See, Morrison viewed music as a great beast you had to wrestle and contend with before it gave up its treasures. Posing his question was a way of asking listeners of The Doors and other musicians: you sure you’re ready to take this on?

Fuseboxx would have said yeah and meant it.

Fuseboxx are famous for winning the 2003 Redhorse Beer Muziklaban challenge, where they blew away the competition and the judges were unanimous in proclaiming them the hands down victor.

Before this, an EP titled Listen had been circulating in the indie rock circuit but it was winning the contest that created a buzz intense enough to land them into the consciousness of scene insiders and get them a spot on UNTV’s broadcast of live performances.

"I think we were just really lucky that we won Muziklaban," nods guitarist Albert. "We were about ready to disband back then. Sobrang wala kaming kilala or anything. Malinis talaga yung competition so we were like wow! Our drummer even cried when we won."

Abby, the rocket pocket, beatifically-faced singer with a colossal voice, laughs "Funny, kasi [our drummer] even held the huge check."

Fuseboxx started in 2001 as a three-piece rock band doing alternative covers but their collective skill quickly gave way to originals. Through the years a slew of member changes have brought them to this, the third incarnation of the band: Abby Clutario (vocals), Eric Tubon (keys and synths), Albert Montinola (guitars), Jessy Trinidad (bass), Lester Banzuelo (drums). Only Eric and Abby have remained as original founders. This talks volumes about how hard it is to be in a progressive rock band.

So they won, and the beer and prize money were funneled into their own celebration. For two years there was nothing and the sense of anticipation grew, lengthened and, finally stretched to an unbearable Waiting for Godot placebo, waned and disappeared. Potential fans shook their collective heads and shrugged.

Three years is a long wait for a debut, but the excitement of finally seeing a Fuseboxx album on the shelves is much akin to an unexpected gift. Despite the travails of the band and the extreme unhelpfulness of their distributing label, an interview with them is a stroke of good fortune.

THE NEW CLASSICAL

"For me," says Eric, "Prog is like watching a movie. It has ups and downs and a narrative. It’s epic...Many people think of prog as the new classical music."

I do. In a musical landscape populated by genres and sub-genres, progressive rock (or just prog) is ambitious, grandiloquent and labyrinthine. Two things instantly come to mind when you hear a prog song: wow, that’s very long and that’s very complex. Groups like Genesis, Yes, Rush, King Crimson and the ever popular Dream Theater are its forerunners.

Critics have also claimed that prog is pretentious, long-winded and bombastically self-indulgent -- which is why it’s viewed as a throwback. A dinosaur of a genre that harks to an age when people still seemed awestruck at the possibilities of electric music and were content to wank to high heavens.

However, the post-9/11 backlash has triggered a renewed interest in prog. In the guise of bands like Coheed and Cambria and The Mars Volta, prog has become the only tool that can aptly convey the paranoia and madness of this age’s socio-political tumult. Prog is a dinosaur no more.

The technical skill and the musical memory required to play pieces in suites, in songs that can last as long as 20 minutes, still remains however. This also presents a set of problems intrinsic to the prog band.

Abby, as a full-time musician who used to lend her alto to the San Miguel Master Chorale and now teaches school choirs, explains that "We usually form it in structures that we can remember. That’s important in long types of songs, like suites. . .Because I’m the one in music I’m the one who usually tries to remember or notates everything. Sometimes they do stuff that I know by theory, but they want to do something else and I know it won’t work. Then I explain that it can’t work or maybe he does a riff and he doesn’t remember how to do it, but I remember and I try to reteach it to him. But he plays something else. So we fight."

To which Eric laughs and points out, "Minsan may ginawa akong riff. Ako na nga yung gumawa ako pa yung mali!"

For a band that once backed up Aiza Seguerra and Rey Kilay, Fuseboxx are the musical equivalent of a hydra, a musical beast. High and low end attacks you all at once. How can five people sound like an orchestra, a rock genius, a metal juggernaut, an odd-time metronome and a host of angels at the same time?

The instrumental "Switch" with its recorded, often unintelligible conversation samples, locomotive celerity and choir girl voices quickly demonstrates that Fuseboxx is light years a cut above your usual rock band. Despite the musing, sometimes lovelorn, Shakespearean-dramatic, Hallmarky lyrics Abby’s immense voice lends gravity to the whole melodic shinola.

"Breathe" with its Middle Eastern, staccato motifs showcases the keyboards and guitars in blazing conjunction, like comets racing side by side or heavenly bodies in an event of prophesy. In its whole, Fuseboxx’s debut is a palette of emotions that comes to a culmination in the opus "Outlet." At a running time of 25:18 it even trounces Sonic Youth’s "Diamond Sea." My favorite of this five-part suite is "Outlet II," with its swooning, swimming-in-wretchedness message and drums that pursue odd-time effortlessly. The lyric "Let glory fall upon the wall of changing time" may be awkward but it smacks of heroic honesty.

"People think we’re complex, aloof people because we play prog," shrugs Lester. Well, with a song like "Outlet" under your belt it’s a forgivable given that people will think you’re a little cuckoo.

Fuseboxx’s music, with its sheer complication and cosmic landscape is definitely not for your run of the mill pop rock listener. But for those who enjoy things on a majestic scale then this is the OPM album you’ve been waiting for. As good as things are, you see, they’re just getting started. It is, simply put, a celebration.

"We already have four songs that we’re working on," says Eric about their next album. "Our average songs are six minutes long. Some are 10 minutes. The song we’re working on right now is already seven minutes long with just the intro. We’ll be releasing two CDs, probably. The first CD is just one song that’s 45 minutes long (like "Outlet") and the second disc is the fragmented tracks."