Keep Your Day Job! (KYDJ!) on Friday last hosted ‘Acoustic Night’ at the Sidewalk Café and Jazz Club which featured fusions of Punk rock from KYDJ!, alternative music from Collage and Jojo and the Bums and hard rock from Feed the Flames.
Gavin Mendonca of KYDJ! , the producer of the show, said it was something new and exclusive KYDJ! wanted to try in promoting rock music in Guyana. “We decided to switch it up and try something softer that can transcend to most people, bringing music in its different elements,” he said.
He also mentioned that inviting other bands to share in the experience is essential in working towards a unified goal of promoting rock music and gaining live performance knowledge since this was the first time each band was performing live for over an hour.
Gavin also revealed that Acoustic Night was the debut performance of Jojo and the Bums a new alternative rock band featuring Joanna Tracey, eliminated contestant of the GT&T Jingle and Song Competition along with guitarists Gavin Mendonca and Ryan Roberts. He said that depending on the success of the show, Acoustic Night can become an annual or even monthly event.
Keep Your Day Job! opened the show with several punk-rock songs like “Don’t Stop Believing” by Journey and “Us Against the World” by Cold Play but the song that brought the crowd to their feet and singing along was the KYDJ! rendition of Dave Martins “Is We Own”. The band also sang their originals like “Ocean Air”, “We Are” and “Hope”.
Collage’s hypo-energetic spirit and melodic soul music with rapper A-TayJah was definitely a crowd favourite, they were nothing less than entertaining.
We caught up with A-TayJah who expressed that as soon as Gavin approached her with the idea she thought what a great idea it would be and that she was opened to it. “It is a crossover of all the bands and their fan bases, if and when the opportunity comes again I will be there,” she said.
Collage’s guitarist, Christian Jones said that he loved the idea of Acoustic Night and jumped at the opportunity since it is all about blending which is the idea of the band, Collage. He added, “It’s all about all the bands in ‘GT’ being in one place at one time and we’re going to make the best of it.”
Collage played their original song “Skipping Chapters” and a few other international songs, but the highlight of their performance was A-TayJah performing Macklemore’s “Can’t Hold us” which had everyone stunned, including band member Lerone Souvenir who watched on in shock.
The band played a few more songs before introducing Music Unlimited’s cameo performance. Music Unlimited is a music school administered by Christian Jones. Rondell Glasgow, one of the trio to play for the band said that as a youth, the performance allowed him the platform and courage to continue doing music. Music is a subject he hopes to write at the Caribbean Secondary Education Certificate (CSEC) examinations. Jojo and the Bums slowed down the tempo for the rest of the evening, singing American pop songs and alternative rock.
Before their performance, The Scene had asked Joanna Tracey why her band joined Acoustic Night and how she plans on introducing the band at its first live show.
She said that she basically hopes the audience enjoys the slow paced music and hopes the band performs well. She expressed that the night is the beginning of a great journey and Acoustic Night is all about gaining exposure, having fun and gaining experience.
The band’s high point of the evening was its rendition of “Picture” by Kid Rock and Sheryl Crow which was well received. The magnificent performance had the audience singing along and cheering to Gavin and Joanna on vocals and Ryan on guitar.
Gavin and Ryan began to play high-tempo music to introduce the audience to the hard rock of Feed the Flames, a band consisting of Gavin Persaud (Lead Vocals), Gavin Singh (Guitar), Gavin Mendonca (Bass/Clean Vocals), Emilio Martins (Guitars) and Nicholas Chung (Drums).
At this point, what started out as a meeting of Guyana’s rock musicians manifested into a ‘Battle of the Bands’, which was well received. Feed the Flames had fans going crazy even before setting foot on stage.
Some called them the best band in Georgetown, others cheered expecting a crazy and mind-blowing performance and that was exactly what was brought to Acoustic Night.
With guitar and drum solos, loud instrumentals, a passion filled performance and the audience at the edge of their seats – Feed the Flames ended the night with a bang!
Proceeds raised in this event were distributed to the bands that performed. Keep Your Day Job! funds will be saved as they intend to travel to Chaguanas, Trinidad this coming July to perform at LocalPalooza, a beach-front rock concert where they will be the only Guyanese musicians amongst ten Trinidadian bands.
