Give A Girl A Guitar And She Will Show You Girlhood
An Interview with Barbie Almalbis
by Faye Allego
When adversity strikes, Barbie Almalbis’ songwriting prevails; she takes her pain and either releases, soothes, or embraces it through her words, her conversations with her loved ones, and, of course, through her impeccable skills on the guitar. Her reputation throughout the years as one of OPM’s great legends is continuously proven through her playful work ethic; From her experimental approach to her esteemed collection of instruments. It goes without showing, but taking the time to hear her mind in tracks like “Paper Doll” and “Maniwala Ka” from her previous work in Barbie’s Cradle and Hungry Young Poets to beautifully loud and honest ballads “Homeostasis” and “Platonic” found in her latest release, Not That Girl, manifests and greatly displays her genius. Almalbis’ music is for everyone and anyone who has the ability to close their eyes and feel. It is now 8:00 pm at Mow’s Bar, Quezon City.
The night is still young, and sooner or later, the crowd from in and outside Mow’s will be hearing Barbie Almalbis perform the iconic guitar solo from Metallica’s “Master of Puppets” as well as cheering on songs from her latest album. Just beside the smoking area is the graffitied green room where Pikoy, Suyen, and members from (e)motion engine and Moonwlk have laid their bags, water bottles, broken drumsticks, and string instruments. Sitting in the corner is Almalbis and her team; In this interview, the technicolor in the graffiti all around the room comes to life as she takes on girlhood and the guitar unleashes.
*This interview has been edited for clarity and brevity
FA: In celebration of Women’s Month and the release of Not That Girl, who are women in music that you look to when it comes to songwriting?
Almalbis: The earliest ones that I really felt encouraged me to write as well [were] singer-songwriters like Joni Mitchell. My most favorite was Brickie Lee Jones, and they still play up till this day. Seniors na sila, right? [laughs] But they still perform. And then there’s so many artists that they’ve inspired as well, Jewel, Alanis Morissette. There’s just so many women that I looked up to. The Indigo Girls, The Murmurs, Elastica, sobrang dami. It’s a wide range, too. PJ Harvey, Bjork, Tori Amos. I had a Tori Amos cassette that I just played every day over and over. Sean Colton.. I’m so blessed to have lived in a time where there’s just so much representation. So much music that spoke about things that I cared about. And I’ve always felt like there was a space for me as a musician and as a songwriter. So I never felt otherwise because of these artists [who] just spoke their mind and embraced their femininity as well.
FA: Are there any new and upcoming acts or female artists that you’re very excited for?
Almalbis: Oh, yeah. Yeah, well, here in the Philippines, Ena Mori. A lot of people love her. I love her. Clara Benin. Pikoy, right there. And, yeah, Moonwlk.
FA: So, “I’m not like other girls” is a phrase that has a negative connotation to younger women as the label of “pick-me girls” is starting to arise, especially in the younger generation. Are you familiar with those terms?
Almalbis: Oh, yeah. I mean, “I’m not like other girls”. It’s like they’re pitting us against each other, right? Society has a negative view of girls, and they actually want to infect girls themselves and to think that way about others. And it can happen. It’s sad. We have to, to somehow fight it. We have to go out of our way to support each other.
“I have noticed that the people around me that I get to work with are getting younger and younger.”
FA: In your new album, your title is “Not That Girl”. So what does that mean, Not That Girl? What does not being “that girl” imply?
Almalbis: Well, actually, I do want the music [to speak for itself]. I feel like the songs, the lyrics, the stories in the songs would better explain that. I would rather not define it in just one thing, the thing that I don’t want to be. Something like that. But the album talks about change as well. Somehow in life, you can encounter the same types of trials or the same types of challenges, but you’re not the same person anymore. You may be able to handle it better this time. It’s revisiting the mistakes that I’ve done in the past and having the grace towards myself that I can change. And extending the same grace to people. Yeah, that there’s always hope for [the knowledge] that you can change. So yeah, it’s not really a girl thing. It’s just a person thing. That I’m not that person anymore. I think that’s so beautiful.
FA: You’ve been performing for more than a decade, and your demographic has remained the same. The youth. Why do you think that is?
Almalbis: Oh, really? I’ve just not really done it deliberately or anything. I have noticed that the people around me that I get to work with are getting younger and younger.
It’s like when I was starting, you must have been maybe not yet born. I was like, wow, these people. It’s like the next thing you know. Now we’re giggling with our friends’ kids, you know. It’s fun. I’m happy. I’m happy to do that. I think. My favorite artists are now. Joni Mitchell is probably in her 70s, 80s, maybe. She’s in her 80s. Yeah, right. I mean, but that’s not an age thing, you know what I mean? I mean, I don’t think she’s lost any connection to me with her music, right? I don’t think music has a, what do you call that? An age separation. So maybe that could be. Maybe music is a thing that we can connect through, despite how old we are.
FA: How does it feel to be considered one of the best female OPM icons? Do you embrace that status?
Almalbis: I’m grateful to be a part of that thread because I’m also a fan of music and I really so appreciate that artists who came before me, and I’m sure they’d say the same as well. We’re just happy to be making music, to be able to be free to express our thoughts. Of course, I try to not take that part of [being an OPM icon] seriously. I mean, you have to not believe your own press, right? I mean, sometimes what makes it fun for me is the music making itself and being able to share it in a venue like this tonight. Because that’s how I started out. That’s the reason why I became a musician because I enjoyed writing songs. I enjoyed playing in my bedroom, and then, a few decades ago when I made a job as well, somehow you’re thrust into a scene, right? There’s that pressure and there was a time that people would compare you with others, but over time, I mean, of course, it’s a job, and you have to be faithful with it. You want to have work, and you want your team to have work. All that stuff. I guess at one point, I could see the difference between the machinery and the purity of just loving the music. And I always want to go back to that because that’s the reason why I’m here. I think that mindset has also helped me through the waves of the industry because there was a time when people were so excited about bands, and then there’s a time when nobody was coming to the shows. But we’d play places, and sometimes there’d be five people there. After playing, we played a couple of concerts in Araneta, right? And then a couple of years after that, we would play [at venues such as] Route 196. There’d be ten people there. But I’d come home and I’d be so happy. It’s so thrilling to perform, to play music. So, I mean, I’m happy that right now the scene is so fun. There are a lot of people coming. But it’s hard when you let the success of it dictate things because you’d get sad when it’s down. So, I always just go back to why I started and that’s because I love music. Yeah, the reason why I’m doing it.
FA: You know, a lot of people say, especially people like our parents, they always say to “Never separate your passion from your job.” What can you say about that?
Almalbis: I mean, I guess to each his own. I’m sure there’s going to be some wisdom to glean from that. But for me, I feel like it’s the opposite. If you imagine a world where everybody’s job was the thing that they were passionate about, then you wouldn’t find lawyers who only love money, and then justice is just something that happens along the way sometimes. Or like other professionals. Actually, this is kind of a quote from a book by Tim Keller called “Every Good Endeavor”. He said you’d find doctors whose passion is money and not really healing people or seeing people come to good health. But health just happens sometimes along the way. But can you imagine a world where doctors are those people who are just so passionate? I know doctors who are like that, and they become the best doctors. And lawyers who are like that, who are just so passionate about justice, and they become the best at it. So, for me, my dream is that it’s the opposite. It’s that people would somehow find the freedom and the support to really pursue the thing that they believe in so much that they would do without getting paid.
FA: Do you think that’s prevalent in your songwriting as well? Or is your songwriting more so diaristic to your own personal experiences?
Almalbis: Can you explain that to me?
FA: So when you’re passionate about music, do you want that to reflect in your songwriting for other people to learn from as well?
Almalbis: Oh yeah, that’s a great topic actually. It’s something that my husband and I talk about a lot. There’s this painter named Makoto Fujimura. I don’t know if he coined it but we heard it from him. But he calls it generative art. So it’s art that generates art in others. Generates ideas and creativity in others. And my husband’s a painter. We’re always on the lookout for artists like that. Those are the artists that we want to follow on Instagram or that we want to watch. You watch their gig or you look at their paintings and it makes you want to paint. And somehow that’s something that we hope that our art and our music does for others as well. That it makes them want to go in their bedroom and write something too. But I hope that it happens naturally.
“You have to have at least one guitar that you can throw around. Pedals, gear, it’s all just toys. It’s inspiration machines.”
FA: There’s actually a movie called “Look Back”. It’s adapted from a manga by Tatsuki Fujimoto. And it talks about two young girls who are passionate about creating manga. And they grow up together, and something tragic happens. And it’s all about the love of art.
Almalbis: Yeah, “Look Back”. I’ll check it out.
FA: Do you view the guitar as a weapon that encompasses your emotions when songwriting? Do you view it as an inanimate child? Or is it merely just an instrument that you love?
Almalbis: Beautiful. I think it’s evolved over the years. Back when I was young, it was my only friend maybe. Speaking about girls and women’s month. I love my family and grew up with my older brother. Maybe seven, eight, around ten. Maybe seven. Boy cousins. I was the only girl in the whole gang. Then I have a sister, but she’s five years younger than me. But during our adolescent and pre-teen years, we were the only girls. When we got around that age, 11 or 12, this was the 80s. People weren’t really into it [girls playing instruments and hanging out with the opposite gender] yet. They left me because I was a girl. I wasn’t allowed to hang out with them. It’s okay, they were doing guy things. That was around the time when I started playing guitar. Every day, that’s what I did. I played guitar in my room. The boys were wherever they were going. I put it down. Every day, I would play guitar. I did that for a couple of years. I started writing songs at 14. Then it became a songwriting tool for me. To this day, among all of your guitars, they’re all your friends I wouldn’t say they’re my babies because I experiment on them a lot. They can take some pain from me. I hack them. I don’t think I have a single guitar that hasn’t been opened up and changed. I want them to be their best. I want to perform using them. Make them useful. I would change things so that it wouldn’t be hard for me.
FA: You’re like Mary Shelley and Frankenstein.
Almalbis: [Laughs] I’ve burned the carpet. I’ve destroyed a couple of things. I’ve had guitars that I’ve given up on and come back to. I wouldn’t touch them for 10 years. One of the guitars that I might use tonight is like that. It’s gone through so many lives. I want it to sound good. I’ve experimented with it all these years.
FA: In your Rolling Stone interview, you said that you fell in love with the guitar before music. What advice would you give to someone starting out with the guitar and should they go acoustic first or electric? How do you know when to tap into the world of pedals, amps, and other gears?
Almalbis: I would just advise using a nylon string guitar first because it’s easy on the fingers and so you won’t give up on the guitar. Naturally, your calluses will develop. By the time you move to steel strings, it will be easier. I got my electric guitar when I was 16. The only thing that was a problem with that was that it was so heavy for me at that time. It still is heavy for me, but now I found lighter electric guitars. They always say you have to have a beat-up guitar. That’s the best guitar to write songs on. One that’s not precious. You can throw it, you can put it in your trunk, you can have your car. You have to have at least one guitar that you can throw around. Pedals, gear, it’s all just toys. It’s inspiration machines. Just explore it on your own, whatever you’re curious about.
Just explore it on your own, whatever you’re curious about.
“I’ve burned the carpet. I’ve destroyed a couple of things. I’ve had guitars that I’ve given up on and come back to. I wouldn’t touch them for 10 years. One of the guitars that I might use tonight is like that. It’s gone through so many lives. I want it to sound good.”
FA: Did you face any fears or even insecurities when it came to your guitar playing? Did you try to fix that?
Almalbis: I’m not sure if I would consider it an insecurity, in which it made me sad or fearful. Maybe it is an insecurity, but I didn’t know what I was capable of, what I could do when I was younger. When I was in high school, I started to find music that I loved, which was glam rock at the start. I would listen to Guns N’ Roses and I would watch Slash play, or Eddie Van Halen with Van Halen, and Paul Gilbert with Mr. Big and their shredders. When I would listen to them, I would always say to myself, I could never do that, so I didn’t try.
I just used the guitar mainly as a songwriting tool. I just knew a few chords and I would just write. I wrote the first album of Hungry Young Poets just using chords.
I never thought of myself as a guitar player doing lead or anything like that. But I didn’t really want to or something. I was happy doing what I was doing. It was when John Mayer came out. He had a cover song of Stevie Ray Vaughan. This was in 2001, maybe. He had a cover of Stevie Ray Vaughan’s Lenny. I found it really beautiful. It was a bit slow. I just said, “That’s so beautiful, let me try to play it”. I just broke it down to chunks. I realized I could do it. I was so excited, I called my brother into the room and said, “Look what I can do”. Then I approached everything else just like that. If I’m interested in something, I just slow it down, try to learn it. Then I realized I could do it. The things that I thought before weren’t accessible to me, I could build it slowly. But it wasn’t a frustration or anything. It wasn’t like I dreamed of doing that. I thought it wasn’t possible. I guess it was just a fun process for me to learn it and then slowly incorporating it into our music. It’s like leveling up. It’s like a game. It’s like a new thing that I can do. You’re just curious. Then you realize you can do it. Like a guitar or singing, you can keep practicing, you get better and better. I’m sure in some way there is. You can get better at rhyming, or faster at arranging songs, or finding out why this song works or not. But I feel like so many people write so many great songs when they’re just starting out. The beginner’s mind. Like Firewoman, I wrote that. It’s one of my favorites from Hungry Young Poets. I wrote that when I was 19. I hadn’t gone to a songwriting class or anything like that. I had a lot of emotions, and I just poured them out. So for me, even with Not That Girl, it’s probably the 10th or 8th album that I made. But I feel like what I like about it is because I’m able to go back to how writing was like in my teens.
Which is I have so much emotion, and I just want to get it out there. So it’s different from playing guitar, where you develop your skill year after year. For me, it was songwriting. Even the last couple of years, there was a season where I couldn’t write. I was scratching my head. How did I write those songs again? What makes a good song again? It’s like you can’t just really pin it down. Who me? Yeah, so it’s like that. It’s a different journey. Different beast. Actually, with this album, Not That Girl, I’m so happy with the process, working with Nick as well, and writing the album. Because that’s how I remember it. I remember how to write in my teens. It was just [that] I had so many feelings and I just needed to process them through music. I didn’t need to be creative, even to invent anything. I didn’t have to think of a story. I just had to write down what I was going through that day, what I was thinking about. That’s it.
“Our perspective and our experiences are very unique to women.”
FA: Do you think it correlates a lot with girlhood? And womanhood specifically?
Almalbis: Of course. Because I’m really just writing from experience. Our perspective and our experiences are very unique to women.
I’m just expressing that. Of course, my best friends, we laugh about it. We can relate to each other’s songs. We would chat with each other, and we’d say, “I love you”. And then he’d be like, “yeah, platonic. Make sure. Just making sure.” Yeah, because we’d be so effusive with our feelings. I guess we’re at that age where all my friends are like, “I love you so much. I miss you so much.” He’s like, “yeah, platonic.”
FA: There are so many thematic elements in your songwriting, especially in Not That Girl. Even in Hungry Poets era or Barbie’s Cradle. Do you think that in your songwriting, do you always think of the themes?
Almalbis: I don’t. I don’t. In life, I don’t plan. Also, in songwriting or making an album, I have no plan. I don’t sit down and think of a theme. The opposite way would be like, you have an album title and then you have song titles, and then you’d stick to that theme. For me, it’s the total opposite. I’d sit down with no plan and then I’d write the songs one song at a time. I’d finish a song. Sometimes it’s hard for me to pick a title because I have to find something that somehow makes this song sound cohesive. I hope somehow the song ends up being cohesive that I can think of a title. And then at the end of it, when I have all the songs together, I’d be like, I hope I can find an idea that kind of ties them all together.
FA: When people tell you their interpretations of your songs, how does that make you feel?
Almalbis: I’m happy I embrace that. It’s just my experience, but I’m happy to share it with other people. Even for me, I can go back to my old songs and it might mean something different for me now. So I don’t really pin it down to what I thought of, what I was thinking of at the moment I was writing it. I’m open to that. I think you can say the same for guitars as well. Picking them out for the first time, it’s kind of like, just see what works for you, right?
FA: If a younger woman came with you, for example, if someone had you as their guitar hero and you were with them in a guitar store, how would you assist them?
Almalbis: Really, I would just– you have to really try it out and listen to what you like.
Every guitar, even if it’s the same brand or the same model, every guitar has a different voice. That’s why I don’t like ordering guitars online, even if it has all the same specs, because you have to hear it, and if you don’t like that voice, then you’re stuck with it.
FA: If you go to a guitar store, do you play your own songs on the guitar when trying it out?
Almalbis: No, I just play random chords.
