[PHILIPPINES] Eric Nam Proves Nam Nation’s Power during ‘Before We Begin’ in Manila

The legendary Eric Nam dazzled fans with a string of performances and his signature charisma on Jan 10 for the Manila stop of his Before We Begin World Tour 2020. It was the second night of his year-long tour which kicked off in Taipei, followed by four more stops in Asia before Eric heads to North and Latin America.

Filipino Nam Nations gathered at the New Frontier Theater had no idea what kind of night they were in for. Eric made sure to prepare all sorts of tricks and treats for his Filipino fans. To begin with, he called his show a ‘TED Talk’ and jokingly told fans: “If your mom asks you where you are, tell her you’re out studying, it’s for school. But tell your friends you went to a concert of course!” He then opened the show with lively performances of his hit songs ‘Come Through’, ‘Runaway’, ‘Miss You’, and ‘Good For You’.

It was Eric’s first time touring Manila since debuting eight years ago. The Atlanta-born Korean singer-songwriter mentioned during his first talk segment of the night that he felt nervous during soundcheck. “This place is huge! And we want to have dancers to have enough square meter available for dancing!” he added.

True enough, the night rolled on with a show of Eric’s versatility as a musician. He went from upbeat EDM hits like ‘Cave Me In’, ‘Lose You’ and ‘Potion’, to his suave-groovy ones like ‘This Is Not A Love Song’, ‘Honestly’, and ‘Idea of You’, and finally to his infamous ballad ‘Hold Me’. GQ Korea’s 2016 Man Of The Year also revealed how good he is at dancing, particularly at doing body rolls, performing to ‘Don’t Call Me‘ and ‘You’re Sexy I’m Sexy’.

But Eric connected with Filipino Nam Nation through his wit more than through the performances and his singing skills. Fans have grown fond of ever since he became one of the hosts of Arirang‘s After School Club. He made fun of his song ‘Like You‘, taking note of its repetitive lyrics that fans still chanted along to. He also took note of the things the fans prepared for him for the fan project: banners, colored phone light stickers, and yellow handkerchiefs to wave during particular songs. The fans also brought presents: a Funko pop version of him, a handful letters and drawings, a Jollibee toy, and baby hands toy that he played around with as fans took pictures.

All Eric could say was “What is that?!” as he continued to receive gifts from fans, even noticing the printout of a broccoli, a fandom joke referring to Eric’s vegetable mask when he joined music program The King Of Mask Singer. Filipino Nam Nation then surprised Eric by serenading him with the Tagalog version of his duet song with CHEEZE titled ‘Perhaps Love’. This was his comment about all the flood of fan projects prepared by his fans: “Is this how prepared you are when you do your homework? Hmm?!”

He serenaded the crowd back by singing the original version of ‘Perhaps Love’. Afterward, he also sang a birthday song for his fans who were celebrating their birthdays that night. In between laughs as he further teases with his fans, Eric then took time to express gratitude to the people in the venue: “Thank you so much for coming, thank you so much for all the gifts. Really, I will not forget this. Manila, you are crazy!”

When the show was almost over, he jokingly told fans it was really time to end his TED Talk so he could go eat his ‘Chickenjoy’ fried chicken from Jollibee, a local fast-food restaurant that every foreign artist who travels to the Philippines must-have. “But not balut!” he added while laughing. 

Eric Nam also sang most of the tracks from his latest English album ‘Before We Begin’, namely ‘Love Die Young’, ‘Congratulations’, ‘How’m I Doing’, and ‘Wonder’. He ends his show with an engaging performance of ‘Can’t Help Myself’, even rapping LOCO‘s parts, before proceeding with the ‘meet-and-greet’ part of the night where lucky fans took group photos with him.

What a wild night it was! We can’t thank Eric enough for letting us join the wild ride of his tour and we hope he will ‘come through’ again sometime soon. Meanwhile, let’s all tune in to Eric’s podcast ‘K-Pop Daebak w/ Eric Nam’ available on Spotify, Apple Podcasts, Google Podcasts, Soundcloud, and YouTube!

 

We would like to thank Onion Production and EN Management for bringing ‘Eric Nam ‘Before We Begin’ World Tour 2020 in Manila‘ to the Philippines.

Written by: Miray
Photos from: Onion Production

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