IS IT HIP? - Apartel’s Music Video Launch at Victoria Court

Victoria Court is always on the lookout for out-of-the-box events and the launching of Apartel's music video is definitely one of them. Apartel, a new super-group formed by legendary Eraserheads front man and songwriter Ely Buendia, alongside co-conspirator and founder, Gnash/DRT front-man, and songwriter Jay Ortega has just launched their first ever single entitled “Is It Hip?”. When we heard the single and the entire album of the band, we knew both brands fit like a glove. Apartel's sexy sound launched in Manila's sexiest drive-in hotel? Mix in alcohol, oh boy, we're in for a treat!

This one-of-a-kind event infuses sight, sound and taste, which is distinctly the Victoria Court way. The Victoria Court Malate Party Wing was transformed into an intimate concert area for Apartel's guests where they can eat, drink and dance the night away.

Why Victoria Court and Apartel? It’s a marriage made in LOVERS HEAVEN!! Apartel’s music in layman’s terms is all about love, love making, and late night calls. Something Victoria Court has always owned and been known for. Apartel’s music is classy and a definite cut above the rest… what with a full horn section, percussions, back up singers, the core band, and the 2 commanding front men, Ely and Jay performing in full on suits… It’s something the local music scene has not experienced before. Victoria Court has always been regarded as a pioneering place where people with a sense of class gravitate to and frequent and could very well be Apartel’s home.

Key words that lock in Apartel and Victoria Court - check in, trip out. Both brands are alluring, sensual, funky, and groovy... once you check in; you're sure to trip out.

*This is Press Release

Zilch - Pupil Band's Most Sophisticated Release To Date

When Ely Buendia sings "The world is a place / behind this firewall" on Zilch's scorching opener "Firewall:, it is both an invitation and a taunt: a wink - nudge suggestion that there is a plane beyond the rabbit hole - that the practice of imagining is a reward in itself, perhaps the best reward of all - but also a show of sneer-filled discontent. In this day and age, when unthinkable things start coming to life, when fiction starts ringing like the truth, it is odd of anyone to not want to rearrange the furniture in their minds even for a bit. And Zilch, Pupil's fourth full-length and their first with MCA Music, Inc. is charitable in imaginings both musical and lyrical.

Finished during a collaborative sabbatical of sorts - Buendia doing shows with punk-rockabilly supergroup The Oktaves, as well as booking the occasional solo revue home and elsewhere; drummer Wendell Garcia doing session work with a host of acts, even reuniting for a few gigs with Barbie's Cradle; and perhaps most publicly, bassist Dok Sergio and new guitarist Jerome Velasco doing a string of successful shows with he momentarily-reformed Teeth - the new record brings with it a fresh perspective on Pupil music making.

One thing is apparent, though: the quartet has long found their musical thesis, and no uncertain number of dalliance will make them stray from their project: in-your-face guitar rock executed in the most rudimentary manner, and this much is evident in first two singles "Out of Control: and "Why". "I've always preferred a stripped-down sound live and on record, and this was the objective from the moment I started writing new songs for Zilch," Buendia shares. Check out


What Pupil has in their hands in Zilch, ultimately, is a more refined rethinking of their sound. "The guitars growl, the drums are in your face, no synth pads, very little delay. It's an album played on the gut level. Yet it is, I think our most sophisticated release to date," Buendia offers. Velasco confidently chimes in, "Personally I find that it's inevitable that the band shall release a definitive rock record. I think this was a great time to do it" Throughout the process, the band was both instinctive and resolute in reconciling hte sound in their heads with the sound that eventually ends up on disc. Wendel Garcia's drum parts, for one, were redone almost entirely in a rented photography studio in an attempt to capture the much-revered John Bonham (skinsman for Led Zeppelin) sound. The band DIY'd the whole thing, installing their own personal mattresses for soundproofing, with bassist Dok Sergio manning the controls.

"Zilch" is now out in CD's at Astroplus and Odyssey outlets under MCA Music, Inc. It is also available through digital download via spinnr.ph and iTunes and streaming via sppinr.ph, Spotify and Deezer.