Urbandub - Soul searching

Urbandub is a Filipino rock band from Cebu City, Philippines. Since its inception in 2000, the band's line-up has consisted of Gabby Alipe (vocals, guitar), John Dinopol (guitar, vocals), and Lalay Lim (bass, vocals). The band's current drummer is Janjan Mendoza, who has been with the band since 2003.

Urbandub is the first indie band who has released albums nationwide thru EMI’s help. EMI also featured Urbandub in a Pinoy rock compilation entitled FULL VOLUME with a remake of Sade’s No Ordinary Love. The band recently garnered the attention of fans throughout Southeast Asia with a recent tour in Singapore.

Birth (2001)

Urbandub was first forced to be independent due to the lack of support coming from major record companies. They released their debut album, Birth in 2001. Off of this album, the hit tracks “Come”, "Boy", “Give”, and “Would You Go” would serve as surprise hits in the Philippine music scene. Birth is raw and heavy, with obvious influences of Deftones and other experimental rock bands. Unique, timely and yet experimental, it was something that entertainment scenes around the Philippines needed: a kick start into the future of original music.

influence (2003)

With the release of their sophomore effort, INFLUENCE (Lighter Records), Urbandub took on a new form, changing their sound with a new drummer (From Jed Honrado to Jerros Dolino). Jerros continued to record tracks with band, but left sometime in 2003 when he decided to leave for undisclosed reasons. The band then recruited JanJan Mendoza. It was the sound in this album that clearly defined the steps that Urbandub would start to take. INFLUENCE includes radio-released singles such as “Gone” and, their most famous release to date, “Soul Searching”, which won the award as Best Song of the Year in the NU107 Rock Awards 2003. The album also won as the Album Of The Year Award in the NU107 Rock Awards 2004. They also released a single called “A New Tattoo”. They dedicate this song to a former friend Juan Paulo Hidalgo.

During this time, the band also experienced the dangers brought by rival frat/gang wars in Cebu as guitarist John Dinopol was mistakenly shot at by a motorcycle riding headhunter of an undisclosed fraternity. He wasn't in critical condition but his left arm was injured and had to recover for a few months. But Urbandub went on, enlisting Faspitch guitarist Russell Manaloto & Mong Alcaraz of Chicosci to fill in for John, who was still active with the band despite the injury. John recovered in less than a year and even went on to shoot the "A New Tattoo" video and perform live with metal braces on his arm.-W

"When we were just starting out..urbandub was supposed to be a reggae band...we were suppose to play reggae mixed with dub, ska, dancehall, hiphop, and rock. A perfect example of what urbandub would have been--is the song "sailing" and "eating me" --that was the style we were suppose to be playing around with--since we were suppose to be a reggae/dub band, hence the name, urbandub. But because of the series of line up changes--and new influences--we became what we are today! The name just kinda got stuck and we never bothered to change it. So there you go..the story behind the name "urbandub"- Gab Alipe