Sunrise Bistro & Bar @ East Coast Park

The Tripsters

The story began as we're approached to perform as a resident band at Sunrise Bistro & Bar. It's the very first time we The Tripsters signed a contract for regular gigs.

What I really like about the place is that there's already a keyboard in place, and it hasn't been so convenient and enjoyable sitting on the cajón playing the keyboard - there's really flexibility and I was then regularly playing not one but two instruments. When friends are told the place I'm performing at, they're like wow, that's way to far, from everywhere. That isolated location really makes a difference in traveling there by car and by public transport. Still, thank God I have a direct buss (966) from Bukit Panjang to Marine Parade, although there's still a 10-minute-walk to complete the journey.

Food are overpriced to be frank, in spite of the fact the bar isn't even strategically located. Some food are great though, such as the Large Prawn Aglio Olio, my all time favorite despite being allergic to seafood! You have to try this if you're here one day. We're entitled to selected food and drinks from the menu, and most of the time I get the Large Prawn Aglio Olio, the taste is irresistible.

To those soccer fans out there, Sunrise Bistro & Bar often broadcasts soccer matches on their indoor and outdoor TVs (they have a big screen outdoor).

Stirling Bar & Grill @ Upper Bukit Timah

Stirling Bar & Grill

One of the legit reasons to visit restaurants and cafes along the Upper Bukit Timah Road is the new accessibility to the nearby MRT stations.

Stirling Bar & Grill is one of those lucky ones, located opposite Bukit Timah Shopping Centre and of walking distance from the Beauty World Station, thanks to the newly constructed Downtown Line.

You might be able to recall a vicinity called Stirling Road located in Queenstown, interestingly yes, the bar is named after this road because it's where the boss this bar grew up.

It was a post birthday dinner for me and Wilsen, my housemate whose birthday is a day after mine. I suggested this place simply because on one Sunday afternoon after church service, I patronized and enjoyed their cold brewed coffee by The Nomad, a mobile cafe serving coffee every weekend at Stirling.

A good and bad thing about the payment - there's no GST charges but only cash and NETS accepted. I guess if you sum them up it's still a better deal isn't it?

Exterior

Apparently they're affiliated with a guitar school and there'll be guitar solo performance at night
If you enjoy listening to guitar solo, this is the place you should be patronizing, I mean, how many bars out there with such niche?

SAFRA The Ultimate Voice 2016

SAFRA organizes an annual singing competition called The Ultimate Voice and we were in time to sign up for our very first singing competition as a 3-piece band. There're solo category and group category.

We're required to submit an audio clip of our performance, if I don't remember wrongly, the duration is limited to less than 2 minutes, where I had a hard time deciding which portion of our cover to be trimmed, we submitted "The Scientist" by Coldplay by the way.

Quarter Finals @ SAFRA Toa Payoh (20 Feb)

We're informed that we're in the quarter finals on 16 Feb, an awesome start for us. And later on I found out that one of our Temasek Hall band juniors, Yoke Ling was also in the quarter final, what a coincidence. Check out her blog entry about SAFRA TUV.

I think there were 19 quarter finalists from group category and 100+ from solo category! That's crazy, and no wonder they limit the duration to 1 minute 30 seconds per contestant.

We performed a mashup of "Shut Up and Dance" by WALK THE MOON and "How to Save a Life" by The Fray, it's random I know, and there's barely any link between the songs but somehow they key Gary sings these two songs in the same key of B♭ major, plus the similar tempo, ultimately I think we're just trying to be 'different'. LOL...

Thanks to Hannah for the video, and we got into Semi Finals. So did Yoke Ling.