Spoons

San Pablo's sons The Spoons still had a different drummer when they started their recording sessions on that fateful Easter Sunday of 2005, and didn't really have a musical producer for this album until much much later, when more than half the material was already finished. Jopet and Bambam (and eventually Sepoy) were sophisticated technicians on their respective instruments, coming from the prog-rock band Aurora, while Eric is just your typical honest-to-goodnessphilosopher-drinker-songwriter who views life from a different light, and happens to have the uncanny ability to express from left – right ( Eric Sangcap-Sepoy Rono – Jopet Manansala and Bam Aquino )the world into that magical combination of words and melody we call songs.With very little experience playing together on stage, the band had the slightest idea about what goes on inside the recording studio. And as with most other self-financed projects by many unsigned and struggling bands were, Meong was forced to engineer the sessions in frantic pace. Every minute of precious studio time had to be maximized, which was productivity-wise both good and bad. The sole objective at the time was to get a few Eric compositions recorded as the band played them live.As early as April of that year, four songs were already completed, "Sermon", "Bintana", and "TV Room", and the 8-minute opus "Oras ng Paggising" was already being heavily played by local radio stations in San Pablo City. After months of inexplicable hiatus (which was very typical for the band), two more songs were recorded, "Sapaw Machine" and "Solo sa Kama".Following a stint with Fiestamundo.com, an appearance on Studio 23's program Team Explorer, several management changes, and finally Sepoy joining the band on the drumseat (which brought difficult, hair-ripping drum re-recording sessions for him and Meong), the project didn't seem to have an end in sight. Two more songs were recorded - a new wave anthem "Losing Time" (composed for an environmental NGO, this song is not included in the album!) and a stripped-down version of the epic "Isang Saglit".On Christmas day of 2005, Aji accepted producer duties, tasked primarily to transform the "demos" into something that sounds commercially viable. A mixdown of a new song "Wala" was sent to Alpha Records which ultimately led the band into signing a record deal for a new artist compilation release. (This would later be known as the album Rock Grooves in Delirious Ways, released on January 2007.) At this point, the band's "project" started sounding more like a record now than ever before. With album name ideas going through many changes - from Bill Cleantone, to Isabel, to Maniwala Ka, to Bintana - the production aspect on the songs took many twists and turns as well. Some tracks had to be redone, and introducing a new drummer midway during the recording sessions took its toll on the tightness of the playing. It was a very difficult time for everybody. At this point Aji successfully convinced the studio management to enter the band into a spec deal, but things still had to be done very quickly. Very minimal overdubs and studio gimmickry were applied in order to save time (which also allows the band to easily play all the songs live). Many of the original arrangements were left untouched. And many guide vocal tracks done during pre-production were used to comp the final tracks, as the emotional value couldn't be duplicated. There were a few orchestrations done here and there, and some programming on the synths too. In general, the production was heavy-handed but only in a few places.The last of the album tracks, "Isabel", "Maniwala Ka", and "Hangover" were recorded, and the last of the mixes was completed on June 2006. A supposed bonus track, the acoustic "Solo sa Kama", was tracked in one night on July 2006, with the mixdown completed the following week, following the addition of a gorgeous sax solo. Eric decided to do a few more vocal retracks come September, and the final mixdowns were completed in October 2006.With the release of Rock Grooves the following year, "Wala" began airing on major FM stations everywhere, becoming a cult favorite of sorts. The band performed at several big events, most notably a mega-rock concert at the SM Mall of Asia in June 2007. They also started to perform regularly at Saguijo in Makati, and a few other bars in Libis.The pressure is still on to release the album. But it all seems to be a hopeless situation. The album remains shelved up to this day... We all await the day when the whole world will get a glimpse of The Spoons' music