Ramona doesn’t need your approval
No, Ramona isn’t some made-up persona, as most people hearing it for the first time assume. It’s, in fact, what’s written on her official records: Ramona Blythe Gorostiza. If anything, it’s Andrea Brillantes—the name that appears on billboards and posters—that may very well be her alter ego.
She hasn’t gone by “Ramona” in a long while—at least not publicly. But once in a while, her family and close friends find themselves using it whenever provocations bring out her feistiness, or when a cocktail or two at a party gets her letting her hair down. “Uy, si Ramona,” they would say.
And for her, “It has always been a part of me.”
Celebrity gossip and fake news are another sure way to summon Ramona. And now, after dealing with those for more than half her life, she’s finally letting Ramona out to bite back at the insults hurled at her—how she acts, how she talks, the things people claim she did—and throw them back not with spite, but with playful defiance.
Hostile comments
If her comment section is a minefield for vitriolic remarks, her debut song, “Gaga” is the greatest hits collection. Here, she enumerates some of the most hostile things she has ever read about herself: “bobo,” “pokpok,” “malandi,” and even “mang-aagaw.” She would be lying if she said these words never hurt her in the slightest.
But because she’s not one to clap back at her bashers or address issues about her, she had to find another way to make herself heard. So one day at work five years ago, while waiting on set with nothing better to do, she searched through her phone for all her “favorite” hate comments she had noted and turned them into a song.
“I want to say mas inis ako kaysa hurt, but I’m sure nasaktan din talaga ako kasi nagawan ko ng kanta,” she tells Lifestyle Inquirer. “It’s like my letter to them (bashers). Nung binasa ko na, sabi ko, ‘Ang cute nito, ah.’ Iniinis nila ‘ko kaya gusto ko lang din silang inisin pabalik.”
Liberating lyrics
Ramona continued to write lyrics, but kept them hidden until this year, when she mustered enough gumption to venture into music. With the help of producers Tim and Sam Marquez of One Click Straight, the raw a cappella melodies she sang into her phone transformed into a tauntingly fun, pop-punk-inspired track.
Writing the lyrics was fun. Recording them in the studio—grungy guitars and all—was “liberating.” If she can sing her critics’ words and beat them to the punch, then they have nothing left to hurt her with. She’s not rebellious the way angsty teenagers are rebellious. But if being rebellious means “being brave and staying true to myself,” then perhaps she is, after all.
“There are industry standards that I won’t follow, if it means I have to be fake…If ‘di ko ramdam na ako ‘yun, ‘di ko gagawin kahit alam kong benta, pasok sa gusto ng tao, o makaka-please sa lahat,” she says.
Don’t roll your eyes now
Take her music direction and the way she chose to present herself. As Ramona, she wears her hair long and red; her eyebrows dyed light. She throws together a white tank top, baggy denim jeans, and winter boots—by all means, early-2000s skater pop punk by way of Avril Lavigne.
Andrea would never. People likely expected her to be demure in this musical detour, but that just doesn’t resonate with the genre she feels at home in. Her parents met at a Foo Fighters concert. She grew up listening to classic rock. As cliché as it sounds—and you might roll your eyes, she says—The Beatles are her ultimate favorite. “Yellow Submarine” was the first song she memorized.
“I have always been passionate about music,” she says.
She once had a Nirvana phase, too. Her mom introduced her to Blondie, and she has been enchanted by the band ever since. Lavigne, Yeng Constantino, and Paramore are also in her rotation. But these days, she’s most crazy about Olivia Rodrigo. “She’s my pop rock princess, my biggest inspiration,” says the 23-year-old artist, who also dreams of performing with Parokya ni Edgar—her favorite Filipino band—one day.
Not asking for approval
But Ramona isn’t getting ahead of herself. She knows well that she will need a great deal of experience before she can even think about collaborating or sharing the stage with her music heroes. The closest thing she has gotten to doing a concert is rockaoke night at her favorite club, where she typically grabs the mic and belts out Kitchie Nadal’s “Bulong” once everyone starts to get a little too tipsy to mind her.
“But once the spotlight is on me, that’s when I feel like I can’t wait to perform live,” she says.
For now, releasing more singles is the most realistic next step for Ramona, especially since she already has songs waiting to be produced. And if people are wondering whether music is just a whim or a fleeting pastime—it’s not. Her love for the craft is “very real,” she insists, and she wouldn’t bother working on something she has no plans of taking seriously.
But how far is she willing to go as Ramona? Does she see herself devoting more time to music? That would depend on how people receive her. On second thought, no—she doesn’t need their approval. She will create, share, and perform her music as she pleases.
“At wala na silang magagawa!” she says.
