Sabotage

Q. What do you want to be when you grow up beta?

Every little kid wants to be something when they grow - Astronaut, Cricketer, Pilot, the guy that gets shot out the cannon...
I was asked the same question too. And I had a bunch of ideas and options in my mind too... one of them being the now repulsive "I want to go to office."
But wanting to be on stage never featured on that list for the first 20 years of my life.

Circa 1989...

A: "I want to be a scientist!" (yeah I don't know what I was thinking either...)


Sabotage was the first Beastie Boys song I'd ever heard. I think I was in school or just out of school. Some late night show on MTV (the 'original' version not the crap that's on today) which played it. I really couldn't understand what the fuck was going on at the time. Too much of an assault on my senses but I knew I wanted to hear it again... That didn't happen for probably another 5 years.
I just think these guys are the epitome of nerdy cool especially in the vid below.


Circa 2009...


A: "I want to be on a stage like this... to sing for a crowd that's a.l.l around me like this... pulsating boom from every amp cranked to the m.a.x like this... lights flashing intermittently like this... and rocking the ever livin' shit outta e.v.e.r.y single body just like this!"






The hunt is on...

3:05

AM is the time this post is being written on a Thursday morning.
No sleep... don't know why.
But sometimes there are good things that come out of lying awake thru the night.

Bliss Logic is something else. This trio plays music which is a mix of rock and jazz with a bit of electronica. I just chanced upon them a few days ago and knew I wanted to go to Zenzi for their live gig and album release. Heard just the one song coz the tiny room was packed to the gills. But there's some mad freakin' talent here.
Been listening to them for the past couple of hours... I can't get over the blend of this music. So many different elements to the music and each of them more appealing than the other. Can't explain it. Do yourself a favour and listen to them. You can download their track 'New Message' here.


Tiny scrawl on the BL CD jacket says:


Bliss Logic: Advisory
Get Cozy + Switch Off Mobile + Send Fumes + Play Loud + Drift


Currently drifting....

Happy to you

The birthday month is here again... Bugger! I mean not that birthdays are bad or anything... feels like the last one just barely went by.

Work sucks... coz there's not much of it coming thru. So to fill up my time (and wallet) I've taken up some small writing assignments. So far I've covered intellecutally gripping topics ranging from the felonious (How to make counterfeit money on your computer) to the healthy (How much should a teenager weigh?) along with some high finance (How to make fast free money online) thrown in there as well. Not a Pulitzer gig thats for dang sure. Atleast I wasn't as fortunate as my other fellow writers who had the pleasure of 'How much do celebrities weigh?' or the even more riveting 'How much do Supermodels weigh?'
But hey it gives me something to kill my time. Some extra money for the beer and peanuts don't hurt neither.

What's got me more kicked is my decision to write some material for standup. Hugely inspired by the amateur comedy night I attended at this club a few weeks ago. So much easier trying to write occasionally humourous stuff on the blog and getting a few laughs from people who get/like my kinda humour. Of course translating that into an act for the stage is a whole other ball game. Those amateurs had 2 minutes a piece to showcase their giggle inducing skillz. Doesn't seems like much but Maaaannnn! you can so bomb in 30 seconds let alone 120. There was one chick in particular who was cheered by us coz it was good to finally see a woman up there after like 5 dudes. But all thoughts of supporting women etc were blown ouffa the stage with a pretty poorly written act. I'm all for self depracating humour but you gotta be good at doing it. And never never N-E-V-E-R piss off the audience by saying shit like, "Well atleast one of you got it." You dumb bitch! That one who laughed was probably your friend who did it out of loyalty.

I'm not sure if I'll be ready to get under the bright lights and spout my spiel. But its fun putting down stuff for potential sketches. Material I've put down so far includes - adventures while ordering takeout, Indians travelling on a plane, partying in the 'cool' places...
Boy I can barely clamp down the deliciouso vitriol that's just beggin' to come out ;)

What else what else? I've been on a sick spree of dling music lately. In the past year or so I have been listening to a lot of ambient chillout stuff. Very loungey, lo-fi and sometimes trancey kinda music. Hangover from all those Goa trips I suppose. If y'all need some seriously cool music for your cafe or something, you know who to call. Hell I've even provided some friends with 'get you into the mood' kinda music. Thought about naming that mixed cd as McLovin' but settled for the more sophisticated Aural Pleasure hehe I love me some wordplay ;)

Q. In what 2 ways is pornography associated with this blog?
A. Tori Black & Fayth Deluca (sorry to disappoint but I chose the cleanest pages)

yeaaahhh... So in case you felt the need to egosurf, be prepared for Google to throw up some interesting results once in a while :D
But damn... Miss Black is cute!

And lastly I sign off with a few new songs (apparently I put up cool links so I have a rep to protect lol) which are on the loopy playlist:-

Shkabang - This is an electro rock n roll supergroup featuring the likes of Anushka Manchanda on vocals along with some heavyweights from the Mumbai gig circuit who've played with bands like Pentagram, Zero ,Tough on Tobacco and Hypnotribe. Quite like their sound. Should be a good album when they come through with it eventually.

Vicodin Love Confessions - Just love the name of this band out of Toronto, Canada. Bit of alternative and a dash of indie along with a whole lot of rock. Their new single Jeebus is up for download on the popular torrent sites.

Nikhil D'Souza - Now I came across this dude a few days ago and was plesantly surprised and impressed. I'm a big fan of Jason Mraz and this singer songwriter reminds me a lot of him. Listen to 'Storm without a Sky' and tell me I'm wrong! Nice to see our fair city has its share of such musicians.  

And we end with a dash of Bollywood... Amit Trivedi rocks!



Till next time... vaya con dios.

JMWG - Take #1

Been wanting to do this for a while now... This being using Audacity to record my vocals on a karaoke track. The attempt is amateurish but I didn't really expect anything less given that I have to work within the limitations of my home PC.

I've chosen Why Georgia by John Mayer primarily because my throat was a bit off today and I felt I sounded a bit like JM :D
Do have a listen and let me know what you think...
Thanks!

Without music, life would be a mistake...

Well… just re-read my last post and after some serious cringing I have come to the conclusion that it was just a badly written thank you note to mah peeps (there’s that black thing again…). So in my present stone cold sober state, I’ll just say thank you and I’m very grateful for your presence in my life.

I was also going thru some of eM’s old posts last week. She’s like a celebrity of sorts now. From a famous blogger to a published author. Quite the feat. She writes pretty good. See… that’s my writing style. But if I were an author I’d jazz that up just a bit – “Her, often vivid, descriptive style of prose is quite becoming… especially her accounts of love and life in the urbane landscape of the towering metropolis… quite enthralling indeed.”

Nice eh?! Felt downright British there... by Jove!... ole Blighty… Tally ho… Spotted dick! (what the...??)

While I haven’t read it yet, I do intend to get me a copy and who knows maybe get it signed by her since she lives in this city now. Damn! That would be a first. I don’t have a signed book by a real live author... err... or a dead one either. So all of y'all need to go out there and buy a copy too. Help a fellow resident of Blogosphere make a few bux and all that.

So coming back to that post of hers – it was about certain songs from different times in her life. Which got me to thinking about some songs/artistes which are so ingrained in my mind that I swear there are times when I just need to think about them and I can literally hear the music in my head. Goosebumpy sh*t that…

So onto the list of 4:-

1. Beat It by Michael Jackson – I distinctly remember seeing the video of Beat It way back when on television. Now I might have been just a 5 year ole chile but my memory is absolutely crystal clear on this. And I remember it was shown in connection with some award ceremony. There was a blurry memory of a picture which looked something like a big tuba like thing in the bacground of the stage. It was only years later that I managed to connect the dots. That's right... I was watching the Grammys that night in '84 on Doordarshan. Till date, everytime I listen to this song, it never fails to gee me up. I think this song really started off my on-going love affair with rock. Killer guitar riffs along with that super fantastic solo by Eddie Van Halen (with that speed shredding and his signature tapping) really make this a standout track. Aural delights aside, this solo is a visual treat too. Take a gander at this.

2. Let's get rocked by Def Leppard – My first e-v-e-r rock song. In them days, mix tapes were the rage and pretty expensive to make as well. So when my buddy Z got one made by a local dj, he was kind enough to give me a copy. (btw said local dj went by the name of Aqueel – yup the same dj Aqueel of Yeh Vaada, Disco '82 etc fame) I remember Joe Elliot’s raspy voice in the intro demanding if I wanted to get rocked. And no sooner did the first few bars blast through my Panasonic cassette stereo, I surrendered. Def Lep holds a special place in my heart. British pop-rock at its best and their heavy use of vocal harmonies influenced us when we did our own songs. Hysteria and Adrenalize are two albums I will never grow tired of listening.

3. Billy Joel – I can’t really pinpoint any one song by Billy Joel because I pretty love 'em all. Again an artiste whose tape I must have run ragged on that trusty ole Panasonic a million times. If I had to pick, it would have to be Allentown, Its still Rock n Roll to me, Tell her about it, Movin’ out (Anthony’s song), The Longest Time, New York State of Mind, Just the way you are, This is the time… aah forget it... just waayyyy too many. Billy’s song writing is unfussy and uncomplicated. I've thought of him as a storyteller more than songwriter. His stories are mostly simple ones… but whether they are or not, they'll get to you coz thats the way he writes them. If there was one thing I could have just for a while, it would be to have the talent to write a love song the way Billy does and sing it for my woman.

4. Nothing else matters by Metallica – My first “metal” song or so I thought going by the band’s name. I’d been given a free copy of their self titled album (also referred to as the Black album) by a school buddy whose dad was a biggie with Universal Music (back then it was Music India Ltd). That cassette lay in one corner of my bookshelf for all of like six months gathering dust. I can’t quite remember why one day I tore off the plastic wrap and slid it into… you guessed it – the Panasonic. It definitely had to do with someone at school telling me I just HAD to listen to this particular song. Of course I was hooked after listening to the song the first time. Played it for another 4-5 times in a row which was a task considering all the rewinding I had to do. For the younger readers of this blog, Rewinding (and Fast Forwarding for that matter) was this process one had do with tapes in order to get to any song you wanted to listen to which was situated anywhere after the first song in a tape. Quite like shampooing - RWD/FFD --> Stop --> Play to check --> Repeat if necessary.

Special mention also about that musically confused/chaotic decade - the 80’s. With most other decades, there is an association of a genre with a particular decade - like blues and jazz for the 40's and 50's, rock for the 70's, grunge/alternative for the 90's, hiphop for the (early) 2000's. But the music from the 80's has always been referred to as that. 80's music. No particular genre ever made that decade its own. There was rock and pop and metal and rap... just one big mish-mash. Musically I am pretty much an 80's child. My sense of rhythm and melody developed from listening to the artistes and music of that era. The harder, harsher edge to my music probably stems from the grunge and alternative influences of the 90’s.

Of course there are a lot more songs… tons more in fact but I think I’d have to start another blog for that. Since lazy me has no intentions of doing so, I'll just settle for listening to some Def Lep and MJ and Billy and reliving some memories past.

Man I miss that Panasonic…

P.S - In connection with my 15.09.08 post, I came across a supercool video of Incubus at their concert in the Red Rocks Amphitheatre, Denver. If you like the original song, then i think you will love this trippy bass heavy version of Drive.

For those about to Rock...

I've been goaded into making a post (you know who you are!)

Nothing major happened this week. Had a holiday on Wednesday coz of Ganpati. Mid week chuttis are so nice no?!
I was at V's house for Ganpati lunch something which I’ve been going for the past few years now. Her Mom makes the most awesome modaks... yummmm...

Of course the whole post-lunch discussion of "soooo-when-are-you-going-to-get-hitched?" was brought up. What’s with all Matashrees anyway?? I thought girls usually have the whole pressure thing exerted on them but even us guys too?!? Aaaahhh... So what if I’m turning 30 in a couple of weeks... Do I have to get married (or even consider it) just coz I’m turning the BIG THREE O. Nah I think not.
So as V's mom was going on about me getting her a bahu, V was rolling her eyes and giving me pitying looks probably thinking, "Oh you poor boy... I have soooo gone thru this not too long ago".

Lunch got done and I then headed to catch the early evening show of Rock On with the siblings and my pals J & A. I got tickets for this theatre in Mahim called Starcity (the artiste formerly known as Badal of the old Badal-Bijli twin theatres). Went there to try getting tickets before lunch. House Full on the board and as I turn away disappointed, I get psstt-ed at. "Boss, Rock On mangta hai kya?!" Aah what an idiot I was! Of course there is gonna be a tout at these places. So I asked him for 5 tickets and he said it'll cost me 750 (that’s a 150 bux a pop – yeah OK I needed a calculator for that). I’m used to paying no less than 200-300 for a single ticket whenever I go to a PVR or Cinemax or some such. Even for my math-challenged brain the cost of the tickets seemed far too less. It then clicked that I was in Badal of Badal-Bijli in Mahim fame and not a PVR Juhu or Fame Andheri. The original price of the ticket was Rs.100 wonly. I actually asked the blacker very sceptically, "Aap black mein hi bech rahen ho na??” Dude must have thought I'd smoked up some bad sh*t or something :)

Rock On wasn't as bad as I’d thought it would be. I remember telling the Miner that I fully expected this movie to be a complete dud. Regardless of its eventual reviews, I’d have watched this one anyway because I feel a connect with the movie. Having been part of a band myself long ago, I was always hoping someone would make a cool movie about bands, the lifestyle and the gig scene from an Indian context so this was nice to see.
My biggest disappointment with the movie was the soundtrack. Farhan might be a pretty good actor but he can’t sing. One song (the title track) for promotional purposes could have been done by him but not almost 60% of the tracks. I mean it’s a movie about a band for God’s sake. The music HAS to be good. Disappointing clichéd stuff by Shanker-Ehsaan-Loy and the sheets on which most of the lyrics were written were only good enough to be used as toilet paper. (What the fuck is - “Mere taash se heart ka king, mera ek chandi ka ring”) Javed saab apne bete ke vaaste, you could have written waaayyy better lyrics than that.
On a positive note, I loved Zehereelay sung by one of the true rockers of the Mumbai gig circuit in the 90’s – Suraj Jaggan (of Dream Out Loud). It’s a completely wannabe hard rock song where the movie makers I’m sure have tried to poke some fun at the stereotypical Black Tee and bandana clad bands you see on the Mumbai (or Indian) gig/club circuit. But the outstanding track for me is the wonderfully serene Phir Dekhiye sung by Caralisa Monteiro. Sweetly sung with a hint of coaxing and mischief in her voice, this is one lovely song. (Caralisa - Marry me!).

The ride back home after the movie brought back old memories of the band days…
- hanging with the guys while they were auditioning for vocalists…
- them finally picking me coz I was there (“yaar tu hi gaa le since you know everything”)
- our first ever gig which had more than 3000 people…
- getting the “shakes” so badly at the time that I nearly dropped the mic…
- playing in front of the totally biased (for us :) college crowd…
- the cute girls at the Sophiya’s college fest…
- our first television show/competition…
- getting hassled by the judges during said competition and in turn pissing them off…
- roaming the streets of Noida at 10pm trying to find booze so we drown our sorrows…
- Not finding any booze anywhere!...
- deciding we wanted to get into the Indi-pop scene…
- doing the rounds of record labels…
- getting shot down by all of them…
- all the support and affection of our family and friends who remain our biggest fans till date… (Man that last one almost sounds like a shout out on our never-released CD)

Funny thing is I look back now and believe we were a band ahead of its time. OK that might sound a wee bit like I’m full of it but its not… honest.
I’ll tell you what I mean… we started covering alternative rock bands and had a pretty mixed playlist. Of course we played the usual Bryan Adams, Queen, pop-rock stuff. But in them days there weren’t too many bands who were also playing Stone Temple Pilots or Goo Dolls or Green Day in the same set. A few years after we passed out, it seemed that every other band was playing stuff similar to ours. I don’t wanna say we were as good as Zero but when I first saw/heard them, it felt exactly like the kind of sound and material we would have done.
Then again when we tried to get into the Indi-pop scene. Our brand was straight up soft rock with Hindi lyrics (nice ones too unlike taashes and kings and sunglasses).
But no – “you guys sound too western… only guitar and drums and synth… you need to have more Indian instrumentation…”
Of course a few years down the line, one of the most popular bands on the scene is Strings. Soft rock with Hindi/Urdu lyrics. Just a case of (bad) timing I guess…

As I stared out of the window, I'm thinking perhaps we hadn't wanted it badly enough for it to happen. So many musicians have struggled for years before finally making or quitting it. In the end, there are no regrets. I stumbled into it almost accidentally and its influenced my life profoundly and probably made me a better person today.
I used to be a very introverted person back in college not to mention shy and quiet. Today I’m a lot more outgoing than I was then - I guess being the front man for a band will do that to you.

P.S – I still get the damn shakes