Introducing the girl a.k.a. Cassandra

I still recall from where Sharon Cuneta got the nickname. It was from Casey, the name Drew Barrymore had in one of her early films. The title was Irreconcilable Differences and it was about a marriage coming apart and how the daughter, played by Drew, dealt with the pain caused by her warring parents. But instead of Casey, Mom Sharon decided to call her baby girl KC with the two letters standing for Kristina Cassandra.

The title of that movie now sounds like a portent of things to come. Sharon’s KC did not go as far as emancipating herself, but she did experience the pain of watching the marriage of her parents come to end. Maybe, unconsciously for all concerned, it was a way of disassociating their KC from what happened to that Casey that although she grew up known as KC everywhere, Sharon’s daughter has always been Kristina to her family, in school and among her close friends.

Now grown up, smart, beautiful and a celebrity in her own right, Kristina is all the more known as KC everywhere. The name is now part of showbiz lore. It will never be shunted aside, retired or erased from memory. But while she is KC in public and Kristina at home, who is to stop this girl from using another name to introduce another side to herself? This one is neither Kristina nor KC, she is a girl who is also known as Cassandra.

KC or Kristina is now a recording artist and the title of her first album is aka Cassandra. This new girl is different from the actress, the model, the product endorser or everything else that KC is today, and that includes being the daughter of Megastar Sharon Cuneta. Being the latter comes with many privileges but it also entails coping with very high expectations. To the delight of many, who feared otherwise, KC easily hurdled the inevitable comparisons to her mother and is now an established star.

Not so Cassandra. The release of aka Cassandra puts KC in an arena that her mother has dominated for decades. Sharon opens her mouth to sing and a future classic comes out. It has been so since she was 12. While KC can easily stand on her own in other aspects of her career, her debut as recording artist invites close comparisons.

I guess that is why this girl has chosen to be called Cassandra. Singing is the most personal among all the things she does. She is not reliant here on anybody. Only herself. And she now presents to us not the KC who long ago toyed with singing Mr. DJ. She is also not Kristina who might be expected to do Sana’y Wala Ng Wakas. This is Cassandra and I am glad she is nothing like Sharon Cuneta.

I know that had she been given Cassandra’s songs to sing, Sharon would have also done a great job. But she missed that boat and it is now her daughter’s turn to take the ride. Solo, of course.

The uneven quality of the CD calls for a producer who could have kept a tight rein on the production and given it a definite direction. On the other hand though, that could have detracted from the spontaneity of the whole package and the sense of rebellious fun that KC or I should say Cassandra imparts to the songs.

Her choice of material is eclectic but that is forgivable in a first album. This is an artist still in search of herself and is more attuned to what she can do and what she likes rather than what works together.

I love Doo Be Doo, the South African hit song Joey de Leon adapted into Filipino. This is the most commercial cut and puts KC in touch with a wide market. I can already hear children singing doo be doo for ages to come. I love the inclusion of Joey Ayala’s anthemic Agila Haring Ibon. Only a singer who eschews limitations can get away with this. KC does. And sweet and wistful is Ryan Cayabyab’s contribution Ngiti Lang.

Other cuts included are covers of Melt with You by Modern English; I Just Can’t Get Enough by Depeche Mode; Umbrella by Rihanna; Imagine by John Lennon; It Must Have Been Love by Roxette; and new originals like Impossible, An Updated Version of Me and Breathe.