Wednesday, September 16, 2009

Satu Angan-Angan

Cstaz is a Malaysian rock band from Ayer Keroh, Melaka, Malaysia formed in 2002. The band was unofficially formed in early 2002 when the members started playing music together. The original members were Scha, Phoefs, Ene and Jane. Hanny from the band Pinkiest Pink joined Cstaz in early 2002 but then resigned when Cstaz decided to record an album as she wanted to give her band more priority. In March 2003, Cstaz, with a new member, Rienn, signed a five-year contract under the most prestigious recording company in Malaysia, Vermilion Music Records. Their debut album, The School, recorded when the band members were just 12 years old and still in primary school.

The School, fully written by the members, was sold over 23 million copies around the world. Cstaz has become the most successful Malaysian artistes. Their first single, The Head Prefect topped the the chart around the world as soon as it was released. It was sold over 4 million copies around the world. Cstaz was the music phenomenon even though they were still new. Their first ever mini concert in the US was a blast after 20 000 tickets were sold out in just a week. Famous and influenced celebrities such as Pink, Christina Aguilera and Hilary Duff also attended the mini concert. Cstaz also received 6 nominations in the Grammy Awards and won 2 of it. After The Head Prefect, the band then released other rocking singles from their album such as Throw The School Out, I'm Gonna Slap Mr Ake, I'll Never Understand and The Love Song. As for their first album, they have received a lot of awards and nominations.

In 2005, Cstaz created another blast to the music scene after launching the second album, 7 Hours.The album was edgier and darker than The School. It was sold around 25 million copies around the world and has received a lot of compliments as their latest album was more mature and fresh.The singles released from the second album was, 7 Hours, There'll Be No Boys(In This World), Today (featuring Joel Madden and Synyster Gates), Beezy and This Heart. After releasing all the smashing singles, Cstaz decided to do a world tour. In 2006, they started touring 17 countries with their rocking, live performance. The countries were, Canada, USA, Mexico,South Africa,England, Germany, Italy, France, Russia, Japan, South Korea,Hong Kong, Singapore, Indonesia, Malaysia, Australia,and New Zealand. Their world live tour was successful after over 2.5 million tickets were sold out. The tour also has won a recognition as the best live performance by a rock band in an award ceremony in Malaysia.

As their popularity increased, Cstaz also has become victims of commercials as a lot of corporate companies competed to make Cstaz as their spokesmodels. Cstaz has agreed to do commercials for Pepsi, Nike, DKNY, Covergirl, BMW and Samsung. Besides that, Cstaz also has been labeled as the fashion icons for teenagers. Two of the members, Scha and Phoefs were invited to do a fashion runway for BCBG Max during fall 2006. Cstaz also has launched their first clothing line, Heartless Magnet in December 2006.

In 2007, Cstaz released their third album, The Soul of Riot. This album was produced without one of the members, Jane, who took a break as she had personal matters to handle. The album was also successful as the two albums before and it is sold over 3 million copies around the world in the first week. However Cstaz has caused a controversy as they only released 2 singles out of the album, The Soul of Riot and Tragic. All of the fans were extremely disappointed because they knew how good the songs in the album were and it was such a waste not to release them as singles. The rumours split that the members of Cstaz faced a lot of internal problems that made them hard to cooperate among each other. There were also tabloids that saying Cstaz were going to split.

However, the lead vocalist, Scha, denied it and said that they would never split up. Finally, the controversy settled down when the members of Cstaz made an apology as they really have to take a rest from the music scene. They had to concentrate on their studies and make preparations in order to face the Malaysian Education Certificate( Sijil Pelajaran Malaysia) examinations in 2008. The decision that Cstaz has made has disappointed their fans. However, they still showed their supports and prayed for Cstaz success. Starting February 2008, Cstaz had to reject all shows requests from all over the world and they really did take a break from the music scene.And now, in 2009 Cstaz has promised to come back. Instead of releasing singles from their previous albums, the fans are surprised to know that Cstaz is actually back with a new album which is going to be launched in January 2010. And the biggest surprised is the members left are only, Scha, Phoefs and Ene.

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