(today, i was confronted with quite a paradoxical reality in my present state of affairs with life. with all the music life has faced me with over the past few days, i had actually stopped listening to music.)
i’ve wanted to write over the past couple of days. but this post was supposed to be different.
special? don’t know.
profound? maybe.
historic in my lifeline? maybe yes.
silence probably exemplifies the best form of profoundness which becomes historic. more than tomes of verbose discourse.
‘when you know your heart is light/electric is the love’
there was a glow in the bliss of this post coital breathlessness. an aura which hung over the space surrounding their entangled mass. the source of which wasn’t the incandescence of their physical beings, but the temper of their souls.
only one of them could see it.
*
he was cursed. stylo could see. through to the light of the souls.
the stern flame in his father’s which showed him the way of life. the tender nurturing of his mother’s.
pink puppy love flames. crimson leaping bounds of lust. sanguine fortitude of blood brotherhood.
soot stained darkened ones. chameleon-esque conniving flickers. evil ones which pulled in the light of others like a black hole.
and that one true flame, which glowed unwaveringly. which led him to itself like the guiding star.
*
the glow of the aura was never as pristine as he had imagined in his entire life before this. a slightly muddled shade of gray. not the right grade of luminance, missing that flavor of vibrancy, devoid of that saturation of light. just like an underexposed photograph in the memory which loses its contents over time.
the oracle told him that he would find the answer to this on the highway to the gates of reason. intent on finding solace, he set out. what he didn’t know was what awaited him once he crossed the bridge of identity. hearing the booming rev of a v16 behind him, he looked at the rear view mirror. only to hear a whizz which singed his hair swept askance over his right ear. the oracle obviously hadn’t warned him enough. no wonder her soul glowered in green shadows.
the gates of reason stood up right ahead, mighty in their stature. but stylo’s v8 had started groaning by now. the v16 was inching closer with each flicker of the soul. since he was a child, stylo had heard stories that the gates of reason were forbidden territory for mortals, so much so that they were practically taboo owing to the hushed whispers in which they were spoken about. he had also learnt through one such story that as you approach them, you tend to get blinded with their white light as they flood you with the truth you set out to search for. obviously, nobody ever survived. and nobody ever knew if they actually learnt the truth.
as he lay there while his blood oozed out of the hole in his chest, the culprit of which was still wrecking havoc in his nicotine stained lungs, he got his answer. in that flash second, he saw his soul.
from what i remember having read in my history texts when i was in school, there was a period called the middle ages, or what i remember simply as the generic medieval europe.
then came the industrial revolution. (yes, i do remember there was the renaissance period as well, you arty ones).
machines movin’, mass makin’, money flyin’.
and people dyin’ – maybe one of the many things common between both periods.
i was reminded of these times during a recent online conversation, although the context wasn’t exactly on the degree of opacity the souls of these periods possessed. historians, economists, sociologists must have written tomes on it already.
europe, it was argued during the conversation, was built upon the graves of those who died in the sweatshops. of those who gave up their lives toiling for their grain under tyrannical fiefdoms. which led to the natural conclusion that in order to achieve a state of being called developed, physical human labor and sacrifice is mandatory.
of course, the pyramids were built upon the backs of thousands of slaves too. the egyptians were ‘civilized’ after all.
in today’s day and age, does aspiring for the status of being a developed nation still warrant the same sacrifice of human labor and life? my point of argument was that today, physical human labor has been replaced by technology. the field on which you play with the ball of industry is made of different turf now. instead of physical human labor, the war to win the status of development is how much any nation can derive out of technology. human sacrifice, yes. but not in the form of physical labor or loss of lives.
another point raised was that the playing field isn’t level today. developed nations at the finish line do have the choice of coming back onto the track and strewing it with the shrapnel of their progress. you can’t go as far then, can you? specially if you are running barefoot. but that’s always been the case. the world wasn’t built to be level. balance would destroy the equilibrium. the earth’s pivot is an inclined axis for a reason.
so what do we do? i’d just like to listen to this banging through the speakers.
‘europe ain’t my rope to swing on/can’t learn a thing from it/yet we hang from it/gotta get it, gotta get it together then/like the motherfuckin’ weathermen/to expose and close the doors on those who try/to strangle and mangle the truth/’cause the circle of hate continues until we react’
familiar? ‘yeah, we gotta take the power back’.
too much of rage? maybe. but ‘then first you must learn how to smile as you kill’. and is ‘a working class hero something to be’?
i’ll quell your thought if you read on, in case this sounds like a bollywood producer’s plea for a mega blockbuster.
i’ve always had a liking for the expression – hit by a freight train. that’s how i like my music. and most else in life. freight trains will always be an enduring subject in my memory because of their association with a falsetto which unleashed some of the most raucously debauched moments in rock n’ roll history. yes, i mean the reference to the freight trains of the loaded variety.
those who have followed this post till now will probably know the feeling of being hit by a freight train. you simply don’t know what hit you or when it hit you. you just witness the aftermath as the debris flies around. left befuddled, maybe stunned. loss of speech? ummm, maybe. or an outburst of expletives? quite likely.
in my case today morning, the feelings were a mix of being stunned and outraged. of being at a temporary loss for words and then a mild shower of profanities. followed by an intense feeling of me going head on, and hitting it, rather than it hitting me. for once.
the debris i saw flying was the side-view mirror of my beloved ride. and this glorified freight train was a bloody blueline bus.
i’ve still been wondering if it would have been worth my time to have stopped the monday morning traffic behind me. demanded compensation for the damage? quite unlikely to have gotten anything out. engaged in a verbal volley of abuses? wouldn’t have resulted in anything, except maybe escalating it into a physical duel, now that i think of it. and the bus driver could easily have become the second freight train to be in action this morning. oh yes, a call to #100. this sounds so very appealing but alas it occurred to me just now, so i could be forgiven for not having thought of this considering the adrenaline rush i experienced at that time.
i still like the idea of being hit by freight trains. only of a different variety. only in my mind.
and please, a bollywood blockbuster is the last thing i’d want to imagine being hit by right now too.
*i do hope this doesn’t acquire the same meaning for you as it did for me. let alone monday morning. any time of the day, week or year.*
so the french football team may not have given much reason to cheer this year. i’m sure most of us would know a few (unless they are one of those as well) who would be nursing their depression by frantically looking around for another nation to back for the world cup trophy now. at least that is one advantage of not having your home team playing for the cup. switching loyalties becomes so much easier and guilt free. for my part, the sole reason why i’d liked the french football team went away with a headbutt.
the great savior that music is, fete de la musique would have acted in big measure this year to salvage some spirits (yes, i know ‘drowning (in) the spirits’ saves too, maybe). which of course, gives me good reason to believe why this year’s fest was several notches above what i’ve seen in the past. (remember the reference to reason taking french leave in my previous post?). in fact, the primary reason why i did make the effort to go there was because of this mumbai based duo i’d been extremely keen to watch perform. uruguay vs. s. korea didn’t hold much blood for me anyway.
playing music creatively is one thing. having stage presence and putting an act together is a completely different ballgame. and getting them both in the right proportion made sridhar-thayil hit the nail spot on at their performance tonight held at the alliance francaise. they gave their audiences rain. then they immediately drowned them in an aural flood. you want some love tonight? of course, there is a love song. but then you’ll have to go through the hate song too. don’t be surprised if this isn’t the usual love-hate equation, and you find undertones of sexual ambiguity. suman sridhar, with her bright polka dotted dress made for a spectacle. with an impish charm, which could transform itself into the oozing sensual innuendo of a seductress or the commanding gaze of a dominatrix in a split second, she captivated the audience with a voice which was equally at ease in shifting gears. the best exemplification of this was when the classical vocals led intro to ‘electric temple’ (i hope that’s what it’s called) moved effortlessly into jazz infected soul vocals as the song progressed. all this while jeet thayil kept good stead with improvisations on his fender. but his voice wasn’t any less either when it came to their songs which contained a mad flurry of the spoken word. juxtaposing themselves against each other, there were moments when there were verbal volleys with the emotions of both on the either extreme of the spectrum as they transposed their thoughts and reactions. similar moments of insanity prevailed through most of their set as suman just wouldn’t stand still, with her polka dots reducing themselves to concentric circles and parallel lines. the best parallel to describe her would be a lily allen meets beth gibbons meets martina topley bird. ok, some might say i’m pushing this a bit too far now. but then yeah, i guess you get the idea.
so in case you get the wind of them performing any place in your near abouts, make it if you are in for some entertaining madness. let’s hope delhi gets to see more of them.
as for myself, i’m happy the french gave me good reason to cheer with two excellent gigs this week. which team are we supporting now, by the way?
the north eastern part of india, without doubt, has been one of the most under-rated regions when it comes to exposure in the mainstream performing arts sphere. this, of course, is really sad and unfortunate considering the fact that the region is, and has always been, burgeoning with musical talent. the good bit has been that there definitely have been bands – and i’m talking of a time since a good couple of decades – which made their mark. the great society, mojo, and of course, lou majaw, have over the years been representative of the region’s talent, yet, they have been the only bastions most people would have known. and there has always been this lingering feeling that there is more to it than has met the eye, or err, ear.
21st june turned out to be special for me this way (of course, it is special to me, and will always be; those who know it also know what’s not so special about this day for me too, and they know what i mean – let’s just say reason took french leave on this day some years back), because it unveiled something which i lapped up with complete eagerness. as most would know, this day is celebrated all over france, and in quite a few parts of the world now, as ‘fete de la musique’ or the world music day. delhi isn’t much different now either, considering the cosmopolitan (ok, i say that with some trepidation) nature our capital has acquired by now. most of all, personally, i would still not really look for a reason to celebrate a festival of music, but if this day gives me one more opportunity to do so in a year, so be it. i’m happy!
so this year it was ‘the handshake concert’ – the idea behind the name being the spreading of love, peace, etc. through the singular action of a handshake. noble thought indeed, and quite a workable one. yeah yeah, munnabhai probably had a better one up his sleeve, what with the ‘jhappiyan’ et al. nonetheless, it’s music after all. and there could be no bigger force of action which could promote everything which is needed to bring balance into this world in a better way. period.
this concert was a very different experience in itself, and i don’t mean in terms of just the artistes. the venue was stein auditorium at india habitat center, and attending a gig at a seated gathering was a little unsettling in itself, specially when you are used to stepping over people’s toes to get right up to the front to take pictures and trying to save your equipment (and yourself) from raging moshpits, unless of course, you are part of them. so it goes.
soon we had luke kenny coming on stage, the usual niceties being exchanged, and finally, we being treated to what we were there for. the first ones to come on stage were cultural vibrants, a trio of sisters, decked in their traditional gear with voices that resounded in perfect unison as they harmonized their pitch with the assistance of a solitary mono-stringed traditional instrument. unusual was the first word that came to mind, nice being a close second. or maybe the other way around. and as is turned out, the latter part of the gig was to contain some unusually nice voices. i use the word unusual because i’m not really used to being faced with such stuff, but then yes, i have learnt, rather evolved myself, to have an open ear. the quarter of tetseo, which were actually a vision by themself too, had some really complex vocal harmonies being transposed over each other, with one half handling the alto section and the other taking care of belting out the tenor part. short and sweet, till now. what did come as a surprise, and i mean, s-u-r-p-r-i-s-e, was when luke uttered something about the phantom of the opera. you mean, whaa? of course, i do pride myself about my books, but then of course, i haven’t read it, and the only experience i’ve had with this musical is looking at one of the posters at big chill (yes, the one which says el fantome d ‘el opera) while waiting for my food, or the gerard butler-emmy rossum starrer. oh, and did i forget mentioning iron maiden? this place was by the farthest stretch of imagination, the least where i’d have expected to hear an operatic rendition of a musical. but so it was. when asin and nise assumed their places, and began singing, it was pure symphony. absolutely worthy of a standing ovation.
the rock n roll country that the north east is, this genre could anyway not have been left ignored. there was o.f.f., which sounded quite promising. young, energetic, with a fair bit of a punch in their alternative laden music. given the right kind of exposure, they could hit it off well. one of the earliest proponents of electro-rock, medusa, came up from mumbai too. i was watching them after close to three years, and the last time i saw them, was a mad experience. maybe it was the venue and the setup, but then i did have a feeling they maybe lacked their earlier insanity (and i think they might not find it respectable to be called sane either). there was something lacking – maybe there was some more growth, musically, which i expected, i’m not sure – but they couldn’t really fill up the venue the way they could have. raxit was all the over the stage as usual, which is something i’ve liked about him. vocalists are definitely not expected to stand still with their mouths trying to make love to the mic at all times. the high point of course was when soulmate finally emerged as the crowd yelled out their name in frenetic anticipation. tips was the personification of the expression ‘angelic vision’. draped in pure white, she patiently fixed butterflies to her mic stand, as there were gasps being subdued in the crowd. it was flower power in its fullest glory that night, made complete with a peace medallion. when it comes to blues, there is nothing which can come in the way of calling soulmate one of the best acts to have been seen in a long time. with her raging voice and effervescent theatrics, tips adds to the sweltering longing of rudy’s guitar – all of which oozes itself in the form of a lingering pleasure.
the gig wasn’t without its share of biggies of a bigger kind either. grammy nominated buddhist monk, tashi lama, enchanted the audience with prayer chants, gurgling in a voice which had a bass tone that defied all conventions of what is generally called ‘singing from the pit’. and finally, our very own pt. vishwamohan bhatt – grammy winner, creator of the mohan veena – which was something being looked forward to, and wasn’t disappointing either. after all, he did try some blues on his strings too.
this was, for sure, one of the best concerts i’d have attended in a long, long time. not just because of the quality of the artistes, but also because of the sheer diversity in the genres displayed, and the biggest being that yes, my faith was re-affirmed that the north east does thrive with talent. musical talent of a different kind too from what i was expecting. any concert assumes a special meaning when it lends itself as an aid to musical discovery too, anyway.
images from the gig can be viewed here. anybody wishing to use these may contact me please.
the way you could see them, there was a sea of disparity between the two. yet, they had been part of something two decades ago, which is still a long shot for most even today. mahesh tinaikar seemed to play with a sense of fortitude. the lines of his face, which lit up from time to time as the stage lights flashed across his visage, contained within them stories of a journey which most independent musicians only dream of. the other person though seemed to still overflow with a sense of childlike frolic – unabashed, vocal, unhurried. uday benegal has come a long way too, having traversed from here to across the atlantic, and back again. but seeing both of them together on stage, was like a slice of history being served in front of you. on his acoustic guitar, mahesh, played some tremulous blues based string work. worth stirring your soul for. uday was the quintessential front man, out to please his audience. to be honest, this was my first whirling kapalas gig (that’s what they call themselves now), so the material was fresh for me. and very different, in a pleasing way from the glam laced rock n roll they played in their heyday as rock machine, and later, indus creed. sankarshan kini had a lot to do with it, in the form of his violin’s lament. but did i tell you, that the slice of history was served reheated? and did it taste del-i-cious! either they gave in to the audience’s demands, or playing songs from their past is a regular feature of their live set, what was sure was that nobody was complaining. ‘trapped’, ‘rnr renegade’, and the song asking for which the crowd spent volumes of lung power, ‘pretty child’. but happiest i was, when they came back up on stage again, and made ‘top of the rock’ as the final song of the set. after all, those keys were what started the first song on their first album. and that’s how they are registered in my memory.
watch a few of the images of last night’s set here.
had been a while since i’d last attended a gig i actually wanted to. so when pentagram came a calling, there was some definite good reason. plus i had to check out my new d90, which was still waiting to be deflowered at the altar of rock n roll. the venue was attitude in gurgaon, a place i had been wanting to check out some long months back when they seemed to be getting regular with live gigs. unfortunately, they applied brakes to the gigging, so i never got the reason.
armed with my newly found ammo, we reached the venue and immediately made it to the first level where the band was supposed to begin in a few minutes. oh yes, and catching up with dr. feelgood, who was catching up with vishal, our frontman in the form of his bollywood doppelganger. the venue was pleasantly full, not overflowing with people (now i don’t know if that is supposed to be good or bad). vishal soon got up on stage, and with the first riffs from randolph’s guitar, they immediately started bringing down the house with ‘rock n roll’. after all, ‘its ok, its all good’ has been one of pentagram’s most loved albums (though i personally liked ‘we are not listening’ too, not sure how many today would’ve heard it), so it was good reason for people to jump around. the jumping around didn’t do much good, but not for any fault of the band. ‘can someone turn on the fuckin’ ac…please?’ the voice boomed into the box, the venue staff was seen moving around with remote controls to try something, but didn’t seem to do much good. (in hindsight though, i found the answer to my question. it was good there weren’t as many people. else we’d be in swamp of sweaty bodies slipping on each count of jump. bad ‘attitude’, eh?).
‘animal’ soon followed suit, so did ‘electric’ and ‘this is for my people’. however, when pentagram tried out some of the newer stuff they have been working out, it didn’t seem to go down too well with the crowd. maybe because people after being a few drinks down want to be in the confines of familiar territory. the newer stuff was decidedly different, but then that’s how they’ve been over the course of their past 2 or 3 albums. the beat structure had a strong accent of local western india folk music is what i can say. similar in a way to what ‘my roots’ plays to on s+f’s ‘mantis’. not bad, but will take time to grow on people. the band probably took cue of this, and immediately moved in a different direction. something really commendable. reading the audience, and giving them what they want isn’t something which comes as easy to most bands.
‘killer’ came next. but not so easy. pasted on the voluptuous beats of ‘smack my bitch’. and the people went MAD! pentagram has had a way with adding their twist to covers. last i remembered them doing ‘desire’ in their electrorock form, and they didn’t disappoint this time either, for ‘desire’ followed soon enough.
all said and done, brilliant performance and pentagram as tight as a vice, the sound was good, audience was ok, the venue, ummm, lets just say, it could have been much ‘cooler’.
it was dark outside. of course, it was closing upon midnight. he was still coming to terms with adjusting to the concept of daylight saving in this part of the world, but he did know that even though the sun may not go down as early as it does in his part of the world, midnight is dark. and tonight, the darkness had been lurking from dusk. or maybe since the time he thought dawn had broken. he didn’t really know if there had been a sunrise at all.
inside of course, he had stubbed out the sun shortly after it left its final traces during twilight.
sitting inside his studio, he felt like pulling the drapes aside to catch a glimpse of the moon’s reflection in the river running across the street from his apartment. but the river had run dry. there wasn’t moonlight either. “how silly of me! i took away the sun and still long to see the moon?”, and with a self derisive smirk returned to staring into the emptiness that glowed from the screen of his laptop. a solitary picture. taken just yesterday. which had meant so much then, had contained so much emotion. today, it was failing to strum any chord of passion in his soul.
the chords did strum somewhere in the background of his imaginings. or were they? ah, stan getz. yes, of course. he remembered how fondly they had got that player and how he had spent close to a fortune looking around for vinyls. all to experience that warmth in sound. the warmth was still there, after all the player was the same. but it wasn’t enough to get to the chill of his bones. but the music did pierce through to his soul. the last he remembered enjoying jazz was when he was cooking for a bunch, rather a trio, of his lovables. a much enjoyed casual weekend lunch filled with a laziness which is just what a saturday warrants. with the main course being named after the vital ingredient of jazz which infused itself into the dish too. all of which seemed like such a distant reality now. more like a dream wafting itself through the mists of fogged up memory.
but it was fusion-acid-jazz that day. and tonight, it was the plaintive wail of stan’s trumpet which harmonized with his soul. though he hated to admit it within the circle of his new found acquaintances in the new city, he was but a neo convert to jazz. the smooth talker he was, he could talk about jazz, just like mostly anything under the sun, with enough conviction to make the phonies around him begin to doubt their understanding of things.
tonight, he discovered jazz.
he had never tried making love with coltrane or davis filling up the room with their presence. he did seem to feel tempted to try it out each time he saw jerry maguire being handed over that tape of coltrane and davis performing in stockholm circa ’63. he never found the vinyl, maybe it didn’t exist. and he never tried making love with the help of jazz either.
“it may have been splendid.”
now that he had discovered jazz, in retrospect, the idea seemed very appealing. he knew that jazz reverberated with his soul only when he was swinging at the extreme ends of his emotion. joy. or like now.
something on the lines of ‘indian ocean has mostly used four instruments through their career. we urge you not to add yours’ flashes on screen. a message which elicits a smile and a quick glance to do a double check on my phone to see if its set on vibrate. its a small gathering at the cozy theater. maybe it’s the relatively early hour (6.30pm is early for a weekday) or it was purposely not publicized as much (as good humoredly admitted by the organizers - in a bid to make more people watch it by buying tickets in cinema halls). but then there aren’t as many people as you’d have expected, yet the theater is pleasantly filled up in a non-intrusive manner. and so it begins.
i don’t really need to say much about indian ocean, and their impact on the independent music scene in india. suffice to say, by far, their brand of music has been the most accessible kind to have been made in our country. steeped in modern western music grooves, yet rooted in rustic sounds from the deepest recesses of india’s soul. going down with equal ease with both an iphone toting, laptop carrying teen in delhi and a charming belle tucked away in benaras. an aging soul walking around hiranandani reminiscing his heyday and a long haired dude in adyar who has just picked his first guitar. a bearded skullcap in a hurry to attend to the call of prayer and a vermillioned forehead rising early to catch the first glimpse of morning. they have simply cut across everything, and made themselves, like i said earlier, the most accessible.
which makes it a reason good enough for someone to engage in an endeavor to put together the snippets of the band’s journey over the years. and that courageous someone is jaideep varma, who through a meticulous method of interviewing the band and all people associated with it over the years, has crafted together a non-fiction film titled ‘leaving home’, which provides quite a good insight into facets unknown to most fans. the film begins with sights and sounds which would be familiar to any living soul of delhi, and gradually reaches the courtyard of a house nestled in the lanes of karol bagh. a house which has been home to indian ocean over the past many years. the walls of which would contain within them echoes of the sounds created by the band for generations to come. chronicling the band’s coming of age, each band member shares their thoughts at various junctures in their timelines as they struggled for survival and then later, grappled with stardom. aiding the four protagonists (asheem chakravarty, rahul ram, susmit sen, amit kilam) are various family members, ex-band mates and numerous associates (anurag kashyap, sudhir mishra, rabbi shergill, shubha mudgal), each of whom help to provide a perspective which adds an unsurpassable element of honesty to the film. a liberal interspersion of live footage of some of their best known songs – both in concert, as well as during their jam sessions – provides that ubiquitous element which the band stands for.
mind you, this is not a feature film. nor is it a documentary. it’s a non-fiction film which documents the travails of the band. so don’t expect any fussy frills to excite you through your viewing. considering the fact that it would be a low budget independent film, the film has been made very well. the concept, though not exactly novel, has been executed in a very justifiable manner. though the editing could have been slightly slicker; post production could have smoothed out some of the rough edges. the sound, however, makes up for everything, picking up each subtleties of each nuance music and pronoucing it – something extremely essential to a film of this nature. despite all this, any indian ocean fan would relish the entire experience of reliving the band’s story. but then this is it. the film, in a certain way, may not really strike a major chord with people uninitiated into the blend of the band. a novice may not necessarily end up becoming a convert and try to delve deeper into exploration, if the movie is his maiden experience with the band. i may be wrong (and honestly, i’d love to be proven wrong), but i guess this is something that would be best left to time after the movie has seen a major release.
but above all, owing to the soft spot i have for the band and indian independent music as a whole, i feel that irrespective of anything else, the thought, feeling and effort which went into making this is definitely commendable. it makes me feel proud. and it makes me want to grab every lover of indian ocean and ask him to watch it.
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