Hombre = The Man ( Spanish)
Well, Rene certainly IS the man in The UnXpected.
Soaring guitar solos.
Sweet vocal harmonies.
Musical Director.
Extremely funny when drunk.
I first got to know about Rene when I was… er… 17 or 18. When Brannigan’s was still at The Hyatt and his band Brawn Awt was the resident entertainment. They rocked and we loved going there for the strawberry magaritas! A few years later I was visiting KL with a friend and we tracked them down at Hard Rock Cafe and lucky little me got to jam with them!
In 2004, we were looking for a new guitarist as Roy (our previous guitarist) was gonna move on to other stuff. I got a contact number from our good friend David (catch David at Balaclava on Mondays) and was told this Rene plays guitar AND keyboards. I thought his name looked really familiar and when we finally met, I was stoked! Man! I get to play with one of the most happening guitarists to ever come out of the Philippines! Wheeeeeee!
Initially Rene was quiet and unassuming.
It also took Brandon a while to get used to Rene’s accent. I was usually the ‘translator’ during rehearsals cos Brandon could hardly make out what Rene was asking of him.
The Rene now is my inspiration, he makes sure we all get our vocal harmonies right and he plays guitar like he’s on fire. Also, he plays it on tippy-toes sometimes. Hee hee!
With Rene we are able to push our limits when it comes to the songs we choose to cover. Here’s a guitarist who can play literally everything.
We are so blessed.
We are also grateful for the side-splitting stories of his younger gigging days, from the Philippines to Japan to China.
This is the Hombre. Watch him, and be inspired.
read about Brandon and Asri in our brand new category “The UnXpected Revealed“!
