BLACK PIPE pictures

the PREVIEW

The much awaited preview of Black Pipe's Concert DVD

BLACK PIPE pictures

photography by santos "shanquiao" soriano
design by casie villarosa

The Making of Black Pipe's Araw at Ulap Concert DVD

After three months of studio work, I've decided to highlight the "Black Pipe Experiment" with a concert DVD project that will put Black Pipe in a full-length DVD feature presentation. It took us a week to prepare everything. I had meetings with my creative people to act as both consultants and directors for this shoot. Every staff pitched in including some performers who did back stage work and wardrobe consultancy.

Elmir Castillo and Joey Puna gave the most input by co-directing the concert shoot with me as well as defining the concept of the shoot. Prior to the shoot, they also rehearsed the band for the "attitude" thing. Gil Montano together with the Art Department executed a lot of Elmir's interpretation of the set design while the costume department retrofitted the band. Ayu and some of the performers prepared the band for wardrobe and make-up. Ian Cuenco made the lighting design while his assistant Ed Datuin directed the lighting for the actual show. Santi Soriano took care of the audio department. Santi, Ian and myself were the camera operators that day and all the production sub departments pitched in.

Thank you everyone for this successful shoot and now it's time to suffer in the editing phase alone. Hehehe.

P.S. Thanks to Mc Monderin, Aris Gutierez and Ivan Mariano of Alamat for being there to support your sister band's Concert DVD shoot.

Black Pipe the Album / Araw at Ulap

Bob is Back!!!

Bob comes home

Bob, not his real name, -- his real name is Arnel, but he has gotten used with everyone calling him Bob -- Gonzales is back with Black Pipe. That means that Black Pipe's sound would be more wicked with those fat fingers back on the keyboard. He's really an excellent musician.

So I met them whole again Wednesday last week at Barbariba on their regular Wednesday gig and saw Bob who looks fat n' rite just the way I want him. Seeing him after all the years past and hearing him play just reinforced my faith on those fingers. So we decided to jam in my office / studio and I picked an old Joe Jackson song called Fools in Love. The studio jam was way better than the live set we did later that night.

Bob's return also means that I'd have to rework on some tracks again to put Bob's keys on the music, not to mention that we'd have to re-shoot the pictorials. But I know that it's all worth it and seeing the boys together again gives me a feeling of satisfaction.

a fraction of each....

here's a fraction of each of the songs including the track numbers and all of the just-finished BLACK PIPE album. A better teaser than the last one... the ideo is from their pictorial. Enjoy!

BLACK PIPE -- araw at ulap poster designs

DONE!

L-R Joey Pamiloza (drums), August Gamo (vocals / bass), Casie Villarosa (record producer & engineer) and Kenneth Ryan Tutor (guitars) before completion of the final album line up at the Sunset Studios

black pipe
araw at ulap (demo album)

august gamo bass/vocals
kenneth tutor guitars
joey pamiloza drums

all songs written by

august gamo & kenneth ryan tutor
except nandito lng ako by casie villarosa

recorded at the
sunset recording studio
amazing records

center for philippine arts and cultural association entertainment, inc
manila film center, ccp complex, pasay city

produced by
casie villarosa

engineered by
casie villarosa

photography by
santos soriano

cover / album design by
casie villarosa

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the feeling is absolutely great! Now the longer march to find a label begins...

Araw Gabi

words by August Gamo
music by Ryan Kenneth Tutor
produced, engineered and video by Casie Villarosa

It's not a music video, it's a simple documentation of August laying down the vocal track for the cut.

BLACK PIPE from my perspective

so we are half way into laying down the vocal tracks for the cuts in BLACK PIPE's debut demo album. This video is just to present the band from my perspective as to my involvement with them as producer, mentor and recording engineer. good luck guys!

coming soon

BLACK PIPE's debut album is coming soon...



recorded at AMAZING RECORDING STUDIOS
produced & engineered by Casie Villarosa

BLACK PIPE turns 3-piece

Like in the most usual of cases... Black Pipe has re-arranged themselves and decides to stick it our for now as a three-piece band. I am not exactly that comfortable with the idea that there is no real front man leading the band on stage but I respect their decision and hopefully time will allow them to better judge their situation or totally cope and adapt withe the new set up.

Which ever way, I am here to support them.

At the moment, they are done recording about more than half their material for their demo debut and we've done some live tests on some of their songs which hopefully will attract attention from their regular crowd.

Black Pipe - Nandito Lang Ako

Black Pipe finally visits me in my office and make good on their word that they'll record a song I wrote for them a couple of years back, "nandito lang ako" and it would hopefully be the start of the long overdue album I've been wanting them to have.

I didn't mind that I had to cancel a dental appointment, it was fun engineering for them and seeing the song come together. This is still a work in progress as you can see and I am hoping that the more they play original music, the sooner the band chemistry would come out and figure out the image and genre that's for them.

So below is the actual recording session in my office last Sunday. We patched the three instruments direct to the Fostex X-18 mixer straight to my sound card. For convenience, we decided to use my Yamaha DD65 drum kit. This recording also baptized my new (my wife's birthday gift)Greg Bennett Royale.

Additional tracks were later dubbed, the ad lib part and the other rhythm guitar for a fatter sound. With the Black Pipe down to three, August sings the song and Joey's girlfriend did the backing tracks.

I repeat... it is a work in progress.



v

nandito lang ako...

words and music by Casie Villarosa
performed by BLACK PIPE
amazing philippine records (2008)

they finally got around to working on the arrangement of this song. this is the rehearsal version we did yesterday and the audio is as raw as raw would be. straight into the condenser microphone of the handycam, and i love the rawness of the sound and i'm dying to have the song recorded as soon as aaron gets comfortable enough to sing the song with the proper emotional assistance and feel. he says that he still gets a headache with the higher notes but i guess that only practice can fix that. I've had the same problem recording the original version but it was easier i guess because it was something that i wrote...

the beauty of songwriting is watching how a song progresses and how a song evolves into its own character depending on who interprets the music. i'm not the kind of composer who will restrict the interpreter's interpretation of the song solely because i can. and this is what i want with this piece, if need be, then the interpreter should modify some of the lyrics if he feels that it doesn't suit him and his experience. because if he cannot feel the song, then he might as well not sing the song. that is what it is all about... bottom line... a free hand.

so i am uploading two versions... one is the studio version i did two and a half years ago and BLACK PIPE's REHEARSAL version of the song. I personally feel that the band did a great job of the arrangement and i can't wait to publish in this blog the studio version as soon as aaron gets comfortable with recording it and singing it with his heart.

BLACK PIPE - NANDITO LANG AKO


casie villarosa - nandito lang ako (original version)

black pipe pictures

welcome note

my name is casie villarosa, i am vice president of a relatively medium-sized company and executive producer of the amazing philippine singing star competition broadcasted over channel 13. This web blog is dedicated to a very special band i ran across while searching for a backing band for the competition.

black pipe was the tightest band i came across with and the most promising... or so i would hope...

to black pipe... may all your rock and roll dreams come true.