Featured Band: Pupil

Pupil is a Filipino rock band composed of Ely Buendia on frontman duties and guitars, Yan Yuzon on lead guitar, Dok Sergio on bass and Wendell Garcia on drums.

 

History

Pupil is formed by Dok Sergio from the bands The Teeth and Daydream Cycle joined The Mongols' line-up during the fourth quarter of 2004, making it a five-man band. The Mongols' bassist Yan Yuzon moved to third guitar duties while Dok Sergio handled bass. The transitional five-man line-up was witnessed in The Mongols’ last single and music video entitled “Heroine”. In May 2005, guitarist, Jerome Velasco, a.k.a J. Astro, left to pursue a career in producing and recording studio engineering. The group's last gig under the name "The Mongols" was on July 7, 2005.
Velasco’s departure shook things up for the group as they were trapped into the decision of whether to stay as a band or not. As they decided to continue and as they progressed, the band noticed that they were producing a different sound without Velasco on the lead guitar and decided to form a "new" band. “We got a better bass player and dumber guitarist,” jokes guitarist Yan Yuzon, who left bass playing duties to Dok Sergio to take Velasco’s place. Upon the determination of forming a “new” band, the group’s first move was to change their name.^[1]
Frontman Ely Buendia chanced upon the name "Pupil" while browsing a medical book. The band wanted a classic name for a rock band. Before using Pupil, they tried several other names, such as Villain, Lords of Nasdaq, The Gets, Trochlean, Traitors, and Tyrel Corp. They chose the name Pupil because Buendia liked the fact that it is the part of the eye where light enters. Guitarist Yan Yuzon likes its double meaning, as well as the “eternal learning” connotations of the name. Pupil's launch gig was on July 13, 2005 at the UP Bahay ng Alumni.^[2]

[edit] Resurgence

Pupil had a hard time searching for a record label. They submitted their demo to several labels, but no one was more enthusiastic about the new material than the newly-merged Sony BMG. Incidentally, Ely left BMG Pilipinas in 2002 in the wake of his falling out with the Eraserheads. However, BMG accepted Buendia again like a "prodigal son" as he himself describes it in their debut album's insert.
The band admits that there is a distinct challenge for them, coming out of their past bands (Eraserheads and The Teeth).^[3] The challenge is particularly pronounced on frontman, Ely Buendia, since older fans tend to compare him and his new band with the huge popularity of The Eraserheads before. In an interview by Y. Losorata he says, "I just want my fans and hopefully, my fans to be, to appreciate my music. I’m lucky to still have my career in music as a job and as part of Pupil wala akong (I don't have) delusions to become as big as my previous band was." In fact, the band itself describes their music as actually "one foot in the past, one foot in the present and both eyes dead set at the future." According to Buendia, it's not being there but getting there that's exciting for him, no matter how many times he tries to get there.^[4] He later added in a different interview, "Let’s just say that the Eraserheads is about escaping reality and Pupil is about accepting reality."

Reception and Success

Local radio stations' initial reception of Pupil's music, though, was relatively limited (with the exception of NU 107) due to the band's genre and musical style. While the band's carrier single, "Nasaan Ka?" was played often and achieved quite a popularity among listeners, other singles released from their album encountered more hurdles. The song "Nasaan Ka?" was used as main theme and "story" (based on lyrics) for the first episode of the second season of Your Song. Frontman Ely Buendia says, "Some pop radio stations are still making up their minds on 'Dianetic' which I personally don’t understand since it’s really just one of those straightforward love songs medyo on the noisy side nga lang (just a little bit on the noisy side)." "Then again, minsan talaga hindi mo maintindihan ang ibang radio stations (sometimes you cannot understand some radio stations). It’s not as if they don’t play songs by foreign artists like Nirvana with music heavier on distorted electric guitar than ours. Pero okay lang (But that's okay), that’s the reality of things." He speculates that xenocentrism has something to do about the double standard these radio stations go by. Consequently, they were forced to release an acoustic version of their second single, "Dianetic". The acoustic version of "Nasaan Ka?" was then used as a Bonus Track for Sony BMG's CD Sampler 2006 Volume 3.
However, the band had relatively early success as evidenced by advertising projects that they were involved with and local awards that they have won. They were featured as the Rising Star for the month of May, 2006 in MTV Philippines. In the 19th Awit Awards held in Casino Filipino, they won the Award for Best Performance By A New Group Recording Artist/s category ^[5]. They received another award for their first single, "Nasaan Ka?" at the MTV Pilipinas VMA 2006, bagging the Best Rock Video Award. Then, Wrigley's Juicy Fruit chose them as their promotional models for their product along with Barbie Almalbis, another local artist. They also received endorsement deals from Levi's, Puma, Ray-Ban and Pony footwear.
In November 26, 2006 Pupil won the SOP Music Awards 2006 Breakthrough Recording Artist of The Year Award. "We don't think Pupil should've qualified as 'breakthrough artist' because this actually is our second album after we changed our name from The Mongols", says Ely.
The band also participated in the 2006 MTV Staying Alive Music Summit for HIV/AIDS. Pupil’s fourth single, "Gamu-Gamo", quickly climbed NU 107’s Stairway to Seven's number one spot within the first week of 2007. The band also performed a special 8-minute medley (which included a cover of the Eraserheads hit, "Pare Ko") at the 2nd MYX Music Awards which was held on March 15, 2007 at the AFP Theater, Camp Aguinaldo.^[6]

New Drummer and Mainstream

On July 25, 2007, Yan Yuzon announced in Pupil's mailing list that Bogs Jugo, the band's drummer, left the band to pursue other things for his career. Wendell Garcia, formerly of Barbie's Cradle, replaced Jugo. Garcia played his first gig as the new drummer on July 26, 2007 at the Hard Rock Cafe, Makati. The gig also featured new songs from Pupil's second album. The Mongols' Jerome Velasco played synths with the band. He is also the band's producer for their second album.
Since the release of the band’s second album (Wild Life), the band has enjoyed greater mainstream success and better album sales. The band has also toured and performed in other countries such as Singapore, Qatar, Dubai and Canada. Their live performance of "Disconnection Notice" for MTV Philippines was featured in Best of MTV Live 2008. The same year, the band won 7 different awards which include a Promax/BDA and NU107 Artist of The Year.^[7]
Pupil was personally chosen by Nine Inch Nails frontman Trent Reznor as front act in the Manila part of the "Nine Inch Nails: Wave Goodbye" tour, which was held at the Araneta Coliseum on August 5, 2009. The band Nine Inch Nails are set to tour the globe this year for one last time before going on hiatus indefinitely, as 2009 marks the 20th anniversary of their first release. \
This was followed by a film soundtrack, when the band composed and recorded "Ang Panday" for Ang Panday (2009 film). The band released their first book, entitled "Against The Light: A Pupil Tour Diary", it details their recent Summer Tour in the Philippines. It was launched on November 4, 2009 at the Bonifacio High Street. Aside from the guest band Turbo Goth, Lally Buendia (Ely's sister) also guested and performed three songs from her band, Domino. Dok Sergio played bass, Lally on vocals, Ely played keyboard/synths and Paolo Manuel on drums. They joined The Earth Day Concert at the SM Mall of Asia on April 16, 2010 and afterwards, opened for Tears for Fears with Sandwich on May 2, 2010 at the Araneta Coliseum. The band also performed with Amanda Ling as guest artist (formerly of Electrico) on keyboards during the Nine Inch Nails and Tears for Fears events.