Victor’s musical journey started off on the wrong foot a long time ago when he was forced into slavery in front of the ivory keys to toil under the chains of Bach and Mozart. Several years of less-than-mediocre progress later, the futility of this pursuit became clear to those who started it and the shackles were finally released.
Having grown up on the sounds of the oldies radio channel (Kenny Rogers tunes still play in his head on some mornings to this day), the musical curiosity got the better of him and he dusted off his Dad’s old acoustic to try and make some sounds out of it. This was at the age when girls started coming into the picture, so it was just as well. His first major attempt at learning a full song was Eric Clapton’s Tears in Heaven and he duly purchased the Unplugged album, but little did he know how it would change the course of his life.
What hooked him for life instead was the heavy dose of acoustic blues. From that starting point, he went deeper into the blues, going back to the early masters like Muddy Waters, Robert Johnson, Howling Wolf, John Lee Hooker and countless others to explore the sounds of Chicago and Mississippi. Playing acoustic and electric blues, both slide and fretted, soon took over his life. Somehow or rather, he found time in between to complete junior college, after which he was packed off for 2.5 years of “protecting country”.
Towards the end of that stint in green, he chanced upon the Kolam Ayer Blues Club jam and formed a band called Blues Virus with some like-minded blues fanatics to play Chicago blues ala Junior Wells and James Cotton. They played at all sorts of venues, ranging from upmarket clubs to dingy bars and little tents on the roadside, and this good run of gigs continued after he commenced undergraduate studies at the National University of Singapore. During this time he also took up musical activities in Kent Ridge Hall, joining the hall band, songwriting group and playing for the annual musical production, somehow managing to fake his way through rock and pop songs with blues licks. It was at this time that he started writing blues-influenced songs and, to his surprise, won the open category of Songs 2004, an inter-tertiary songwriting contest, as well as coming in 2nd runner-up and getting Best Original Song for JamX 2006, an inter-tertiary band competition.
During his studies he managed to secure a 10 week internship in the LA-Anaheim region, in which he went for every jam session and blues gig within driving range and caught some of his musical influences in action. In the process, he also got to hang out with some of them, steal licks and sample some kick-ass microbrew beers.
After completing his undergraduate studies, he had to give his ears a rest from blasting electric guitars and crashing cymbals. He also felt the itch to go back to his musical roots of acoustic blues, so in 2007 he formed a blues duo with singer Anjana called Malted Milk and they took part in Acoustic : Stripped Live (at that time they were known as A Mess of Blues), a competition for acoustic groups organised by Imaginings Pte Ltd, with the intention to just play a few gigs and spread the blues to the yuppie crowd. Unexpectedly, their brand of music went down well with the audiences and they won the competition and a couple of other prizes along the way during the quarter and semi-finals. He also got to bum a lot of free drinks during those gigs.
On the other hand, he also started a side-project with some fellow members of Blues Virus to do yet more acoustic blues with a different feel. This group was called Medium Rare and had Louis on double-bass and Brian on harmonica. They too got to play a few gigs around town and spread the word of the blues to the uninitiated.
At this point, his misadventures have taken him to Manchester where he is back in the academic grind as a starving postgrad student. To keep his sanity intact he plays as an acoustic blues duo with Junkhousedog and they have done some great gigs at the Burnley and Colne Blues Festival fringes as well as some questionable gigs at dubious places in the underbelly of Manchester.
To date, Victor has met many great musicians and human beings in all his gigs, jams and travels and has since picked up an appreciation for most American roots music other than blues like bluegrass, country, old-time, zydeco, jazz, funk, rockabilly and gospel. He is currently on a never-ending quest to influence more Singaporeans to listen to blues and to extol the virtues of single-malt Scotch whisky and Guiness Foreign Extra Stout.
And he can still play Tears in Heaven if you are female, attractive and highly persuasive.
YO HOW ARE U HOPE ALLS WELL IVE BIN GIGING DID JAZBER CLEGG OTHER WK WAS WKD THEN THE TAPAS BAR IN BEECH RD ON SATUDAY THE WHOLE STREET WAS DANCING DOIND DIMMITRIS ON 25TH IN DEANGATE GOT ASKED TO DO THE CHOLTON FETIVAL AND PLATT FIELDS FEATIVAL SO YEAH MAN AM BUZZING HOPE ALLS GOOD GIVE ME A SHOUT SOON U NO I LOVE UR STLYLE PEACE ELLIOTT
Hi Victor ... great tunes ... Thanks for taking part in my page for musicians of the world ... blessings from the Swallow's Nest in Zhengzhou City, Henan Province, China, Clay, Pam & Xiaoqing
Hi Victor, Thanks for the request and message. Glad you enjoyed the gig! Your music sounds great. Kyla x ps. I noticed Trevor Jalla in your top friends...We shared the bill while I was on tour in Australia. He's great, isn't he?
Hi Victor, I'll be back in SQ from 19 Dec - 1 Jan. Hope to catch you then.
Love your version of 'Dust My Broom'.
And hey! guess what? I used to be in KR Hall too from 1985-89. Played with the KR Rockers and had some of the best memories in my life. Is the bandroom still there? I remember we used to call the cockroaches that hung out in the bandroom, the KR Roaches!!!
Do you know if they still have the archives group in the hall? Would love to get hold of some of the tapes from some of the concerts we had back then. Could you check?
