Bisrock and Lokal Reggae

When Bisrock took to the airwaves five, six years ago, they introduced local audiences to a new and catchy experience: Bisaya songs were no longer corny. Eventually, Bisrock is rightfully esconced into its niche in the local music scene.

Thinking back to that Bisrock burst makes me wonder: Was Lokal Reggae ever considered by the media, by the appreciating public, as a part of Bisrock?

Could Jr Kilat be considered a similar, albeit earlier, effort to kicking off the popularity of Bisrock, when it launched "Original Sigbin," or "Agta?" (All released before the Bisrock boom)?

About six years ago, I had gotten into a coffeeshop conversation with Budoy and Arcy Mon about reggae music. I asked them about the viability of writing Lokal Reggae music. Budoy's eyes were alight -- and not by some magical circumstance. He looks me in the eye and breathes: "Dumaguete, Cagayan de Oro, Davao, ug uban pa." The idea that Lokal Reggae was growing in so many places is really exciting -- and this is no sudden, out-of-the-blue trend -- I've written about this, several times, as a blogger and correspondent for the local dailies. From my point of view, things have reached critical mass. And the Bisaya language was the key to it all.

I posed the same question to the now-defunct The Herbs, and they pointed me to three new Lokal Reggae hotbeds where the musicians were coming up with original material and developing their own sound -- Cebu Institute of Technology, Southwestern University, and AMA Computer College. Off-Cebu, they also pointed to the cities of Dumaguete, Cagayan de Oro and Davao. "Init kaayo ang reggae anang mga lugara," say the former Herbs-men, now the Microphone Commanders.

And this was all before Bisrock. It seems to me like Eric Clapton, Bob Marley, and rocksteady all over again. You know, when Clapton covered, "I shot the sheriff" and it became so popular that they just had to bring in the real thing to the States. Now, I may be wrong, but there's something Jungian and Zafra-esque to all this. It begs the question of how instrumental Lokal Reggae was in setting the acceptance of Cebuano and Bisaya original compositions.

Was it?

Or was it just a case of simultaneous growth --- Jung? Ian Z.? Theories, anyone?

But I do miss those days, when Bajuyo's Shrub would take the stage, crooning about of the girl that got away... in Binisaya.





Penumbra: Thanks to Ian Z., James of CDMC, Budoy, Arcie Mon and a host of other reggae musicians and enthusiasts that i engaged into conversation about this most interesting "what if" topic.

See you all at the festival!








.