“I’ll be your everything, your devotee…“

Hailing from Quezon City, Philippines is rising alt-pop rock trio The Quirks who just released their second single entitled “Devotee” last Saturday, September 26.

The band, composed of Rafael Esguerra (vocals and rhythm guitar), Chris Saruca (vocals and lead guitar), and Teddy Perez (bass), employs what they call as an experimental alternative-pop rock sound that is “rhythmically-charged, fun, sometimes overly romantic, makes you want to dance and scream the chorus out” and results in extremely catchy tunes.

Their new track “Devotee” was written back in 2018 by guitarist Chris when he was learning about heliotropism which is essentially about how sunflowers follow the direction of the sun which was then equated to a show of devotion.

We think it’s really one of the best songs that we’ve ever written because you just hear it and it makes you want to shout and dance to it while it’s playing at full volume, and that seems to be how people have been listening to it as well.

The song actually underwent quite a long process to create and eventually release.

The band started laying down everything back in September 2019 and finished recording in February 2020. Then the pandemic hit and so their initial target release date of March was pushed back. But this proved as a gain to the group as they used this extra time away from school and gigs to further fine-tune what was to become “Devotee“.

Listen to the song on streaming platforms here: https://fanlink.to/thequirks-devotee?fbclid=IwAR1rnE4qJMk-P9sY4KbgA4oOSdehZhMVORbR0FTj3hybURtWstn9nncQVIg

The Quirks formed way back during their early high school days in 2014 as part of Ateneo’s Music Industry Org.

As the band puts it:

It was a requirement for our org to form a band and we all just kinda happened to know each other. Raf could sing, Chris could sing and play guitar, and Teddy only knew how to play ukulele so Chris told him that Teddy could probably be the bassist because the uke and bass have four strings. After that, we just stayed together as bandmates and here we are six years later!

The group did not get a lot of gigs until 2019-2020 so the few gigs they had were all almost equally memorable. A few notable mentions are their first battle of the bands win at Miriam College High School as well as their first gig at Route 196.

Before we got to (Route 196), we saw a photo of the iconic marquee and our name was first billed. We don’t know why we were listed first but having our name at the top of the bill at this iconic bar we used to go to as audience members just made it even more special.

The band also just recently started hosting an annual gig at Mow’s called Infinity Wal.

It was great to just have all our friends in this iconic gig venue and all the performers were our music friends and even some artists we looked up to. It was like our own annual private music festival!

We booked Mow’s again back in January or February for this year’s but, of course, it never got to happen.

When asked what their goals and visions are as a band, they responded:

The usual, we guess. Play as many gigs as we can and hopefully find our name in the music scene. We want to express ourselves in our music like anyone else. We want to make really good music like anyone else. More than anything, we just want to have fun with what we’re doing. We just want to share that feeling with people in both our live performances and our songs – throwing our energy and our emotions and experiences at them and hoping they throw it back.

Listen to “Devotee” on Spotify here:

Currently, the band shows no signs of stopping as they are already starting pre-production on their next single and they hope to finish it and release it before 2020 ends.

They have also been conceptualizing a music video for “Devotee” ever since mixing and mastering the track so be on the look out for that one soon!

Afterwards, The Quirks are going to “jump in the deep end” and start working on their debut album which they are aiming to be release by next year.

The band comments:

We really have a lot of amazing songs written already and all we have to do is to fine-tune them, record them, and produce them. It just takes a lot of effort.. and money. And time. We’re just going to put more content out there.

Stay updated with The Quirks here:

Facebook: https://web.facebook.com/thequirksmusic
Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/thequirksph
Twitter: https://twitter.com/thequirksmusic

(Featured photo by Zoila Ulanday)