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| Sunday, 24 October 2004 |
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by Mahes Perera
Winners of the prestigious Observer Golden Clef Awards 2002 for the Promising Band of The Year and Most Popular Band, Ashantha Perera and his merrymen who comprise Damage returned home last week for a short spell, on holiday, to be with their families and friends. Damage no sooner they grabbed the Golden Clef Awards last year were offered the enviable position of being centre stage at the El Rancho Restaurant, Marco Polo Hotel in Dubai. To the youth band this was an opportunity they would not let slip by and they worked towards it gaining more experience by playing regularly at our leading nightspots - the hut at Mount Lavinia Hotel and at Mollys before their date to take off. That they left behind them a crowd of young followers is true and as Ashantha tells us Damage will perform one gig for these fans who missed them, and whom they missed too. So scan the newspapers groovers and mark the date off in red! "We will be in Sri Lanka till November 10 and will be returning to the Marco Polo for another stint. We were amazed at the response from the audience they just fell into listen to or to dance to our rhythms. When we started off we played six nights a week with Saturday being our off day. On this day the DJ handled the music. But what happened was that the Saturdays didn't be what it should have been. So the Management requested us to play on Saturdays as well. The Saturday night theme was '21 to 31 Wild Night' and it turned out to be hectic! So this break is I think a well deserved one for all of us" says a happy Ashantha two despite two personnel changes in the band Damage made their mark in Dubai. Before they left for Dubai, Damage was able at the first beat of the music bring on to the floor, enthusiastic groovers,with their repertoire of music ranging from pop, rock, reggae, rock'n roll and a wide selection of retro music from the '60s to the '90s. The band members are extremely versatile and talented multi-instrumentalists. Ashantha the leader, besides handling the load of the vocals plays keyboards and bass while Nalin Samath an ex-member of Bathiya and Santhush plays lead guitar, keyboards, bass and shares the vocals. The glitz of course is Michelle who besides singing, dabbles many a tune at the keyboards. There's Sajith Gooneratne a new face pitching in on vocals with Inshi Deen playing drums, bass, keyboards and he sings as well. So with such talent, any wonder the popularity of Damage has escalated and we wish them all success again when they return to Dubai for their second contract at the Marco Polo Hotel. |
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