Students of Access Computer College are gathered once again to witness the annual Battle of The Bands at the Smart Araneta Coliseum. Participants from different branches made sure that they will give their very best to bring home the bacon. As the battle starts, the audience proudly supported their favorite band by cheering and singing along with them. The members who are performing in front of thousands of students can be truly one of the most nervous yet exciting moments in their lives. While other branches already had their experiences, there are still some who experience it the first time The Defender Band, who came all the way from Villasis, Pangasinan just to compete with other branches, won the 6th place. They made sure that the audience need to expect more of their talents on the next battle. We also have the Bulacan Branches: Syncopado from Marilao who gave us one of the cutest performances led by their vocalist, Coy de Castro, who captured the eyes of various audiences. 7 Stallions from Meycauayan, guided by their coach, Mr Joshua Alaba, offered us an extraordinary performance that made our heads banging from their choice of songs, to the costumes and the overall performance, everyone in the coliseum was in for the rock and roll. Virtuoso of Balagtas, showed everybody that they also inserted a lot of effort in this battle. Although they gave their best shot, it wasn’t good enough for the judges but they went home with happy hearts knowing that they made the people happy. Let us not forget the stunning performances of the Full Metal Band from Zabarte and Syatu Reborn from Camarin. Overflowing with confidence, they definitely owned the stage with their outstanding voices. In addition to that, the vocalists of Augmentor from Monumento and Siglo from Manila managed to pull together their voices and made us knew that joining a contest doesn’t need to be all rock and roll, it needs perfect matching with the vocalists as well. C2 Band from Cubao coached by Mr Joram Buque made it to the 3rd place singing the Bohemian Rhapsody and Anak. Stoic Marksmen from Pasig placed 2nd place which is guided by their coach Mr Mark Moneda stunned us with their performance by their songs “When I Dream About You” and ‘‘Pilipinas’’. Also, the people will never forget the face of their drummer Kyrie Joy Galleto and one of their guitarists, Queenie Alvero whom, I say, amazed the audience with their cool skills. “Unexpected kasi na maging 2nd placer kami kasi yung mga kalaban namin ay mahuhusay but praise God nakuha namin. Maraming salamat sa sumuporta sa akin at sa banda namin!” – Kyrie Joy Galleto said, the drummer of Stoic Marksmen. They made sure to stay humble despite getting the title and reassured us that they will strive harder to get the championship title next year. Finally we have our two-time defending champion, from Lagro Campus, the JRN Reloaded with their winning songs Survivor and Anak. "JRN stands for Jocel, Rona and Nestor - our respective coaches. They are the ones who supported us and gave us the budget and shared with us their opinions about our performances. Especially Sir Jocel, he was the one who constantly reminding us the do's and don't's. Though he isn't a part of the vocal coaches of JRN Reloaded anymore, we still treat him and look up to him as our mentor and we would like to dedicate every single performance to him." - Kristhel Nava said, the vocalist of JRN Reloaded. She also added that the reason why they won the championship title again is because of their originality when it comes to mashing up their song choices. "We thought about our song choices very well, I was the one who guided my covocalists and our bassist guided the other members. We made sure that we clean everything up from the songs up to the instrumentals so we will win." she added. The performance of JRN Reloaded for the past two battles had been very challenging for the other bands; they made it as a challenge and an inspiration to do better for the next year. -Sherily General