Mike & Joe turn album launch into a sing-along

At the end of the recent launch of their self-titled new album Joe & Mike Chan at Mario’s restaurant (Tomas Morato Avenue, Quezon City), Joe and Mike Chan were requested to render a song and they willingly obliged, not just with one or two but four, making the movie media sing along with them. Standard love songs have a way of evoking beautiful memories, right?

All together now…

• First song: Simon and Garfunkel’s Sound of Silence, theme song of the iconic 1967 Mike Nichols film The Graduate that launched Dustin Hoffman to stardom;

• Second song: Chad and Jeremy’s Distant Shores;

• Third song: Everly Brothers’ All I Have To Do Is Dream; and

• Fourth song: Can We Just Stop and Talk Awhile, one of their dad Jose Mari Chan’s hit songs. 

During the presscon, Michael Philip recalled that growing up, he and Jose Antonio (together with their siblings Liza, Franco and Marie Angelica) were nourished on old love songs that they were encouraged by their dad to listen to on the radio, until as they grew older their interest included other genres.

“We grew up on the music of Paul Simon, John Lennon, Cat Stevens, Billy Joel, Stevie Wonder, Glen Campbell and other singers of that time,” recalled Mike.

“But our dad is our greatest influence,” added Joe, that’s why you find that distinct Jose Mari Chan sound and romanticism in some of the songs on the album (Finding It Hard, Tell Her, From Now On, Meant To Be and With Me Tonight). Other tracks include: The Waning Moon, Seven Lake Drive, including two instrumentals Fernandina and If I Knew You Were Coming. Mike and Joe composed all the tracks.

Together with some friends, Mike and Joe were part of the back-up band as guitarists. (From Joe Mari: “I am proud of them. Joe and Mike have inherited that precious gift of music, though they are far better musicians, both of them, than I am or ever will be. Moreover, they have developed their own individual styles and have a strong lyrical and melodious sense.”)

“Dad is a big fan of The Beatles,” shared Joe. “He told us that he and our mom (Maryann Ansaldo) even watched the Beatles concert in 1966 and Paul McCartney’s concert in Japan. He even included a song inspired by the Beatles on one of his albums. It’s called Counterpoint to Here, There & Everywhere (a Beatles song).”

Admitted Mike, “Our songs are derived from our personal experiences…our happy moments, our sad moments, our feelings of love, even our angry moments.”

Mike and Joe with their dad Jose Mari, brother Franco and their sister Liza Chan-Parpan (who does a duet with her dad on the carrier single Christmas in Our Hearts on the all-time best-selling Christmas album Going Home to Christmas)

Joe Mari is famous for his romantic songs (Please Be Careful With My Heart and A Love To Last a Lifetime were used as theme songs of two Kapamilya teleserye). Asked if they are as romantic as, or even more so, than their dad, Joe spoke for him and Mike, “All of us are romantic. We put so much emotion into the lyrics of our songs.”

According to Mike, doing the album came naturally to him and Joe. Before that, they sang Christmas Memories on their dad’s Going Home to Christmas, the follow-up to Christmas In Our Hearts (the all-time best-selling Filipino Christmas album that has sold millions of copies.)

“We’ve been making music together since we were kids,” revealed Mike. “Dad is our source of inspiration. He has been supportive of this project. We let him listen to the songs and he said they are ‘very diverse.’ He knew that we were covering a lot of genres and he’s happy about it. Dad’s forte, his melodious style, is evident in the lyrics of our songs.”

(The Joe & Mike Chan album is released by Star Music, available for streaming on Spotify, Apple Music and other digital store. For updates, follow @abscbnpr on Facebook, Twitter and Instagram, or visit www.abs-cban.com/newsroom)

(E-mail reactions at [email protected]. For more updates, photos and videos, visit www.philstar.com/funfare or follow me on Instagram @therealrickylo.)