Beatles night for Nitoy
Recent years have not been kind to musicians, particularly guitarists who have passed on one after another since the pandemic: Wally Gonzales, Noli Aurillo, Jun Lopito, Rolly Maligad, not to mention drummer Chong Tengansantos, singer Hajji Alejandro, and the songwriters Heber Bartolome and Freddie Aguilar. They join a pantheon of greats up in the sky or wherever Elysian fields your faith believes takes them, singing their last notes that however, as the song goes, do not fade away.
So it was with some trepidation that local musicians heard the news that veteran session guitarist Nitoy Adriano, formerly of the Jerks and lately with Oktaves and Kosmikskala, needed a medical procedure on an enlarged prostate that required funds for surgery. Enter the musicians community most of whom have shared the stage with Nitoy in various gigs, to come up with some benefit concerts mainly in 70s Bistro along Anonas Ave. to help defray expenses.
Beatles Night on the first Friday of July was one such event, and it turned out to be a reunion of sorts among boomers down to succeeding generations X and millennial, singing along to tunes of the Fab Four heard in an altogether different light.
Renditions were not fanciful, yet carefully transposed to the local setting, still keeping range of the original Beatles composition.
House band for the July 4th jam was the Bloomfields, experts in throwback but whose nostalgia exists in the present moment, with Rey Abella of the Jerks providing ample shading and dizzying runs on keyboards a la Greg Rolie of Santana. Abella, who himself has some health issues, had son Nathan a.k.a. Patrick, playing guitar for Bloomfields, assured the music torch would be passed even as Tito Jovie, former bassist of Grupong Pendong, looked on from rock and roll heaven.
The moment of useful nostalgia was punctuated by standout, ripping performances by Chris Padilla of Hilera, Clem Castro of Orange and Lemons, Skarlet Brown a.k.a. Myra Ruaro of Put3ska, Tin Virtucio of Kosmikskala, Paul Puti-an of Borrachos, and Red dela Pena of the reconstituted P.O.T., to fill in the shoes of the departed Karl Roy, whose younger brother Kevin of Razorback was a no-show, although Dong Abay of Damo was in the house but could not be persuaded to do his version of Revolution No. 9 or a punk reading of Fool on the Hill. All of them waived their talent fees.
The women were great, not least Ruaro whose black funky soul chops were enough to stop anyone on tracks, turning Let It Be into a gospel zinger while Helter Skelter was rabble rousing, nearly show stopping number that could have made Charles Manson and Sharon Tate turn in their graves, only for Tate to finally exact vengeance on Manson. We needed intermission after that.
Virtucio chose to focus on the lesser known songs of the Beatles, including Tomorrow Never Knows, vintage psychedelia with what could be stream of consciousness synthesizer and snappy drums before the invention of any drum machine, and another song a bit hard-put to identify, maybe an obscure B side of one of the band’s hits on the far side of Fete dela Musique.
Castro still maintained an aura of one whose angel has flown away from him, while Padilla paid heavy metal tribute, one or the other doing memorable takes on I Want You (She’s so Heavy) and A Day in the Life, both songs from later Beatles that showed an expansion, minds pried open by drugs, the Maharishi, coffee, cigarettes and the growth of studio technology.
Puti-an needed no coffee break to help bring the second set home, the most indigenous sounding of the lead musicians a la Malasimbo, even as dela Pena bared why he is the rightful successor to Roy in P.O.T., playing that funky music right, man.
The final number had all vocalists on stage for Hey Jude, pushing 2 a.m., but already light years away from the opening number Help with a.k.a. Nathan on lead vocals. Surely that image of them reinforces the circle never to be broken, playing as if their lives depended on it, because their lives depended on it.
Seems eons ago since Nitoy was a neighbor on Conchu Street along Vito Cruz now Pablo Ocampo, and our daughters both attended the pre-school at the dead end that turned out to be not a dead end, but another window opening to another cosmic scale. For Mr. Adriano and Mr. Abella, may you get well soon, there are many more blues, Beatles or no Beatles, to play.
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