We just had the best practice we have had together since we completed this lineup of candyaudioline last year. This was last night, of course. Ayn picked me up at around 9 pm… we arrived there and found Charles and John Paul, Jeff indie and Ants and the vocalist of Spring Boutique. They said Allan was inside one of the rooms, teaching Louie (the new SPK vocalist) some songs. Ralph and Lara arrived soon after… since candy wasn’t complete yet, Spring Boutique decided to make use of the studio first. Roel was nowhere to be seen.

We talked outside for a while. I was so glad to be around candymates again. We were already getting worried about time passing, so we went inside the other room and started practicing even without drums. We all agreed that we should start playing some of the old songs so that we wouldn’t seem one-dimensional. It was great. It was so refreshing to go back over candyaudioline’s discography. The semi-practice served as rehearsal for acoustic sets, too, so the time didn’t entirely go to waste. It was actually funky after a while because Lara decided to jam with us on the drums… I think she still remembers how some of the drum lines go from her old job as the first candy bassist. It was really fun, even without Roel, but of course we were a little bothered that we couldn’t really launch into full blast without him on the drums.

Right after we finished, Roel arrived. We were all, “Oh well… what else is new?” and he kept apologizing (we later found out that he had been delayed because he finished watching the telecast of the Filipinas Awards on MTV!). Ayn suggested we go eat at Pares again, but Allan said that we should wait for him to finish with Pillow. So we waited again. It wasn’t so bad; we had a lot of catching up to do, actually. Ralph and Ayn were worried, though, that it was getting late as they both had school/work the following morning. We considered practicing, the four of us (without Allan), jus to make use of Roel’s presence, only we realized we had no money to pay for the extra studio use. Fortunately, Allan decided to cut Pillow practice short and to make use of the last half hour for a complete candy practice.

Ok… so there we were… we told Roel we’d like to do all the old songs, and he was obviously pleasantly surprised at the change. Aba—ang galing namin! We were focused, but also having fun. And we were tight! Allan said to Roel, “Ikaw ba yan?” We were absolutely DELIGHTED with him last night. It was funny because Roel was all blushing and humble when we kept complimenting him. Hah! But we were really happy with those 30 minutes. Allan was planning to practice only 4 songs, but since we performed flawlessly, we were able to play around 8. We were even able to perfect our cover of “Today”. We stepped out of the studio feeling exhilarated. Ralph said, “Ok lang magpa-late, basta sulit ang practice!” At that moment, it felt really good to be part of the band.

We all headed on to Partners Pares near Millenia. Surprise! Roel decided to come along! We all fattened ourselves and our egos up. Ang sarap. It seemed a pity to break the party up at 3 am. Jeff was telling Ayn that we should drink at her house, but she had class a few hours later and everyone was unmistakably tired. We went home feeling excited about Wednesday’s performance. Tuesday, we’re practicing again just to make sure our good karma takes full effect.

I love my band! Group huuuuuuuuuuuuuug… *snicker, snicker*