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AMP's album recording done live at concert!
Channel NewsAsia - Thursday, December 4
Singapore's home-grown band Ang Mo Pai (AMP) will be releasing their new album in 2009. As part of their pre-release promotion, AMP held a mini concert at Esplanade on Nov 28, performing several unreleased new songs. Producer and guitarist of the band, Eric Ng, informs that a few songs in the album will be direct recordings from the concert.
AMP is formed by music producers, Eric and Jim Lim, together with members of live band for several nightspots - Ng Ngak Hwee, Clement Yang and Brandon Khoo. The band is no stranger to gigs, but still finds the concert to be different from what they have previously done.
Earlier this year, the AMP (excluding Jim) also performed at the Esplanade with Wu Jiahui before the official launch of his debut album "Although I'm Willing". That was also the first time they publicly showcased the new song. This time, AMP continues to use the very same stage to perform a sneak preview of their unreleased works.
"Clement, Brandon and Ngak have been performing regularly at nightspots, usually cover versions of pop songs and requests. However, our concert is more focused on the band's original pieces. This is a chance for us to showcase our works," Eric says. Besides songs for their debut album, AMP also rearranged songs previously written by Jim and Eric for other artistes, to give more attitudes and rock elements, and tailored to suit themselves better. "At times, you tend to experience "restrictions" when you are writing music for others. For instance, the original concept of Eric's "One Person" was more towards Brit rock; but there were "restrictions" such as marketability, so the musical arrangements had to compromise. "I Want Happiness" by myself, was also meant to be slightly more rock in style, but it too ran into some "restrictions". In AMP, we can go all out restrictions!" Jim says.
Having had enough of mainstream music, AMP becomes an avenue for the band members to let off some steam; especially for music producers, Eric and Jim. In AMP, they get to do what they want; but is there really no "restrictions"?
While Eric and Jim say jokingly, "No stripping, no killing!"; Clement gave it some thoughts and shares, "Everyone tends to have their own ideas and opinions. When a band is together, there's bound to be some "restrictions"; we just have to hear each other out and work together. On the whole, we are all quite open in the directions for our music. In that sense, we have been able to accept everything till now. There hasn't been an instance where we found ourselves unable to agree with each other in this aspect."
On the concert, AMP also performed songs which are restricted on national radio. Jim shares, "Dialect songs cannot be played on the radio, so the only version of "One Million" that listeners get to hear is the Chinese one. Performing it in Hokkien along with other Hokkien song gives a better feel as these are the original versions."
As for the most "ang mo pai" (English speaking) Brandon, Chinese and Hokkien songs are not all that distant, and definitely not classified as "restrictions". "Though this might sound a little cliché, but the music we do is very free. Music knows no boundary and language is never a barrier," Brandon says.
AMP has been kept busy with the production of Jaycee Chan's new album; but Eric assures, "Our album should be out before Dec 31 2009... It shouldn't take too long actually, as we are recording some songs for the album live at the recital studio. I feel that as a band, one distinctive trait of ours is that we really enjoy performing live. I want to capture some of the live energy and put them into the album along with other pieces by Jim and myself."
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AMP's album recording done live at concert!
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