there's really nothing i enjoy more than.  actually that's a falsehood.  let me start again.  i really enjoy singing.  it began when i was a kid in taiwan.  my dad was a pioneer in the world of karaoke ridding otherwise perfectly good music of elvis's vocals and replacing it with his own.  back then it was cassette tapes that you would turn from stereo to mono rendering the music just music.  so it was from my childhood that i was indoctrinated with karaoke to the point where i found myself inventing chinese melodies of made up words that meant nothing.  hahaha.  that's really weird now that i think about it.  strange made up chinese songs aside, growing up this way left me with an extraordinarily expansive repertoire of american oldies.   

as my dad's exploration of the world of karaoke graduated from cassette tapes to laser discs, from the family room to a full blown karaoked out basement with a stage and discoball and later performances in full regalia at convention style karaoke parties at hotels, my mom's desire for me to be the most asian kid alive manifested itself in learning instruments.  the oddest thing was i had this rock and roll stoner guy as my violin teacher.  he had fucking long hair like megadeth and was sitting there with me pulling a horsehair bow across a violin!  ahahahaha.  but he was way too patient and nice.  he'd sit thru my lessons, i'm sure, in absolute amazement at how horrible i was and the lack of any practice i'd put towards the instrument and just respond with "ok rad man, let's try it again".  at school, i joined the orchestra and would completely fake an entire performance from start to finish.  i was so bad that i started to question whether i was really asian.  i'd do a complex multiplication problem in my head to make sure.  just kidding.  the venture would ultimately leave my mom and i with nothing more than a decorative wall piece next to the bar in the basement (it actually looks quite nice).  with the exit of the violin, ceam the introduction of arduously tortursome piano lessons with veritably the meanest japanese woman ever to walk the earth.  while i was a little better at piano, at that point, i had begun way too late so everyone else my age was vastly ahead of me and performing at carnegie hall.  i floundered for years leaving me with an indelible hatred for the dining room (where the piano was located) and the oven timer (which my mom would set for an hour every day when it was time to practice).  eventually i managed to broker an exit from piano.  i probably should've gone for jazz over classical.

though through all the years of ridicule i endured under the specter of these instruments, i always had the ability to sing and keep a tune quite naturally.  it was like a consolation prize to my parents that when they had their weekly, sometimes biweekly, karaoke parties, they could make me sing in front of their friends.  this made me feel like a clown, but in a way, i kind of liked it.  hahaha.  over time, i developed an involuntary urge to sing oldies like tourettes syndrome.  so i joined the middle school chorus with a couple friends and were the first boys ever to do so.  other guys thought it was gay, but we knew it was genius.  amongst the girls we were the darlings of the chorus.  finally, after weeks of rehearsal the time had come for us to make our debut in front of the entire school!!  the chorus teacher gave us our own solo in our performance of les miserables!!  i still remember it.

on this paaage, i wriite my laaast confessionnn

reaaaad it wellll when iiiii attt lasttt am sleeepinggggg

itttt's the storrrryyy of thoooose who aaaalways loved youuuuuu

the world is full of happiness that i willl never knowwwwww

so we're all dolled up in our white gap buttondowns and slacks, front and center against a backdrop of chorus girls staring destiny squarely in the eye and we begin the solo so graciously bestowed upon us in this experiment for the chorus teacher and the three of our mid pubescent voices.  it started off pretty well but by the second line i saw this fat kid looking at us with a big ridiculous grin on his face and i began cracking up.  the other two guys shortly followed suit and eventually the entire school was cracking up.  this was my first brush with fame. 

in the summer of my junior year in high school, i went to harvard summer school where i discovered the noraebang (korean for music room) and that it was a cool night time activity for FOBs and diplomats kids.  i now had an outlet for my song and enjoyed the praise i'd get from it.  it may or may not have gotten me laid.  i'm not sure.  it certainly got me really wasted off soju (korean rice wine) served in tea kettles more than a few times.

in college, my friends and i happened upon a place called japas on st. marks.  it was a cramped cave of a bar but there were some good singers in there that appreciated other singers.  they offered real japanese style service and a bottle of johnnie walker was only $100.  for the next 10 years, my friends and i patronized the joint and it became the perfect outlet for my need for sing.  i grew up in that place and we just did about everything you could possibly do in a small karaoke bar and its bathroom.  i really liked the fact that it was public and open for all to share in the musical glory.  it became a weekly habit.  sadly, a few years ago the kawano san, the owner decided he was sick of cleaning vomit and replacing the mirror every two months and showed me the plans to change it into a noodle shop.  i wept all over his blueprints.  within weeks it was gone.  i became lost.  

in the years since japas st. marks, i've tried other open bar type places but it simply wasn't the same and nowadays, i constantly feel like i have blueballs of the voice.  bluevoice.  my girlfriend has also vetoed the idea of turning the office into a karaoke room so here comes the reason for this post.  actually i just remembered i brought a spare laser disc player to my freshman dorm room but it was so small it just didn't work.  i think i used it once when a girl came over and ended up feeling really weird about it.  anyway, today begins my search to find a weekend singing gig, probably at some piano bar, where someone would have to play piano and let me do the singing.  i don't really go out on the weekends anymore anyway.  at the same time, at the behest of alex, and at my own dismay at the total lack of what used to be a very easily flowing vomit of words, i shall revive this blog from the dead like that guy who's name starts with "l" but i can't for the life of me pinpoint the word i'm looking for.  fuck it's pissing me off.  when your dreams become riddled with shoes and meetings with buyers and the only writing you do is email pontification, it's time for a diversion.  and i want this to be a complete masturbation for me.  in other words, it's not for the potential of a singing career or becoming famous.  it's purely to satisfy my urge to bust a note.  get it?  hahaha.  this is going to be awesome.