| "Pare Ko" | ||||
|---|---|---|---|---|
 | ||||
| Single by Eraserheads | ||||
| from the album Ultraelectromagneticpop! | ||||
| B-side | "Tindahan ni Aling Nena" | |||
| Released | 1993 | |||
| Genre | Pinoy rock | |||
| Length | 5:26 | |||
| Label | ||||
| Songwriter(s) | Ely Buendia | |||
| Producer(s) | Ed Formoso | |||
| Eraserheads singles chronology | ||||
| ||||
Pare Ko (English: "My Pal") is a song by the Philippine alternative rock band Eraserheads. A censored version of the song titled Walang Hiyang Pare Ko (“My Shameless Pal”) was released as the second promotional single from their debut album, Ultraelectromagneticpop! (1993).
About the song, writer Ely Buendia said: "I just want to come up with a love song that's different. It was an honest love song I suppose. And whenever you feel bad or happy about something, I think it's natural for someone to utter these words. Also I want to know if I could get away with it."[1]
The song was inspired by a friend of Buendia's. "He was heartbroken so I wrote the song about him," he said in his acceptance speech when the band received the Gawad Oblation award from University of the Philippines in August 2024.[2] He also revealed that he sent a demo cassette of the song to his professor to pass his Spanish class.[2]
The song features expletives, such as "tangina" (local slang roughly translated as "son of a bitch"), "leche" (local slang conveying frustration, similar to "damn"), and "nabuburat" (local slang expressing annoyance, although the root word "burat" has sexual connotations). This was unheard of in Philippine mainstream music at the time.[3] The Philippine Association of the Record Industry (PARI) unsuccessfully attempted to censor the song and the album. As a result, the band recorded a censored version titled "Walang Hiyang Pare Ko", which was also included with the original version in the album release (it was later excised from the 25th anniversary reissue).
The song became the basis for the 1995 movie of the same name starring Claudine Barretto, Mark Anthony Fernandez and Jomari Yllana.[4][5]
