I am certainly a Faithfool. I was in high school when my love affair with True Faith’s music began (which pretty much tells you that I’m not really that young anymore, haha). My older brother would play “Perfect“ in our trusty cassette player over and over again till our eardrums bled, so it pretty much stuck in my sponge-like adolescent memory bank. The first True Faith album that I purchased was “Build,” where I fell hopelessly in love with “Baliw.” I was in freshman college then.
Those in my age group witnessed the rise-and-fall-and-rise again of the band’s career. There was a time when the band was practically everywhere, and a time when their gigs picked up minimal interest (I think this was when majority of the original members left and Medwin Marfil was left to recruit new ones in order to save the band, correct me if I’m wrong). My heart broke for them when they had a gig at some carpark and the show was described as nilangaw, for a lack of a better term. This was before the recent resurrection of the Pinoy band music scene, a time when R&B was all the rage. But of course, us Faithfools did not give a shit. Nothing can’t quite compare to the sleek, one-of-a-kind voice that is Medwin Marfil. Listen, we don’t care if Medwin is not some six-foot tall hunk who can make the girls scream and throw their panties at him just by appearing onstage and make pa-cute. His voice is a fucking serenade enough to make us cream at first note, and that’s all that matters.
Bitter history aside, True Faith made up for lost time when they won the Video of the Year award at the MTV Philippines Music Awards in 2000. Suddenly, True Faith has risen again.
So I was beside myself when this very best album was released just recently. Of course, True Faith already came out with their first compilation, “Memories are Cheap: The Best of True Faith 1993 – 2000″, which I got in pirated version (sorry guys, no budget for original CDs back then, hehe). But this latest “the best” album contains their more recent hits, so it makes sense to buy it. And of course I did. An original copy, I might add.
For 299 bucks, the 2-CD album is definitely a major steal. Practically the best stuff is here, from the old school hits like “Perfect,” “Ambon,” and “Sa Puso Ko” to more recent gems such as “Sumasarap ang Gising” and the Culture Club original “Mistake Number 3.” Personally, I loathe remakes. All these covers of foreign songs are proof enough that the local music industry is in the dumps and artists today are way, way less talented than their predecessors, but “Mistake Number 3″ is an exception. The perfection that is Medwin’s voice just fucking owned the song.
Just so this entry won’t sound like an orgasmic, biased tribute from a frustrated groupie, I have to say that I’m not so keen on the cover of “Cross My Heart,” a classic from Everything But The Girl. As sublime as Medwin’s voice is, I’m not so sure if it’s right for the track. It is one of those songs that can’t be brought to justice by a male. It is hard to replicate the beautiful, haunting quality that Tracey Thorn brought to the song. It’s not that bad though, majority of the Faithfools will even love it, I think. Let’s just say, if it was sung by another male singer aside from Medwin, it would have been a disaster.
Just the same, “The Very Best of True Faith” deserves a rightful place in your original CD collection, alongside your copy of “The Eraserheads Anthology” (NOT the putrid piece of trash that is the “Ultraelectromagneticjam,” please).
