Abbey Road

The day before the concert, I’m on a double decker bus with the Eraserheads. It’s been hired by the producer of the show, Marvin Guzman, for the day to tour the group and their entourage for a bit of sightseeing around London. A Filipino flag is draped across the vehicle’s sides, covering its trademark red with our national colors. At the front, on the space reserved to announce its destination, it instead reads the band’s name, with the “E” reversed for extra flourish. It’s as if we’re ready to storm the capital.

All their families are here with us except for Marcus’s youngest, Keona, who unfortunately was not able to get a visa for some reason. But it’s still a sight to see the band members with their kids. I don’t know of any other Filipino band whose members are all fathers. And doting ones at that. That, I think, says a lot.

We’re coming from Romford, which is outside the city proper, but where the band was scheduled to appear for a press conference and a meet-and-greet with their fans. Jude, a friend of a friend, is with me. He’s been based in London for a couple of years and has offered to be a guide while we’re here. I’m texting with Jake Verzosa, the photographer, who has just landed at Heathrow and will go straight to meet us at our destination: Abbey Road Studios.

The studio is closed for renovation so we won’t be able to enter. But it just seems only fitting for the Eraserheads to visit since the only other comparable band to their status in our shores has always been The Beatles. It isn’t that they are that keen on being identified with the Liverpool quartet. (It’s been pointed out before in their former interviews that only Ely is really a fan. In fact, the only band all four seem to be in agreement in liking a lot is The Cure.) If anything, the similarities between the two groups are more in terms of impact and influence. And the way they changed everything when they came out when they did. If the Beatles still existed (or both John Lennon and George Harrison were still alive for that matter) and broke their vow never to come back to Manila, I think it might be nice if they visited the University of the Philippines campus in Diliman.

It’s not clear anymore how the idea came up, but I guess I might’ve suggested it before we left for London, that we should shoot the four of them crossing Abbey Road for the cover of Esquire, as an homage to the Beatles’ album cover. I knew it would be iconic. And I knew that it would resonate with our readers. It also seemed like a good idea at the time.

For some reason, Jake’s suddenly stopped texting me back and I’m beginning to worry if he’ll be there on time. Or get lost on the way.

Jude tells me that I shouldn’t worry and that we’ve got a long way to go. According to his estimate, the distance between Romford and Abbey Road is roughly equivalent to that of Cavite and Makati. We’ve got time. Lots of it.

Right now, the band, all four seated at the back of the bus, starts to jam. With only acoustic guitars, they start singing a number of songs, from The Smiths’ “Panic” to The Clash’s “Career Opportunities”, Queen’s “Crazy Little Thing Called Love” to Blur’s “Tender”, to name a few.

Outside, the satellite towns pass us by, with their monotony of low buildings, their English charm only glimpsed as we travel down the road towards the heart of the metropolis. Viewing the sights from the upper saloon of the bus, with its elevated perspective from street level, imbues everything with a surreal melancholy, as if we’re gliding through but remain apart from everything around us, like spacemen in a rocket ship going forth across the cold expanse. Or disembodied spirits who can only observe the surroundings yet never really touch anything beyond the surface. Exiles from home. Strangers in a strange land, growing stranger every moment.

Earlier, just as we started this trek back into London, the band had launched into an rendition of their very own “Waiting for the Bus” but it’s only now, about halfway into our journey, at the precise moment that a silence has descended upon everyone in the bus, that the restless words and the plaintive melody of the song come to resonate and give shape to this inchoate emotion.

I‘m a travelling man, straight from the can, I‘m a thousand miles away from my number one fan…

As soon as we hit the city, the tour guide comes up from below and starts his spiel. Holding and talking through his microphone, he’s making a gallant effort to get everyone to listen. Even to participate. And we all do, gamely enough, answering his pop quizzes and throwing jokes back at him. From him we learn a lot of things about the places rushing past us outside our windows. A lot of interesting factoids, including a roll call of heroes and villains from a particular area’s history, the reason why London cabbies charge so high (it takes four years of training to get their license apparently), and a lot of pop culture landmarks, like the tube station where a scene in the Harry Potter movies was filmed or the pub where Iron Maiden first played. However, this was all just a preamble to Abbey Road, of course.

I’m texting Jake to ask him where he is, but he’s still not responding. I’m beginning to get worried.

Like the band, it’s his first time in London. We were having breakfast months before when I mentioned to him that I was going. His marriage had just fallen apart so we decided to meet up and just talk. He tells me that the last time he had seen the band he was still in college. (He was too busy with work to attend the last reunion concerts in Manila.) So it was decided right there and then that he should come along to take pictures. As much as I’ve come to appreciate traveling alone, I’ve always gotten along with Jake and knew it would be no problem. He’s a good friend and he was surely perfectly tasked to document this tour given his training and talent as a photojournalist, not to mention his enthusiasm for the music. It would be nice to share the experience with him.

It’s almost evening as we pull up to Abbey Road, and the light is already darkening. It had been overcast all day, which was disconcerting enough but expected. But now it’s rush hour as well. This was another thing I was concerned about.

I’m also anxious to see if Jake had made it.

But as soon as I get off the bus, I was relieved to see him sitting on a bench just at the curb, with his camera. In his hurry, he had forgotten his phone inside the cab. As much as I wanted to console him then, there was still a job we both had to do. We got to work. Anna Disini, who manages Marcus, had already designated me as the floor director of the shoot. Which entailed not only managing the stage directions for the four members amidst the other people that would surely be present there at the same time but also the crowd that we ourselves had brought with us. (Including other media covering the band’s visit, like ABS-CBN’s Ryan Chua who was videotaping the whole thing and thus earning me an appearance on the network’s primetime news program TV Patrol for the first and hopefully last time.)

The first time the four Eraserheads crossed the road they walked across too fast. The second time Jake was already struggling to compete for space to get a decent shot given that everyone else had taken out their phone cameras to form a crowd around him blocking his view of the street. The managers of the band started to help to control the situation by shouting out aloud that only Jake would be on the road for the next attempt. Jude, who was my lieutenant and in charge of cueing the band to cross, signaled to me that they were ready to give it another go as soon as the traffic would allow. We waited for the cars to pass.

It was rush hour all right and I was beginning to despair of getting the cover shot, given the volume of vehicles that were turning up. Added to this, there were other tourists around waiting for their turn to do the famous crossing. I also started to notice the presence of uniformed men talking into their radios on the periphery.

We had no permit to do this after all.

Standing in the middle of the road, Jake had positioned himself about a hundred meters away to get the right amount of distance to get it as close as possible as to how the Beatles were also photographed. That would also give him a wide area to cover but with probably not as much time to capture the moment. The traffic showed no signs of abating and he had to dodge a number of cars that whizzed past him, driven perhaps by irate motorists who hadn’t a care about what we were doing or who were so sick and tired of just everyone else doing it all the years that they were looking for someone to make an example of.

I was also worried that it was going to rain.

With the day fading, our chances of getting the photo seemed to be remote. Just as I was thinking this, the road suddenly cleared of cars and pedestrians.

I called out to Jude to give the signal for the four to walk across.

But just as each band member was about to hit his respective spot, and Jake was about to click the button on his camera, someone from the production crew runs into the frame to take a picture. I see this and run to push him out but it’s too late. Thwarted again. We would have to do it one more time.

I’m now embarrassed enough to approach the band and talk to them to beg for their indulgence. No worries at all, they were all gracious enough to tell me, although I know that this was all making them already uneasy. I tell myself though that we’ve all come this far, it would be even worse if we don’t get it done. If anything, I owed it to everyone involved to make it happen.

Offering a little prayer to St. Jude, the patron saint of the impossible, I ask for another opportunity. Like many times before, it’s answered and given.

And again the Eraserheads cross the street. This time though it’s someone not from our party who deliberately walks into the shot and stands there, behind the band. He looks directly at Jake and I and smiles. Fuck.

The sensible thing would have been to pack up, call it a day and think of other options for cover. But I’ve never been accused of being sensible. And against better judgment, I ask that we try for another take. We were going to get this, goddammit.

On the fifth try, we got it. It couldn’t have been more perfect. It was decided that we wouldn’t arrange the members in the order that was expected of them. Ely wouldn’t “be” John Lennon at the front of the line but instead be at the back where George Harrison was. Marcus would be first, then Buddy, and then Raymund. This somehow made sense, although I’m not sure exactly why. But it felt appropriate for some reason. Maybe it was because we weren’t after a recreation as much as homage, and what’s one without a bit of a smirk? No one can say that the Eraserheads really did what was expected of them, and not ever without a sense of humor. More than anything else, that’s perhaps the one thing they really have in common with The Beatles.

I thank everyone who helped make it all happen later and apologize for all the hassle that they’ve been put through. (I also apologize to the guy that I pushed. That was bad manners I admit.) Raymund tells me that it’s all good. “That was punk rock,” he says.

There’s a good feeling about as everyone heads over to the gate of the studios and poses for pictures.

We did it. Like I said, it seemed like a good idea at the time.

Now it was time to celebrate.

Share this Story