5th January, 2006. I finally stepped in the reopened No Black Tie; the original No Black Tie was where I went for my first gig on the 8th of September, 2002. (What happened to Flatline? Well last I bumped into them I got free beer, so big deal if they’re not gigging.) Most of 2003 was spent going to gigs in gay bars. Yes, nobody else would let rock bands play, so in the daytime, the stage rocked. 2004 was a more acoustic year, with the Starbucks Music Series, and Paul’s Place in Uptown, Petaling Jaya. 2005 marked Paul’s New Place in Old Klang Road, and I’ve not been to Paul’s New Place in any year other than 2005.

Aminah had a most haunting voice. She was accompanied by Reza on guitar (also the organizer) and her brother, Salim, on percussion.

It was then Reza’s turn, and he crooned with the rich creamy smoothness of an R&B singer-songwriter. Man, if there was one (not-so-super) superpower I could wish for, it would be a voice like this. Ladies would queue up… no wait, they wouldn’t; they’d mob for a piece of me!

This one was a lot less smoky, with a balcony overhanging for a better view. They also had tables, compared to the old layout of rows of chairs and stacked tables. (Then again, it could be that one gig I went to that had it arranged that way.)

Plush Velvet had Izzy and Jeremy, with Izzy having quite a powerful, soul-cutting voice, and Jeremy providing lush jazzy chords and funky guitar fills to back her up.

Az Samad was back in town; how could you miss such an explosive performance? He is seen hitting what I presume to be Shelley’s precious Seagull. Later examination would reveal that he made scrapes at the bottom to aid his percussive guitar attacks.

Just when you thought he was already stellar, this supercharged, upgraded, acoustic fingerstyle guitarist drops by during Berklee College Of Music’s summer break to show us showmanship and live improvisation should be done.

Shelley Leong also shows remarkable improvement, or maybe it’s because she’s on grand piano instead of the usual acoustic guitar setup (which also showed improvement the last time.)

Shelley Leong and the Jazz Odyssey had one of those fusion jazz ensemble jams; when Shelley did her grand piano jam, it could only remind the jazz-unenlightened Albert of one band – The Doors.

Az used a sand bottle as a glass slide! (I now resolve to find a glass bottle; the glass slide sounds much sweeter than a metal slide anytime.)

Yee Meng on open mike, on a Taylor. (Somehow, none of the performers before this got such nice, brilliant lighting. Or maybe the Taylor *cue sound of awe* has a spotlight dedicated to it.)

Rhapsody does a short open-mike stint, too. Amazing diva-ish voice. I think the picture could show you the amazing amount of projection she has.

For more pictures, head on down to Ed‘s version with more of my pictures.

Edit 31st January 4:36 PM:

Moonshine KL has being postponed till further notice due to problems with DBKL.

Then again, you could just head over to the next Moonshine:

Yeah yeah, you know the drill, I’m going.