NU Killed Ely Live

Last Month I held the sweaty palm of god. Like, literally. And it sang, specifically a song about a dance with a maid.

Ely Buendia is the lead vocals of Eraserheads and Pupil, if you live under a rock. Or worse, a rock. And speaking of rocks, he’s probably one of the priority rock gods you need to google right now. Especially that it’ll be a while before you can listen to him be played in long playlists on good free live-rock radio broadcast now that NU107 is finally no longer just undead.

Ironically I blame it on technology and I guess I’m writing this because it has just dawned on me that music is surprisingly powerful among Cebuanos in ways never accounted for before and anything that puts it in crisis deserves a bisection.

When we question technology it’s always about the issue of excess that gets the ax. And the hardest question we’re faced when this happens seems to be about drawing the line. It’s about finding where and how exactly we could consider the next purchase of a new iPhone acceptable without bolstering the reasons we’re now facing something seemingly as inconceivable as a free rock radio channel being completely off-air. I guess doing that seems to be as easy as playing the electric guitar, with no actual guitar, and blindfolded, and just as cliched. But I still think the least we could do is to remember the question.

And wouldn’t it be better if we always remind ourselves of that, instead of always finding the quickest ways to render the just recently launched cellphone, music players and free radio defunct? Encouraging people, especially kids to apportion such time and passion for music to the point of even respecting enough someone as distant and impersonal as a musician to label them as a god is clearly better than teaching them it’s not bad to own, own, own, right? Own houses you barely have time to live in, laptops in cities you can hardly power a street lamp without interruptions and more junk you don’t even need. Or want.

I guess it’s still a matter of preference, because what is freedom anyway if not that? Besides, it’s not like listening to Ely Buendia sing live and humming along with him is better than using all your gadgets combined during brown outs that are no longer rotational, right?