cool story Tony,
but how come they dont look like they are Filipino?

Jeff(bigtikidude)

Jeff(bigtikidude)

Last edited: May 08, 2007 10:51:59

Gotcha,
that spailns a whole lot.

Jeff(bigtikidude)

Jeff(bigtikidude)

bigtikidude
Gotcha,
that spailns a whole lot.

Jeff(bigtikidude)

The Philippines would be a fun place to set up a tiki bar. ;)

"Turn the knob to 10 and break it off!" -Baja Marty

When I was in the Navy in the late 80's. A crewmate and I found a little hole in the wall bar on the fringes of Olongapo where the house band played The Ventures, Link Wray and other cool 60's garage stuff. My buddy would sit in on drums for Wipe Out. It is amazing how much musical talent is there. If you close your eyes to just about any cover band there, you'd swear it was the real band.

Olongapo was the proving grounds for bands. You needed to know your sh*t if you played in Olongapo. Your audience here were American troops who knew a lot about rock music. I am going to be posting some more 60's era band photos from the Philippines in this thread.

beatmantony
Olongapo was the proving grounds for bands. You needed to know your sh*t if you played in Olongapo. Your audience here were American troops who knew a lot about rock music. I am going to be posting some more 60's era band photos from the Philippines in this thread.

That's awesome. I want to know more about it. I've asked my inlaws, but they don't remember much. They did tell me that they heard Dick Dale in the Philippines back then.

From the site you provided, I started looking around and found this page:
http://pinoyclassicrock.com/recollections.html
It mentions that tunes like "Bulldog" and "Moon Dawg" were played on TV.

I've always been curious about the role of instrumental music in the Philippines. I've heard the tradtional music, played on the Rondalla. These tunes have a definite Spanish influence and many of them I could see being played as surf tunes in the same way that bands here have taken other traditional music and gave it the surf make-over.

Tony, you should take the "lola" music of the Philippines and update it! haha

-K

"Turn the knob to 10 and break it off!" -Baja Marty

What can you tell us about RJ and the Riots?

The drummer has recently passed away but RJ and the rest are still alive. The bass player, Alan Austria, lives here in SoCal. I will forward your post to him. RJ and the Riots were very popular not only in the Philippines but in Asia during the early 60's. They played a lot of Ventures and Fireballs and also wrote their own songs. RJ, Ramon Jacinto, is said to have owned the first Fender Jaguar in Asia. The biggest hit they had during that era was a song they wrote titled "Weightless". RJ has become a very close friend to the original Ventures to this date. A fiend of mine archives a lot of the 60's band photos and I will ask him to send me some so I can post them here.

Thanks Tony for posting this - very interesting!

The Scimitars

I have a copy of an album by The Electromaniacs! It was given to me by the same guy (that gave me RJ and the Riots) at work that wanted it converted to CD from LP...These guys were great...very Shadows-like. Although on some of the tracks, it seemed like they may have been using inferior equipment to record with when compared to the Shadows and other bands of the era. They did have plenty of talent, no doubt.

• Surfbeatnik

beatmantony

What can you tell us about RJ and the Riots?

RJ with Nokie Edwards

This photo was taken most likely at the time that RJ contracted Nokie to record Nokie's catalog of songs at RJ's Ventures studio in Makati.. RJ brought Nokie to the Philippines for that purpose to archive Nokie's songs...

Rob_J
I have two cassette tapes by Ramone Jacinto. He is a fine guitar player.

I'm pretty sure RJ is still performing in Manila. From what I understand, he owns a nightclub, possibly a radio station, and has his own guitar company.

Ramone in action:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3bcKDA6JtM0&feature=related

He sure is..All of the above and he sponsors concerts and brings in name acts all the time mostly '60s artists. Sometimes he performs with them.. He brought in John Ford Coley, (England Dan and John Ford Coley) Peter and Gordon and Chris Montez on one bill although only Gordon Waller of Peter and Gordon showed for this. Then there was another concert where Peter Asher actually made it to Manila with Gordon and performed at the Araneta. The list goes on of the acts he brings in together with RJ 100 DJ Steve O'Neal... The Zombies for one with Colin Blunstone and Rod Argent. The Beach Boys were here through RJ 100/Steve O'Neal.

I had asked RJ if he knew if Billy Hinsche of Dino, Desi, and Billy would be with the BB because Billy was part of the BB as I saw the BB perform in the States with Billy. Billy is half Filipino btw and had a 60's hit, The Rebel Kind with Dean Martin's son Dino, and Desi Arnaz Jr. They were the Jonas Brothers of their day or the Jonas Brothers are Dino, Desi and Billy of today as they were the first act of that kind to appear to the world.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4sTZP8d_4XI

Billy played keyboards for the Beach Boys. I was not able to attend the concert so I don't know if Billy was on the Manila tour..
http://www.billyhinsche.com/

RJ has his own cable access network called..you guessed it..RJ.. Channel 19 on Skycable.. RJ 100 radio is on all day everyday and on weekends the station plays hits from the 50's and 60's...He's the only station here doing that I think and is nationwide.

I had RJ's factory rewind the pickups on my vintage '70's Strat because they burned out and they did a good job in creating a jangly tone. I was surprised at the tone and I have had Seymour Duncan personally rewind my '63 Jazzmaster in Santa Barabara in the 70's before anyone knew who Seymour was except guys like Page and artists of that caliber..Seymour actually played my JM to demo what he'd done. I only mention this to give you an idea of the lengths I have gone for tone and to explain how well RJ's guys rewound the pickups on my Strat.

RJ down scaled his stores from years ago. RJ Music used to bring in some great equipment. He sold the only Fender Ventures model Jazzmaster I have ever seen, offered many other brands, also and offered (s) music lessons at his branches which are in every major mall.

The guy is into everything. I had them build me a Leslie cabinet and they nailed it just from drawings. I provided the guts from a vintage rebuilt 122. If you know what a Leslie looks like with twin rotors, motors, treble horn, bass woofer, tube amp, and how these pieces are precise routing, you would know that it's not that easy specially if you've never seen one up close...

RJ guitars are well made and for the price, it's hard to beat if you're on a budget. $200 for a Les Paul? A Strat? Tele? SG? Pbass? Jazzbass?

Guitar playing wise, Ramon nails the Fender surf tone/licks and it's evident on his recordings.