What Made Me Started on Indie Music

I'm sitting here, looking out at the windows; the white boxes, each depicting a life inside where I'll never know. I thought my own, as I placed my thumb against my lips.

I'd been wanting to work on this for the longest time, as... it was what makes me, me. Goosebumps formed across my arms as I was tracing across memory lanes, back to my school days, before venturing further back, propelling me into nostalgia, to the times where internet was barely a thing.

The days of dial up internet when you're using low speed internet service with the windows with blue load bar against the sea of grey as you impatiently waited. It was during the time before you know internet is going ot be as instant as a click. Apart from the virtual pets, clicker games and love calculators, there's this virtual quagmire of chatrooms. The ones where lonely souls gather, where empty people constantly repost their ASL, looking for kindred spirits, where chemistry comes in bytes. During that period, it was when MSN eventually become a thing in school, where social sites like friendster was the "tinder". And there was ICQ.

ICQ or MIRC was the old school omelgle, except that it is a huge chatroom. We get paired off, we get thrown into a flurry of messages, and saying that you're a girl would literally explode your inbox. I met T there. It's not a love story, well because I'm straight and he's a dude. He's cool af; a guy who was 19 when I was 14, a dude from a University from Malaysia. As funny as it sounds, I wasn't into arts at all back then, and he was from performance art club. And we talked. It was funny to say that the 2 virtual persona that impressed me throughout is this guy here and another guy, M (hello League of Legends US Server), who does philosophy. So.. funny how that turns out.

T and I spoke for days and he asked if I like music. "Of course", I added. "Uhm, you might like this one, if you're open to trying out something you", he vaguely mentioned that he and his performance art club (drama and music) was working on a project and he would like to share a song with me. "Send away", I said.

"01, [][][].mp3", it read, as my poor computer didn't know Chinese. It was like nothing I'd hear before. I love the strange soothing new age wuxia touch, and the whole amateurish yet professional vocal. It's like a gem that could really shine if you polished it hard enough. "I love it, I seriously love it! Send me more! Is there more?", I asked excitedly as if I'd found this teasure somewhere across the vast internet. T was nice enough to rename everything else with the romanji pinyin, before sending it to me. "Yi Shi Chuan Sou." I never thought this would eventually propel me into the indie song world, where I love to discover hidden gems that seems to speak to my soul.

On the other hand, it is also extremely funny how easy to you can "sing-together" with pop songs, so I guess that'll have to give them that. It was a very good ice breaker, in most social situations and it binds people for the same era together. "90s kids", that's what always got us closer.

I looked back again, at the present, as I whispered under my breathe, the songs that'd all made me, or break me (when I'm down). I think diving into the world of alternatives and indie, made my world alittle crazier, unique and of course; better.

I'm thankful for this whole experience that probed my curiosity, ushering me to went on a music tour, parading different genre, exposing myself to music from here and now, across distant lands. It was because of all these that lead me to music with the likes of Libera, the Marias, Phum, brb, sobs, Imeanus, Hello Nico, Zealand, Hollow Coves, The Paper Kites, Cigarettes after Sex, and the list goes on.

And all of them, eventually, made me; Me.