I live my life like my journey has just begun every morning.
I am influenced by great historical figures such as Martin Luther King, Malcolm X, Ghandi and Bruce Lee, who all stood for their beliefs and made a difference to their societies.
Closer to home, I am inspired by my parents and generally people from their generation who had to struggle and work so hard to bring us up.
My grandma used to live alone at a kampong at Pulau Tekong and I remember visiting her as a family every week by bumboat. I just loved the community spirit then where everyone from different races knew each other, got along and even shared fruits from the garden.
Timbre rekindles some of those memories, where I see Singaporeans of all race and creed come together to celebrate music. That makes me happy.
Kids who groove to music never fail to bring a smile and brighten my day.
I was very much a loner growing up. I was listening to blues, jazz and other African American music forms since I was 16 and not many of my friends at that time could relate or identify with that.
In retrospect, I am thankful as it helped me immerse myself totally in music, which helped shape my personality and define my purpose till this very day.
As a kid, I wanted to be a policeman. Well, I guess we all feared and respected policemen when we were young and we knew that they protected society.
When I proposed to my then girlfriend in the middle of my performance at the recent Singapore Arts Festival, I was truly happy. It was a milestone in my life and it happened to be my birthday (which was a decoy) and all my friends and colleagues were there to witness it and celebrate with me.
I collect vinyls; all 400 plus of them.
I don’t have any political persuasion, every system has its pros and cons. However I’d like to see young Singaporeans encouraged and inspired to sing, play music and create their own songs.
If we can have a slightly more relaxed and less fearful censorship system to help this process, I will stand for it.
You cannot please everyone, and sometimes you have to focus on your own happiness as well.
Lending money to friends can break a friendship.
At the end of the day, I want to uplift Singapore music to a new level where we have 10-fold more support and a viable music market place so that musicians and artistes can make a decent living.
A mature first world society requires first world arts and culture as well.
