While I was driving from Consolacion to the Cathedral in Cebu City last Saturday, I heard a Monster Radio DJ interviewing a band called Drip Manila. At first I did not find the discussion interesting at all because the female DJ seemed clueless about the quartet and their brand of music. But since I like the electronica and triphop genres I did not touch the tuner of my car radio.

Drip Manila was in Cebu to do some gigs and promote their “Identity Theft” album. What really caught my interest and fueled my curiosity was when Beng, the group’s vocalist, said that their latest album is released under a Creative Commons license. I thought - are they the first Filipino band to release a copylefted album? Guess what I did first when I grabbed hold of a computer with an internet connection? Yes, I visited their multiply site.

Drip Manila’s “Identity Theft” album is indeed the first full-length Filipino album to be released under Creative Commons. The license gives users the freedom to remix and share Drip’s music as long as it is for non-commercial purposes and that the band is given full credit. I am now listening to “Turning Gray” via Last.fm as I write this post. And I find the track melancholic yet relaxing at the same time. Beng’s voice is both dreamy and confident. Kind of strange yet pleasant… thus I like it.

Drip is Beng Calma-Alcazaren (vocals), Malek Lopez (live keyboards, sound design & programming), Caliph8 (turntables & FX), and Ian Magbanua (beats, samples & programming). To know more about them, you may visit their Multiply or MySpace site. Their album is available at Amazon, Napster and local music stores.

Image credit: Drip Manila at Multiply