Self-Titled

       Beyoncé's self-titled surprise visual album is so good it goes beyond words. Looks 10 years in the making with the thoroughness of every sonic & visual detail. Looks made since birth. Very well conceived and translated. 

       All my respect for Beyoncé as an "artist" now more than ever. Brings the quality of music today to a much better, groundbreaking level. Gives you (hope for) the future of music (what with record-breaking 80,000 in 3 hrs & eventual 800,000 iTunes downloads in 3 days). 

Score: 9/10

Standout tracks: 

ALL (iff) in one sit-down. Pretty much like a musical tapestry that necessitates a full vantage point view. Singly, you won't quite get her.

#Beyoncé

Dear Miley Cyrus,

Your shock factor raises eyebrows. 

Mine raises iTunes (sales). 

This is THE (only) way to make M-U-S-I-C. 

XO,

Your Queen Bey

Paul

Proof Heaven exists. I just died.

Since 1889 - PAUL.

124 years of killing people by "too heavenly good it's hell-bad" eats. Made me forget I have felt anger my entire life
#LOL #Paul #Love #ThankY♥️u

30 Years Bold

In celebrating 3.0, you can be bold by...

playing good music together

being careful with my heart

and THIS!

Fire / Frozen

I admit Jennifer Lawrence didn't get my vote for her Best Actress win for Silver Linings Playbook. If I were The Academy, I would've reserved it for her performance in The Hunger Games: Catching Fire. A full 2 hours gave me 2 glaring realizations:

1. Her splendid nuances were on full display in Catching Fire. She IS an actor. 

2. It's never too late for Janice De Belen to have a career in Hollywood. 

#HungerGamesCatchingFire

Okay, besides starring "me" in it, I loved Frozen for its silky-smooth music, well-timed humor, triumphant storytelling, innovative characterization, & above all, for its heart (frozen or otherwise). 

Extra commendation for the singing voice of Elsa. Man, she fits the character like a glove - gutsy powerful yet wonderfully controlled. At some point, she could sound like it's a Lea Salonga musical; at another, like it's Rent. Her belting range is eargasmic. 

Pity #Frozen has to be shown alongside #HungerGamesCatchingFire. I mean, I loved the latter but the former needs fuller attention from "kids," you know.

#Disney has at long last reclaimed its glory (after the flop that was Lone Ranger/John Carter/Prince of Persia/Treasure Planet)

Did I mention Kristoff and I are alike in some overt & collusive ways? 

In addition, it has eventually dawned on me (mid-movie or in my own mid-review) why #FROZEN's songs are for keeps, and do give a sense of familiarity & instant likeability. What with all the classics the songwriters have seem to have cleverly "rehashed" to sound so close to our hearts & memories. At the very least, I enjoyed every song for whatever it's worth even before retracing the past music they seem akin to:

Do You Want To Build A Snowman? 

-I Am But A Small Voice (Lea Salonga/Odina Batnag)

Let It Go 

- Defying Gravity/Wizard & I (Wicked)

In Summer 

- Beauty School Dropout (Grease)

Love is an Open Door 

- What You Own/La Vie Boheme (Rent)

For the First Time 

- Part of your World (Little Mermaid)

Most favorite part:

Olaf: "Winter's a good time to stay in and cuddle. Put me in summer and I'll be a....

a happy snowman!"

A full LMAO ROFL LOL moment!

VERDICT:

8.3/10 stars

#PrayForThePhilippines

For Yolanda victims.

by Francis Cabral and Edizon Zausa

Posr

Never have I had (and never will I ever have) an account in any site of this sort. Pero try nyong i-meet ang "Toff" na 'to. Baka mas gwaping.Pa-share kamo ng pogi tips (baka mas mura ang sa kanya), pati anti-aging tips kung pano maging 3 years younger, kung ano ang feeling ng nasa isang "open relationship," at kung pano maging toned uli kasi tumataba ako lately. Or baka pwede syang mag-substitute sa'kin sa trabaho kasi minsan I need more than one body to perform my highly demanding job. Or baka may twin brother pala ako! Tatanungin ko ang nanay ko! Soap opera material ito! =>

#AnotherPoser

#AnotherHater

#BakaHoldaperItoIngatNaLangSaEBha

Lola

Goodbye, Lola 

Exactly 1 month before our birthday... 

Kala ko makaka-celebrate pa tayo together, 'la =,(

Social (Network) Lurker

Hindi ko sana papatulan. Ang cheap. 

Not that it's significant or matters a whole lot of deal. 

I don't care but I cannot say I'm not affected. 

If anything, this incident proves one fact: I have at least one hater lurking in this dog-eat-dog world. 

Well, again, not that he/she matters 

but hurling my name out there for everyone to (cyber-)bully may make anyone (or politician) rethink 

how to filter democracy with some meaningful Internet-related bills.

Bored nincompoops.

A recurring reminder that context could be everything and taking a (clever) thing out of it can make virtually any otherwise positive or seemingly unassuming thing wrong, erroneous, defamatory, and basically negative.

I am happy with (almost) everything going on in my real life 

so fretting over this cheap posting 

is the least of my concerns for now.

My extremely precious time belongs to real people 

who genuinely love me 

and the surge of opportunities continually showering on me. 

Besides, there is always this maxim that pacifies me:

"Fakers will always worry about maintaining an image.

Real people would never care."

I. DON'T. CARE.

BECAUSE.

I.

AM.

HAPPY.

One way or another, whoever submitted me to this blogger 

will either get a dose of his own medicine or worse, own karma.

We are living in a self-correcting universe.

May araw ka rin.

Maybe not today, tomorrow or the next, pero MAY ARAW KA RIN.

WARNING.

What you're about to view below will WASTE YOUR TIME 

and cause you worthless stress:

Force & Roc

You are my Roc.

My Force.

My Love.

You know who you are.

Toff as Trains

Social Networks are like Trains. 

Gatherer of Different Folks. 

Depicter of Life's Snapshots. 

Transporter of Multitudinous Stories. 

At Mind-blowing Speeds

- #‎TheToffSocialNetworker

Poem for Someone I Used to Know & Another I Barely Know

The Fuss & The Furious

I find all these MARIAH LIP-SYNCHING-ON-IDOL accusations STUPID. Really. Let me tell you why:

1.) As a TV producer myself, my first reaction while watching the Mariah medley real-time was “F! BAD EDIT!!!” It’s VERY simple to say so – it was widely announced a week prior that she’d do a PRE-TAPING of her Idol Performance on finale’s eve. FYI: Most, if not all, pre-taped productions make ALMOST-PERFECT outputs. If the producer making the final cut of this number was keen enough to notice in the editing computer that the AUDIO and VIDEO layers seem not synched, then there’s gotta be a BAD CALL from him/her to carelessly give it a go for airing. The most probable thing other than this technical dubbing issue is SABOTAGE. Who's not aware of the unspoken Mariah-Idol wrangle?

2.) The mere fact it’s PRE-TAPED means it’s editable/curable between the editing & airing times. Had the editor/producer, Mariah’s manager or Mariah herself double-checked through the playback monitor that something’s wrong (don’t tell us they didn’t notice ‘cause all the 14 million Idol viewers did!), they could’ve revised it or even requested Mariah to do the number again LIVE ON-AIR (“forget the logistical costs the pre-taping had incurred; it’s my a** on the line here daaahling!”) had she known there’s a huge embarrassment coming her way on national television. Such largely sets Mariah’s case apart from the alleged Milli Vanilli, Ashlee Simpson or BEYONCÉ lip-synching scandals; their performances were IRREVERSIBLY LIVE; Mariah’s was pre-taped.

3.) It’s no coincidence that minutes after/during the taping, fans in attendance at the pre-taping have taken to the social media that Mariah has done 3 TAKES, sung more fan-favorite songs in-between takes and was in tip-top vocal shape. Given Mariah is a perfectionist & granted she did MIME her performance, she could’ve done it a THOUSAND more times if theplayback kept showing her an UN-SYNCHED, “staged” live performance. The RAW AUDIO recording of the taping was even uploaded online by a crafty fan an hour after or two. Take that as reference to the TRUE LIVE performance and you can see a world of difference between what aired & the truth. Thanks to Trent for this proactive answer to future questioning: http://thelavalizard.com/2013/05/preview-mariah-carey-american-idol/

4.) Okay, granted she considers this lip-synching aid in some of her past performances (say, for more than a decade now), wouldn’t she have been a MASTER of this art by now? Again, had she purposefully planned to pull a lipped performance, she should have been keener in checking (in the monitor) if she did it perfectly or not. In fact, she herself could have told whether she missed a beat during the number itself and stopped mid-way to re-do the number. 

5.) Coming from that “3 takes” theory, the material (that aired) certainly displayed a cobbled-up number, piecing together the best points off of each take. If this was a call from Mariah’s musical director or engineer, I’m pretty sure a more masterly attention would have been paid on the final cut. If this was a call from the producer, wow, how did you achieve that position with inferior capacity?

Clearly, somebody’s gotta take the blame for all this sh**.

PS: Don't ride this castigating bandwagon if you tolerate singers who lip-synch in a couple of local variety shows.

Understanding

Whoever said

love and career 

can't go together 

is yet to find 

an understanding partner...

and thus, a healthy relationship.

USANA: A Son's Story

During my recent visit in Taiwan & Japan, vacation was my purpose but HEALTH was my priority. Winter played between 3°C and 11°C. Twas even rainy in Taipei & so cold in Tokyo my neck & lips chapped.

Best as what mothers always know, few days before my flight, my MAMA gave me powerful WEAPONS as "PABAON." Not extra scarves or money but those I was skeptic at first to bring since I've just had my share of shots I thought. It's USANA & it's MERE VITAMINS, on second thought.

Not until I got home has it dawned on me that w/o this "pabaon," I could have surely returned voiceless for a gig, throat sore, immune system impaired and all thanks to MY WEAK LUNGS. But I have coped & have been assiduously protected. Most importantly, I've got my mom. Thanks Ma. I LOVE YOU.