Manila finally sees Charlie Puth

MANILA, Philippines - People who watched the blockbuster Furious 7 last summer may have gone through the similar experience on their way out from the theater: Recalling images of the late Paul Walker while the song See You Again caresses in the ear in true LSS (Last Song Syndrome) fashion.

The song, anchored on a hauntingly beautiful chorus sung by studied musician Charlie Puth, gave the shocking death of Walker extra poignancy in the hearts of Filipinos, given the fact that the hunky star died in an accident after attending a fund-raising activity for victims of Supertyphoon Yolanda.

That See You Again voice finally came to Manila early this month and allowed more audiences here to put face on the name and, yes, another heartfelt chance to remember the beloved Walker even more.

“I get chills when they all sing the song I wrote,” said the 23-year-old music graduate from New Jersey in a chat made possible by Warner Music Philippines.

With his Marvin Gaye song collaborator, Meghan Trainor.

Charlie performed at Eastwood in Quezon City last Oct. 3 before an appreciative Manila crowd mostly anticipating for him to sing See You Again which became 50 times platinum worldwide. The track is mainly credited to Wiz Khalifa, yet Charlie being featured on the track gave it its soulful grandeur.

He implied, “It’s emotional to know how Paul wanted to help up to the day of his death. His legacy lives on.”

Charlie is bound to put his debut studio album called Nine Track Mind and featuring new single One Call Away. The collection of songs includes the now-hit single Marvin Gaye which he features Meghan Trainor.

Pre-orders are available at http://smarturl.it/NineTrackMind, but the album goes out everywhere on Jan. 22 next year.

Charlie shared, referring to the album, “You’re gonna hear something made by a singer-songwriter in his bedroom. I grew up listening to Mozart but what you will hear is a combination of all the genres I have come across with but in a not-forced way.”

He added, “Lyrically, it’s about girls and everything I’ve been feeling about the past year.”

Collaboration is one of Charlie’s comfort zones and he recently teamed up with Lil Wayne for Nothing But Trouble, which is theme to landmark documentary 808 that chronicles the story of Roland TR-808 drum machine. Marvin Gaye, with its amusing title paying homage to one of music history’s heroes, debuted at No. 1 in the UK and Ireland, and has  now amassed more than 39 million views at Charlie’s YouTube channel, www.youtube.com/user/CharliesVlogs.

When asked how he melds technical musicianship into his work and crafts songs with universal appeal, Charlie noted, “I went to conservatory and I am a concert pianist. But I don’t put so much jazz to my songs that I believe lots of people won’t be able to relate to. What I do is take little bits of classical music and put them in to give it some more dense. To listeners, they hear something a little bit different, whether they like that or not.”

He added, “But the goal is to progress music, like bending the norms of musicality.”

In 2011, American TV host Ellen DeGeneres invited Charlie and a friend to appear on her show where they did their rendition of Adele’s Someone Like You. His fame grew fast from there on.