there was a ghost on the train the other day

there was a ghost on the train the other day. i didn't noticed her, till my rather terrified travelling companion pointed her out and asked if she was one.

she was sitting on the same side as us, on our right, in another section of the cabin, but her reflection could be clearly seen in the window in front of us. i gingerly observed her, cos you never know... but other than a bigger than average hairdo, she seemed as human as me and my companion and the other passengers on the train.

her face was small and pale with little eyes that were looking straight ahead, not at particularly anything, not at us. perhaps the big limpy frizzy hair dyed a too light shade of brown was disconcerting, but i was struck by how tired she looked. most people on the train going back home from work look tired but her tiredness was of a graver kind. the kind that a night of full eight hours sleep will not remove. the kind that accumulated day by day, week by week, month by month and before she knows it, years after years. the complex kind that is formed by various causes, when her heart was broken, when her soul was crushed. when she has to wake up and know that today is not a new day. when she watches others and wonder why she could not be like them, be happy, be indifferent, be less worried, be more able, be more beautiful, be richer, be more asshole, be less jealous, be less bitter, to have more potential, to have an ambition, be less of this, be more of that. and then she tries to remember when it all started but it was all so long ago and she is so comfortable, yet so uncomfortable, that the only thing she wants to do is to cry and feeling there is absolutely nothing else that she can do, yet feeling there must be something that she can do.

nothing will probably change and all this will repeat itself and she will remain tired and feel dead till the day she dies. and till that day, everyday, she dies a little, knowingly, on her way home, on the train.

band from malaysia ferns releases debut full-length after mercilessly teasing fans for months with false dates of release

ferns
on botany
(fruit records, 2007)
http://www.myspace.com/fernfrens

it’s here, it’s finally here! with much thanks to the good folks at fruit records! ferns (warren, abby, meng, dave and boon) released two top-notch eps and then proceeded to tease fans for months with false dates of album release that never came to be. and now the group finally releases a peculiarly packaged cd with die-cut picket fences, illustrations of farming tools, vegetable batch, trees and rainbow all in green, plus a patch of astroturf glued to its front. i'm very tempted to walk on it barefoot...

so cute, but is it any good? well, this is my best album of 2006. perhaps even 2007, as it’s already out for sale but the release date printed on the album says 2007.

the album gathers four songs from their earlier self-released cd-rs, add a couple of once-available-on-myspace songs and throws in a bunch of four new ones. and just as fans are expecting, none are fillers.

the older songs are always great to listen to, particularly dear derelict which remains a firm favourite. the song in two parts (one part gentle sway, one part almost exuberant swing) still send chills down my spine when the piano and drums take over, and the singing goes higher and warren's voice is a little raspy, sounding like it will crack and break at any moment under the weight of emtions.

my new favourite will be wistful thinking, the most upbeat song that had me clapping and tapping along in no time. a couple of the new songs, citadel and when we die, moves into similar atmospheric rock pop terrain which fellow malaysian pals furniture do so well and which ferns are pretty good at too, as first heard on older songs like the western front. not surprising cos some band members from both bands were previously from the defunct this body broken. lots of chiming guitars and multi-tracked vocals, all floating on rolling drums that goes loud and soft. the soft-loud dynamics might have become a somewhat post-rock cliché but when it's done so well, i'm not complaining.

their music is decidedly poppish and sometimes, almost twee. yet, its nature is not quite so when you listen to the words which are sad and cynical at times. for example, the line "en route to suffering" is heard twice on both disaster strikes again and when we die.

somehow, listening to ferns feels like falling in love.

i am leaving montreal, heading to massachusetts

i am leaving montreal, heading to massachusetts! the weather is excellent now but flurries is expected to come in an hour. i can see the dark clouds in the not too far horizon... got to run! see everyone back in singapore soon!

i am quite miserable in montreal

i am quite miserable in montreal. it has been raining the whole of yesterday and the whole of today. it has been icy rain all the time. kinda like blade runner. kinda like se7en. kinda of like brazil (i cannot remember. did it rain perpetually in the last film...). btw i am typing with a keyboard used for typing french characters and i cannot figure out how to type the question mark, the inverted comma and a few others.

and it will be flurries tomorrow - soft watery snow. and we have to drive back to the usa. i have prepared a cd case packed with cinerama, harper lee, lovejoy, cinerama and of cos, trembling blue stars to listen to and keep us cheery and introspective during the long rainy ride.

the best of montreal are the streets with their mix of intellectual and bohemian character, with vintage and antique shops, foreign groceries, bookstores, record stores, bakeries and lots of non-canadian eateries. but it will be crazy to walk in the chilling rain, to be out in the sub-zero weather, to be blown at by gales of wind...