Julien Drolon's Phil So Good Album Launch

Julien Drolon and Rhian Ramos

Manila based French singer Julien Drolon has made a name for himself in the local music scene for the past year performing in various malls and music festivals all over the country. His profile increased tenfold when he released a video of Ipagpatawad Mo singing in Filipino and in French that got him mainstream television coverage. Now, he sets his sights in firmly establishing himself in the music industry by releasing his debut album (an EP) entitled Phil So Good. The album’s name (also the title of the carrier track that featured Rhian Ramos) is Julien’s way of expressing his love to the Philippines which has been his home for the past couple of years.

The Embassy of France to the Philippines, Alliance Française de Manille and Entertainment Circuit organized the album launch of Julien Drolon which was also attended by Rhian Ramos. The event that was held at the Alliance Française de Manille gave me the chance to ask Julien more about his music and the album.

Julien only has praises for the quality of musicians from all genres here in the Philippines. In fact, his band in the album and during tours are made up of Filipino musicians. Among local recording artists, he particularly likes Brownman Revival, Tropical Depression, Gary Valenciano, Bamboo, Moonstar88 and Franco a lot. Chito Miranda of Parokya ni Edgar was someone he almost collaborated with but their musical styles didn’t seem to fit so that idea was shelved. Speaking of musical styles, Julien says that his music is more of a funky reggae heavily influenced by Bob Marley and Jason Mraz.

Talking about the tracks in the album, he said that he wrote and recorded Phil So Good unaware of the Department of Tourism’s It’s More Fun in the Philippines campaign. But he will be delighted if this song does promote tourism in the country. This sentiment was also echoed by Rhian Ramos who grabbed the opportunity to show off her rapping skills in this track. She said that she’s been a closet singer for all this time and that she’s happy to be featured in Julien’s album. Rhian’s initial foray into the music scene was her track You which was included in the Audition Battle Dance album back in 2009.

When asked about the the other songs, Julien explained that Free to Love was written when he was in Hong Kong and it’s about the freedom of loving people. No More Divisions, on the other hand was the first song that he recorded here in the Philippines. Encouraging people to live their dreams is the main message of the song Wake Up. And the interesting reggae song Peace through Music featured lyrics (in Filipino) written by national hero Dr. Jose Rizal. The last track, End of Time, a funky song clocking almost six minutes is Julien’s take on the 2012 prophecy

The album has an overall feel good vibe in it with all the songs having a positive spin since Julien does want to promote peace, love and harmony through music. His thick French accent is sometimes a bit distracting although it surprised me that this same accent didn’t bother me that much when he sang lines in Filipino. And the same could be said with his impressive Filipino in Ipagpatawad Mo which unfortunately wasn’t included in this album. Julien explained that he wanted to focus on his own songs with this album, hence the non-inclusion of this track.

One significant aspect of this album is that it is available as a USB drive shaped like a key with the songs already in MP3 format. Lyrics of the songs and the video of Phil So Good are also included in the drive which also has a lot more space for more files. The album packaging is actually a 50 page notebook that Julien encourages his listeners to use in writing their dreams which was effective for him.

Special thanks once again to the Embassy of France for inviting me over to the album launch.

Phil So Good

Tracks:

1. Free to Love

2. No More Divisions

3. Phil So Good featuring Rhian Ramos

4. Wake Up

5. Peace through Music

6. End of Time

7. Phil So Good (Instrumental)