FOR YOUR LISTENING PLESHYUR ] The pre-brandy-soaked Ate Guy

Image from SUPERSTARstruck: The Nora Aunor Fanatics Blog

We're guessing, of course, but La Aunor sounds at her most sober when she recorded the collection of songs in the three-disc compilation called Nora Aunor Superstar from Vicor. Her troubled, tragic days still ahead of her, there is none of the heavy, torchy boulders that weigh her '80s performances down. Consisting of covers and originals from three to five albums that included Lady Guy (which she produced) and Nora and Christopher In Love, Super G effortlessly allows her distinct vocals to carry the tunes and, well, the power of love to lift her up. Because that's how she registers, floating in the clouds, with only a man called Boyet as her upper of choice. Originally recorded around 1974 and 1975, the songs indeed sound born from a gentler, sweeter era. Our favorites: "Who Broke Your Heart and Made You Write that Song?" "Take Away The Sunshine" and one must pause and shut the rest of the world to hear her sing "I Got Caught Dancing Again." The occassional faulty deekshen is part of its loveliness. "I feel a sheever run up my spine," she sings in "Laughter in the Rain;" and in "Sweet Memories," "My world is like a reever, as dark as it is deep." The song choices on the first disc are topnotch, but on disc 2, it's an entirely different trip altogether: the Atsay star plays kolehiyala and sings Taglish. She worries about the "sermon ng mommy ko sa'kin" in a song called "Puppy Love," and in the Sunny Ilacad-Spanky Rigor composition "High School Ring," she sings about a gift, a "symbol ng pag-ibig ko." The P350 we coughed up for this thoroughly trippy compilation is the symbol of ours.