Gone After Midnight

I’ve mentioned on an older post that I was looking forward to attend a Goth-related event and I did attend it.

My sister and I attended the 8th installment of Eternal Death Wake (EDW). It’s an annual event brought by Subkulture Productions.

I learned about EDW when I was researching on the net about The Late Isabel and other gothic bands in the country. EDW stands for Eternal Death Wake; it’s a yearly Music festival and club event series held every hollows eve in Asia  that specializes in Dark Alternative Music most especially from the Gothic and Industrial Genres. I'm happy that this kind of celebration takes place in the country which also includes performances of the local gothic bands I like. That is why I’m dying to attend it ever since. Unfortunately academic stuff and other things always got on my schedule.  But this time, nothing got on the way. It’s also a good thing that the event was near our place. 

When the event came, some parts of Malate were closed because there was a street party going on and Crobar (the venue) was one of them. So we had to walk a bit to reach the entrance. When we reached it, an inspection was going on for safety reasons. It’s our first time going to such event and we were surprised that water was not allowed; maybe because the clubs wanted the attendees to buy only from them, it’s still business you know. We didn’t bring water but we brought sports drink and the guards told us that it was worse than water so bye sports drink. 

We finally reached Crobar. It’s still early and the place was not jampacked yet. After sometime, the attendees in their Halloween attires started to arrive. The bands started to play and one of the performances I really like was by Switch.

I was really looking forward to the highlight of the event which is the performance of the Tokyo-based industrial Goth band called Psydoll. I wasn’t really familiar of them until the event revealed them as special guest. I got curious so I goggled them. I listened to their music on Myspace and I was blown away. Really awesome music. It took a while before their turn and another half an hour or so for their set-up. Nekoi, the vocalist (also a manga artist) apologized. But all the waiting was pretty worth it. When they started to play, almost everyone gathered around them which explains why I didn’t manage to take decent photos, it’s hard getting around. They made a very awesome performance. It was eargasmic, hypnotic, oh, really amazing band.  I wanted to have a picture with Nekoi  but I got shy. Damn it! Now I’m very regretful.  :( I hope I’ll see them perform again in the future and have my fangirly photo with Nekoi. 

I also looked forward on the tattoo giveaway, I had this feeling I might win. Unfortunately I haven’t heard about it again. Something probably happened.

Anyway, there was also a shibari (Japanese art of bondage) exhibition. I got curious on how it would looked like, you see bondage was done with naked, or if not, almost naked participants. If that’s the case, the people outside would also see it because the club walls were made of glass. Just imagine that we were like inside an aquarium. The exhibition came and the participants were dressed. The tying was done meticulously and I admired how the ropes surrounded the body, it almost looked like a corset. It reminded me of macramé, one of my hobbies. I never thought tying a body would be beautiful. After the body tying,  the participants were  hung on the suspended ring and they were swung for a bit. I forgot take note the name of the man in-charge of the tying. He’s really good at what he does.

 

EDW8 was supposed to end at 3am but it was extended. At that time, people were starting to leave. We decided to stay and finish it until the last band performance. 

The event was good but I wasn’t that satisfied. I was hoping to hear more Goth music and see more gothic attires. But my not-that-satisfied feeling was also my fault because the event wasn’t strictly Goth at all. It also catered to different genres and there was nothing wrong about it. Nonetheless I still enjoyed it. I’ve witnessed different bands of different genres performed. There were also some unusual acts, one vocalist even got naked in the middle of their band’s performance. I’ve seen musical instruments that I’ve never seen before. It still had good music. Psydoll’s performance was a blast. Shibari exhibition was awesome. It was still worth seeing.