The Yodeling Fish

Some of you may now be aware of my Multiply site, and the songs I put up on it. I've had many people say different things about it, but mostly the question the most people ask is "why do you do it?"

Frankly, I don't really know.

So for the lack of inspired writing, seeing I lack life experiences, wit, and a general sense of humour, I've decided to make this blog post a dissertation of why I can't stop recording and posting songs, a practice almost as annoying as my tendency to link every single damn site.

Let's just go back in time a little, just for some context. I used to be (and still am) not a normal boy. No, I didn't like wearing my sister's dresses, not like she had any to begin with. What made me different was my sheer lack of any sporting ability whatsoever. Yeah, sure I played badminton for a while, but when one thinks of it, it's a damn lame game. Go on, name a famous shuttler. Or is it shuttlecocker? See?

Anyway, while every other boy shot hoops or scored goals, I was always left behind, poor boy, catching fish from drains. Until I discovered my dad's guitar. I remember waking up early one Saturday morning when I was 11 to catch the cartoons with a huge bowl of cereal. As I sneaked down the stairs, I glimpsed at my dad's guitar. Being the curious George I was, I tried holding chords and banging the strings. That's when my dad came down. The first thing he said was, "You wanna learn that?" I nodded. The very next day he threw me a chordbook and taught me my first three chords - A, D and E. I played "Guantanamera" for a month.

By the time I hit high school, I had a little arsenal of chords, both in major and minor keys - even 7ths, which then to me was "jazz". I covered everything from Deep Blue Something to Michael Learns to Rock. Goo Goo Dolls and Jason Lo were the gods I worshipped. And while the guys grew muscles and scored with the ladies, I sat in my room, night after night, yodeling til the neighbours threw bricks and cats howled. When I discovered plucking, I'd play Jars of Clay's Frail with the lights turned off until I literally fell asleep with my fingers still moving. That guitar became my life.

I drooled over a black acoustic electric for two and a half years, and every time I passed by the window of Ipoh's most rip-off guitar shop I'd stop to drool at it. I own it now, a black beauty which I've used for countless performances, and still do for all my songs. Did I tell you I sold my body to get that? That's a story I'll only tell if you ask me. But I digress.

Fast forward a few more years, and Ezra's in college, still annoying the shit out of his roommates and housemates not only because he still wails instead of sings, but he's also acquired (HORROR!) an electric guitar. It's around this time that I started playing around with the Windows recording tool. Sitting at a little bistro having lunch with Seng Hean and Danny, I saw Damien Rice playing Cannonball on MTV. I loved it. And quite spontaneously, I recorded myself singing and playing that song, which I then turned into an MP3.

One day, I sent that file on a lark to a friend. She couldn't believe it was me. Yes, yes I sound much worse when I sing but I thought it interesting that she asked how I got two guitars playing at the same time. Fact is, I didn't, it was one all along, but I was quite flattered I fooled someone into thinking that I was good at it. Which got me thinking - what if I really did play two guitars? All those times I screeched out the solo while strumming, what if I could actually do it? I got so excited I went searching for a mixing tool - and found it in Mixcraft, a basic multi-track program that allows you to layer one sound over the other, and add effects to each to boot.

I went on a recording frenzy, starting with Disagree's Crumbs' guitar solo. I couldn't stop feeling amazed that those beautiful melodies were actually all me. You could call it narcissistic, and it was. It's when you discover how well tuna goes with onions and tomato, or sand and buttcracks, or ah bengs and tight shirts...it was a revelation. I didn't know I could hear two of myself playing at the same time. The last time I felt that way was when Ah Meng and I duelled the outro of Oasis' Don't Go Away at 10:00PM outside the school library. Beautiful. I felt the same perfect duality as Dave Murray and Adrian Smith as they ease sweet dual leads in Iron Maiden, or when Britney got preggie with Kevin's baby and went on to shoot that corny perfume ad.

Fast forward almost a year on, I'm toying around with more effects, and a new drum program. All with the same guitar, albeit a new webchat mic and an undoubtedly worse voice. Go see it all in March.