Sherwin Tuna, a.k.a. DJ Love, is one of the producers and choreographic pioneers of the ‘Budots’ genre of electronic dance music that emerged in the southern Philippines in the late 2000s and early 2010s. DJ Love lives in Davao City, Philippines, and is also one of the founders of the Budots dance and production collective Camusboyz. DJ Love’s productions have received national recognition through Philippine television and 180,000 Youtube subscribers. In 2019, he was featured as the creator behind Budots in the acclaimed documentary “Budots: The Craze.”
In this episode on Extended Asia Vol. 3, “Discovery,” They have a work entitled HQHD in collaboration with Tropical Future Institute, DJ Love, & Angeline Meitzler.
Tropical Future’s interest in ‘diskoral,’ or pop-up block parties, near their family’s house in the Philippines led to their interest in budots and the Philippine sound system culture. This situation prompted a collaboration with the producer, musician, and DJ known as obese.dogma777 at a party in Cebu called Tropical Diskora (2017). Obese.dogma777 became attracted to budots because of the genre/style’s uniqueness and the adequate representation of Filipinos’ laid-back, high-energy, and idiosyncratic nature. The diskoral party was hosted inside an art gallery with other artists and designers with aspects of a traditional diskoral recreated, such as using palm leaves and artists’ performing as MCs.
While this audio/visual project emphasizes a playful interpretation of budots, we look towards hybridity and the reinterpretation of budots into other club genres by dispersing their signature samples and essence. Angeline’s interpretation of the track into a world built using game engine software furthers this vision of increasing notoriety for budots locally and internationally. Incorporating mythic symbols of Philippine culture alongside references to the genre adds a rich context to the essence of the track as a cross-genre, budots remix. We hope this track spurs more interest from musicians, dancers, and fans to explore this dance/music genre that originated in the Philippines.
Link:
https://www.facebook.com/camusboyz.davao
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Image by DJ Love
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This work is part of “Islandwide Coverage,” a multi-site, multi-author project by AWKNDAFFR is an artistic operation situated at the intersection of art, theory, and praxis by Wayne Lim and Soh Kay Min.
Part of “Natasha,” Singapore Biennale [SB2022]—across a network of sites, including the Singapore Art Museum [SAM] at Tanjong Pagar Distripark. It will take place from 16 October 2022 to 19 March 2023.
