Amateur Takes Control

WE HAVE MOVED!

www.amateurtakescontrol.tumblr.com 

Hey guys,

So sorry for not updating. We totally forgot we had a livejournal. Lame, I know.

Anyways, we've updated our upcoming shows page, even though there is only one show. Probably gonna be our last for a few months since we'll be heading to the studio to record a few songs for an EP and since Syadie is going to NS.

So yeah that is all the updates I can give you now cause we've been busy with our own stuff.

Hope you guys are healthy and may you have a nice weekend ahead!

Adel

Finally had the time to update this livejournal a bit.
As you can see, the links on the left are different and they have more info on the band such as press/contact, discography, etc.

We have two shows coming up! Check our upcoming shows page on the left for more info.

Sad news: I am disappointed to announce that I will not be able to bring This Town Needs Guns to Singapore as their Australian tour will not be happening. This means that if i bring them down I will have to fork out money for 4 return tickets which is just out of my budget. Sorry guys. Hopefully in the near future.

Adel

 Like i promised.

What do you think?

Photo credits : Hidayah Jais

Good evening amateurs,

hope you guys are doing well!

Just to update you people on the band and what we have been up to.

As you all already know, Isa is in NS. He is currently bald and will be booking out this Good Friday. Pictures of his shaved head will be taken and if we have the time, it will be posted here!

Syadie the cutest drummer of all time is very busy recording with his other band Paris In The Making. Really great band who I've been friends with since i was 15. They're touring South East Asia early May with Milvains from Italy, so keep a lookout for that.

Jem is currently busy with his school exams. He's studying business management or something along those lines in SIM. So far, the only one in the band making money since he's working for some top secret government agency.

I am in my last two weeks of school before my holidays start. Pretty hectic weeks ahead for me but I am still able to put some time aside for Left4dead. I will be playing two shows in Manila with my other musical experiment which is A Band Named Power in June. So that will be pretty exciting. I am also busy trying my best to bring This Town Needs Guns from UK with the help of my friend Matthew Cooper from Uneven Blonde and I am doing my very best to make it happen.

On a more ATC note - we are saving up and will be meeting up soon to jam out some new songs for a release late this year. Thank you for your patience and support.

Cheers,
Adel on behalf of ATC

Our dear bassist Isa will be going to National Service next week.

So the band will be taking a break before we start playing shows again.

Wish him luck if you know him! :)

Hey all,

just wanted to update you on our show this Friday 27th February.

Indie Indeed
27th February
Friday

Lineup:

Everybody Loves Irene (Indonesia) - 730pm
Amateur Takes Control - 845pm
Deepset (Malaysia) - 10pm

We'll be play a couple of new songs so it'll be nice to see you there. Our album will be for sale so bring some cash!

Thank you and have a nice day.

Amateur Takes The Rap

Please vote for us so that we can perform at the Worldwide Festival in May. It would be totally awesome if you could help us in getting our music be heard by more people.

If you have voted, do let us know so we can personally thank you.

But anyways, THANK YOU in advance!

Cheers,
Amateur Takes Control

Yesterday's issue of I-S magazine was a huge disappointment for me.

At the top of the cover page it showed "Amateurs Take Control". So, I thought is it a coincidence that the title sounds almost like my band name or did they spell my band name wrong? I took a look at the contents page and found 3/4 of my band's photo (1/4 of the photo or my face rather being covered by of all bands Astroninja). That was the first FAIL.

I thought that was it but when I turned to the actual article, i saw it again. ATC's photo at the top of the page, the largest photo in the article. Bigger than Plainsunset, I Am David Sparkle and The Great Spy Experiment. You are probably thinking, why am I upset over a photo? There are many reasons. Firstly, the photo was uncredited. That photo of ATC belongs to Postscript and art directed by Villains. From what I know, KittyWu Records (our label) gave them that photo of ATC and it wouldn't have been as bad if they have at least credited KittyWu. Secondly, the same photo was edited without permission TWICE. Honestly, if it was some school magazine article I would have closed one eye but you're talking about a heavily distributed magazine (you're talking 50,000 copies weekly). It's just nonsense to me that such a publication is not taking crediting seriously.

One last thing - Why is our photo the biggest? When we were not even interviewed and there was not even a bit of information on us. The only thing about us was just the following sentence :

"The brainchild of Errol Tan and Lesley Chew, the year-old label has made a big splash in the indie music scene by promoting and marketing bands like electro-pop band The Karl Maka, shoegaze/electronic act Amberhaze, and post-rock group Amateur Takes Control"

Just for your reference, the shot below is of the mentioned article (first page only) and have been used only for CRITICAL use.




So that's about it. We from ATC, don't believe in free publicity and we don't believe in someone else getting the cash while we're here working hard writing and performing the songs.

Adel,
Amateur Takes It Or Leave It

Congratulations to the Lunar Node guys for launching their EP. Please get it when you have the chance.

We looked like that (refer to photo below) after our 8 song set.


Credits go to Joey T.

Also, our album "You, Me and The Things Unsaid" is selling at all Gramophone outlets and The Esplanade Shop. I would recommend getting it at the Esplanade Shop as it is significantly cheaper and I feel kinda bad for the guy who works there cause I spilled my drink on the floor at the shop just now. So please, support us and Singapore arts and music in general buy shopping at the Esplanade Shop!

One last thing, ATC will be playing at the Esplanade Waterfront Stage on 27th February for some event which i'm not particularly sure about as details have not been out yet (i wonder why). From what I heard, Deepset from KL and Everybody Loves Irene from Indonesia will be playing as well. It will be our first time on the outdoor stage so we would love your support.

We have been in the studio writing new songs and planning an EP late this year. We've been on a songwriting rampage and what we love to do is share our music so we are working hard in making it happen.

I guess that's about it for now. Since this is a journal, maybe we'll update on personal stuff about the band if any of you are interested (which I hardly doubt so?).

Thank you for your time.

Love,
Adel
Amateur Taking It Seriously

Hello,

so we played our set at home club last Saturday and we honestly did not play an awesome set.

But we're thankful for everyone who stayed to watch us. It really touched me to see that the crowd was huge and that none of you threw tomatoes at any of us. We will do better next time we promise.

On a brighter note, we're happy for the Sparkle boys and we really want to see them go to Texas.

Thank you all for supporting the cause.

We'll be seeing you this Saturday. It will be an awesome show!

More info on the show in our past entries so do check it out.

Adel

Isa and I got quoted in a Straits Times article yesterday (Wednesday).

Check it out HERE.

Have fun kiddos.

What is Indie to you?

Cheerios,
Adel

Hello all,

just an update about this saturday's show. There will be I am David Sparkle merchandise on sale during the show. Please support them by purchasing their merch. More info at www.totexasandback.blogspot.com

Unfortunately, we will not be selling any merch this Saturday. But we'll be looking forward to see you guys there.

Can't touch this,
Adel

Your support is most welcome.

Cheers,
Amateur Takes The Plunge

The band had possibly the best show of our lives.

We kicked into 2009 the best way possible - with Communication Downbreak.

We'd like to say thanks to those who came, moshed (i'm not talking about your pussy pop punk moshpits), stole the mic, saved our gear and for supporting us.

To the bitter ones with low spirits and could only heal themselves by using profanities to others should just fucking grow up.

Have a good new year.

Adel

Hey everyone,

The show tomorrow at Straits Records is going on at 8pm.

Other bands are Tacit Aria, The Pinholes, The Zozi, ETC.

We go on at 10pm.

It's $5 per entry. (Really sorry about this one cause I just found out myself)

Hope to see you guys there!

Amateur Takes Control has come a long way since we first started out. It's been 2 years exactly since our first show. I can still remember our first show, organized by our lovely friend Stacy. Heider was on drums, Steve on bass, Jem and I on guitar. That was our first and only show planned cause I never thought people would actually like the music that I wrote. After that show, more people called us for shows and In that month alone, we played 7 shows. That month was crazy for ATC.

Now, things are a little bit different, I guess. In 2008, the amount of shows we played that paid us, not produced by me (a lot of our shows are produced by me), could be counted with one hand. And we're still expecting a payment from one organizer from a show we played in May (which apparently is heavily sponsored). Though we don't play shows very often, we're content with what we've achieved so far. Two years is a short time and there's definitely more stuff that's gonna happen with the band.

To the people who have been there since we started out, we truly thank you for your support.

On to other news -

Our label, KittyWu Records has done it again! This time, they're bringing Mogwai down! Please support KittyWu by coming to the show. I watched Mogwai back in 2006 when I was only familiar with a few of their songs but their show CHANGED MY LIFE. If you don't believe me, you have to watch them.

Visit www.kittywurecords.com for details

Also, our friends from I Am David Sparkle will be heading to Texas in March for SXSW! We're really happy for them. IADS will be having a fundraiser show on the 31st January at Home Club to fund their trip to Texas. More details when I get them. In the meantime, if i'm not wrong, the line up will include A.U.M, MUON, The Great Spy Experiment, Plainsunset, 41 (KL), Dear Arson, A Band Named Power, ATC and of course I Am David Sparkle.

I swear to God, that is one of the best lineups I have ever seen for a long time.

That should be it for now.

Thank you, Goodnight.

Adel Takes A Bow

Click on the button above to check it out!

There are a lot of awesome music so don't miss out.
Show will be up for 7 days so check it while you can!

ps: Starts at 8am Singapore time 7th Dec.

Hey folks,

here is another review. Interesting to see someone else's opinion on our album "You, Me and All The Things Unsaid". He reviewed it drunk alright.




Click on the image for a larger view.