth dimension and back, even Eddie kicked butt on it!!! Cher Siang played a killer solo on Love You Long Time (and the other songs, too!), going in-and-out of the harmony, with the right amount of tension-and-release, it was crazy enough to send chills up my spine! I was relating to him after the set, that I probably had multiple-mental-orgasms just listening to the whole band play their butts off! With the last tune, we had Kevin Choo (my sax brutha!!) jam with us on that nice funky blues.. and we three horns traded solos like an ongoing mamak conversation!! We ended the set with Junji doing a beautiful encore ballad, a duet with Cher Siang on piano! Man.. what a crazy two-nighter it turned out to be!

I'm so blessed with having these cats as band members... and as best friends, too! Thank you...

.. Thank you so much!

Well, the band will be taking a three week hiatus from the clubs, due to some scheduling. But this is a great opportunity for us, as we're working on some new material before the our next show in Top Room on the first weekend of August. So do stay tuned and hope to catch you then!