American singer-songwriter Alec Benjamin has made quite a huge impact in Malaysia following his performance on the Big Stage finale.
His kind and thoughtful gesture of not shaking hands with female Muslim judges has gotten many praises among Malaysians, and he also gained a whole bunch of fans after his performance.
“I think it’s always important to learn the customs where ever you are. I was lucky enough to have some helpful people to educate me when I got here. Anywhere I go, I think it’s important to learn the customs. I just want to be respectful.”
Apart from performing at Big Stage, Alec Benjamin also put on a private intimate showcase for some VIPs, members of the media as well as selected group of fans.
During his special showcase, we managed to have some Q&A sesh with him, and here’s what we learn about Alec when he was in Malaysia.
1. Malaysia was his 1st Asia stop and his favourite food in Malaysia are roti canai and rambutan.
2. His favourite performers on “Big Stage” were Sarah Suhairi and Baby Shima. “I really love Sarah. She got a really special voice. I also like Baby Shima too. I’m a fan of both of them.”
3. “Death of a Hero” is about a person that Alec looked up to, but he later found out that the person is not as perfect as he thought, and was quite disappointed about it. “I guess you shouldn’t hold yourself to impossible standards because nobody is perfect.”
4. When it comes to writing songs, his inspiration comes when he’s feeling down and sad, which is why his songs are mostly solemnly sad. “When I’m feeling happy, I’m not going to stop and write a song. But when I’m feeling sad, I like to take a minute and pause, and write a song about it. Because it gives me a little break from it, and it makes me feel better. When I’m happy, I don’t need anything to make me feel better since I’m already happy.”
5. He always come up with song title first before lyrics.
6. People thinks he sounds like a kid and sometime a girl, but he’s happy that people are actually listening to his music. “I don’t care . People have their own opinions. So it’s all good. As long as people are talking about it and are hearing my music, that’t like more exciting for me.”
7. His dream artist is Chris Martin from Coldplay and Jason Mraz. He also became a fan of Kaka Azraff after watching her perform live in Malaysia.
Jason Mraz is the reason I started making music. Him, Eminem, John Mayer, & Chris Martin are my favorite artists. https://t.co/ApU3C6ASTu
— alecbenjamin (@AlecBenjamin) September 26, 2016
8. He knows basic Mandarin Chinese as he studied the language in high school for 3 years. He can still understand simple Mandarin. He did a cover of “Me and My Four Sisters” (對面的女孩看過來) by Malaysia’s Ah Niu’s (阿牛) before.
我可以说中文！fun fact. Cha BOI speaks some Chinese 🙂
— alecbenjamin (@AlecBenjamin) June 18, 2016
9. He would love to write a song for Selena Gomez.
10. The best advice he ever got is “Put my music out. A lot of people hang on to their songs because they wanted it to be perfect, but it’s never going to be perfect. The only way you can do it is just put it out and move on to the next one afterwards. You can keep on perfecting the same song, you have to move on to new song and you get better with new song and not the same song.”
Feel like you know Alec a whole better already?
