The Darkside Is Coming To TNL Onstage

As you can see, I am back. Yes, my brief hiatus from blogging has come to an end, amid much cheering and celebration from our beloved resident trolls I am sure. Sadly, my absence has not been due to bodily harm, manic-depression or some other juicy post-worthy story; I just got rather, well, bored. Yet, despite being off the Kottu-radar for more than 3 weeks, I am flattered to find the odd Gehan-related humour peppered across the higher echelon blogs (whose names I am not worthy to link to), and that too humour of the highest degree. I would tip my hat off to you, but I don't wear them because I am 'headless'. Get it? Haha.

So I was pleasantly surprised when my dull and mundane existence was interrupted by a call from TNL yesterday, telling me that I had been selected for the first round of the TNL Onstage 2009 Soloist competition. I was quite surprised to be honest; I had sent in my demo CD at the very last moment after some persistent urging-bordering-on-nagging from bloggers. Eventually I thought, what the heck, and I hastily downloaded the registration form, filled it out as soon as possible ("History of the band/artist"?), went through the long list of terms and conditions ("TNL will not be liable for any claims arising due to the participation in the competition"? Could you be more vague?) and burnt a CD with two songs. This was the hardest part; which songs to send? After a careful process of elimination based on pros and cons, I tossed a coin and decided on "Ghost Of You" and "Like A Stone". This was followed by a short and concise explanation to the parents and a frantic search of the premises to find a envelope large enough to send in a CD. Finally found one, stuffed in the forms and CD, sent it off and proceeded to pace around my room nervously for a full 7 minutes, after which I concluded that I wouldn't hear from them in the near future and forgot all about it. Till now.

The girl on the phone was very polite and had a lovely voice (do you have to have a good voice just to work at a radio station?). She first told me that I had been selected and congratulated me. She then told me that there was some meeting at the head office on Thursday where they would spell out the do's and don'ts of the competition, as well as meet the 'backing band'. However, she was very understanding about the logistical difficulties I would have about this.


"Oh but you're in Kandy no? Aney sin for you."

(Or something along those lines.)


So instead, I am supposed to come in on Saturday for the interview and photo-shoot, and once I am done with that she could run through what I will miss during the Thursday meeting.

And that, dear readers, is how much I know at the moment! I'm grateful for the opportunity, and I guess I'll ride my luck as far as it will take me. I am under no illusions about my vocal abilities, so I'm not going to plan too far ahead, but I DO love to sing so it should be fun! According to the radio, the preliminary rounds are supposed to be held on the 22nd of this month, but I'm not sure about that either. Hopefully it'll all work out with as much drama as possible, so that I will have something to blog about in the next few weeks.

In closing, I am going to do something now that I was very much against despite many people suggesting it before for my headless videos. Yes, you guessed it; I'm asking for song suggestions. If there is a song that you feel I might be able to do justice to, do leave it in the comments section of this post. Nothing too fancy, nothing too boring; the main thing is that it should have a nice vocal spread, something melodic and pleasing to the general populace, so please no indie or folk songs, thank you very much.

And also, song suggestions only from adults above the age of 18 will be considered, so sorry Jerry and Fallen, maybe next year.