Clay Fusion

Clay Fusion is a Filipino rock band based in the Philippines. Composed of Luis Guerrero as lead vocalist, Marvin Ramos on lead guitars, JR-C on bass and Francis Rivera on drums.

Prologue

Luis and Marvin started jamming during their 1st year at their college school Manila Central University with drummer turned DJ, Bong Canay or DJ ShootDown and Vincent Abelarde on bass. “No name, just for fun!” they quoted every time they play. They started playing in a mid-class band rehearsal studio around 2000 with sounds of the latest OPM rock and foreign labels in alternative rock scenes. Due to lack of interest and bass playing skills, Vincent decided to leave. After several months, one of their friends Carlo Camara introduced JR-C. They discussed their influences and everything seems harmonized with regard to their musical skills and musical philosophies until Bong decided to leave because he believe that he cannot meet the level of drumming skills needed in a gig so JR-C bring in Francis Rivera, a high school friend of him, to hammer drums for a beat. As the 2 newly acquired members joined the easy go old members, things seems a mess but was able to fix and created a brand new material. They started primarily covering songs from Red Hot Chilli Peppers, Rage against the Machine, Limp Bizkit, and Staind.

Live Era

Bulacan Project, mission accomplished: Their 1st gig is in a battlefield of all amateur rock bands in Bulacan, with appearance of their former drummer Bong as 2nd guitarist. They lost said event but gained respect after winning Battle of the Bands 2001 somewhere in Caloocan City, captivating the Best Vocals award won by Luis Guerrero for covering current mainstream songs of Incubus, Pardon Me, Nice to Know You and Wish you were Here and beating more than 25 rock bands in which joined by not less than 8 bands who has/had an underground recordings already. That time they were joined by guitar sessionist Joseph Cobales, as back up guitarist to mainly focus in guitar effects that will serve as their turntables.

Championship ring? Year 2003, JR-C finished his degree in Commerce and decided to work on a different path supposedly but because of the excitement felt in music playing, he decided to play more as a brain bleeding bassist of the band. As JR-C remained as their furious bassist, Marvin joined another band (affiliated band of Fusion)called Zero, to lead hard scratching guitars for covering Smashin Pumpkins and soon gained personal commitments with bands female bassist Waki.
So after winning an award, they shifted from alternative rock material to thrash hitting metal specifically Deftones. Things again are not on the same page so they bring back the used to be material of Clay Fusion. Incubus covers, plus a couple of compositions. They entered and tried to defend but failed to win again said music competition. Doing covers of Incubus’s, The Warmth and New Skin, competing against more than 20 bands but this time majority of the bands has recordings already and some came from Japan (showband). “We may lose the title but we didn’t lose the magic and touch, we had fun, actually, we don’t lose at all.” they quoted because that is their most outstanding performance, even more stupendous than their performance when they won the title.

Sayonara! Year 2004 is the time when Luis Guerrero decided to work on different path. From school, music and personal pleasure, he decided to work in an office environment but also tried to work on a now defunct band Cold Siren. Due to too much difference in musical influences, he departed from the band as well.
Since JR-C is having a kid, Francis working and practices his studies in a cyber café, Marvin went in almost the same stripe by joining an RNB cover band lined up as bass player but then decided to leave because of personal commitments and Luis is out, the band split up.

4Peat***** Long blank pages for the Fusion, so they decided to put up a play, a reunion gig in a bar somewhere in East Avenue, near Sulu Hotel. This time it’s very different because it’s the era of emo-punk so it’s hard to bear out their skills since their material belongs to alternative rock. They played covers from Live, I Alone, Lightning Crashes and Selling the Drama and one RHCP song, Under the Bridge. By making the swarms wild and showed that the music of their era still rocks, the 4 musicians proved that they can still win the hearts of their followers.