Pinay New Yorker

They played to a packed Nikon Jones Beach Theatre here in New York last Thursday, August 14, 2008.  Alan and I had long planned to watch the show because we were both fans of Journey from the eighties, plus we have been keeping tabs on Arnel Pineda whose phenomenal rise to becoming the lead singer for the band cemented our loyalties to our old favorite group.

I had ordered their latest CD, Revelation (exclusively distributed by Walmart) weeks ago and we both agree that it was a good marketing strategy to have released a CD of their old hits with new arrangements and Arnel singing in lieu of the original vocals by Steve Perry, alongside their new tracks and  DVD of one of their concerts in their ongoing world tour.

While Arnel’s vocal range equals Steve Perry’s and the timbre of his voice is similar to the latter, you will hear him singing as himself in both the old and the new tracks.  By this I mean that you know it’s not Steve Perry, but you know it’s Journey.

At the concert, he was a firebrand moving all sides of the stage and really working the audience.  It was a tight repertoire and a good show on the whole.  Well worth having braved the thunderstorms for and sitting on seats that had just been rained on. As if on cue, the storm didn’t return until after the last song was sung.  Seeing Arnel perform among these rock giants makes me proud.  Arnel is not really an unknown singer in the music circles in Manila, Arnel was discovered by Journey from clips the band found on YouTube where he sang some covers with his band Zoo.

He’s living proof that Filipinos are truly world class performers.  I’m sure many of the more popular singers back home wish they had the same luck Arnel had, having been invited and eventually hired by a band as famous as Journey to be the new voice behind their music.  It’s a well deserved break for a great singer and performer — He was introduced as "Arnel Pineda from Manila," and at the end of the show, he remembered his roots and shouted "Salamat, kababayan!".

To which I say, "No, Arnel — THANK YOU!"