MORE HELP IS ON THE WAY for victims of Tropical Storms ?Ondoy? and ?Pepeng.? This time, foreign pop and rock stars are playing together in a benefit concert dubbed ?Rock For Relief? tonight at the SM Mall of Asia open-air grounds.

Some 15,000 tickets have been sold, or 75 percent of the venue?s 20,000 capacity, according to Francis Lumen of MTV Philippines, whose parent company All Youth Channels is mounting the charity show with the US-based Music Management International.

In a press conference Friday at the Makati Shangri-La hotel, American singer-songwriter Katy Perry, the event?s main performer, said she was glad the concert?originally just a regular, ticket-selling show?was finally pushing through after being postponed last month.

It was actually Ondoy which caused the postponement; promoters then thought of turning it into a fundraiser which Perry agreed to.

?I cancelled some projects to be here,? she said. ?I?m glad to be helping out.? After arriving Friday, Perry went out with her co-performers?Arnel Pineda and Neal Schon, lead singer and guitarist, respectively, of the pop-rock band Journey, and Dave Elkins, Zach Gehring and Jacob Marshall of the alternative rock group Mae?to distribute relief goods to residents in Marikina and Cainta.

?It?s very humbling for us to be part of this,? said Marshall. Asked by the Inquirer to relate how the band had coped in crisis situations, he recalled ?moments of discouragement? in the past, like when his band?s van and equipment were stolen while on tour. ?But life goes on,? he said, ?and the most important thing is that we have relationships to fall back on during a crisis. This concert is a celebration of that thing.?

Pineda, who couldn?t make it to the press con spoke by phone to the Inquirer, recounting his own experience with calamities. He said he almost died when he was 5 years old because he fell off the roof of the family residence in Pampanga at the height of a typhoon.

Pineda?s own foundation donated $25,000 to the victims.

All proceeds from the concert will be turned over to the Philippine National Red Cross (PNRC) which is spearheading calamity relief efforts. The new FM radio station U92, also operated by Lumen, has turned over a P1-million check to start the ball rolling for the fund raising.

Concert-goers are encouraged to bring at least one of the following items for donation: imperishable food, drinking water, clothes, blankets and medicine.