Let the music play

Warning - Insanely long post. Heavily link littered for the benefit of those who could use some musical enlightenment ;)

A post about music on this blog should fall under 'knew this was coming' category, going by the numerous times I associate my post titles with song names and lyrics. So why now? Uhmm, why not I thought. Hence.

The early days

My oldest memories of music probably date back to the mid-80's. That was a time when tapes were the rage with a dual cassette player/recorder being the zenith of luxury. I don't know whether music was as easily accessible as it is today (legally or not) but there was quite a stack of cassette tapes in the house, courtesy mostly my uncles. Dad was never so much into music. Ghulam Ali, Pankaj Udhas, Anup Jalota, Mohd. Rafi, Sudhir Phadke, Arun Date, Asha Bhosle, popular filmi music and some english tapes thrown in for good measure, all jostled for space on that ever filled up rack of cassettes.

Moving on in to the 90's and cable TV spreading itself into everyday average households I was attracted further to music, latest filmi stuff mostly. I remember walking down the street to the music shop with either of my uncles. Here we used to sift through latest releases and pick a bunch of songs to be recorded onto a cassette. This saved the dough to buy an OST for a movie when only 2 out of 8 songs were worth listening to. Ofcourse, the recording was more expensive than buying an OST but it made economic sense to have only the good songs and spare your ears of the crap. My sense of rhythm was growing up on a steady diet of Bollywood fluff.

Inglish know you?

Somewhere down the years, I think 7th grade, I chanced upon English pop music. Like every kid my age then, I started off with MJ, Madonna and the likes. The list soon started to grow with more 90's music to include Bryan Adams, MLTR, Ace of Base and one off Canuc acts like Snow kept things interesting. This was also the time when our very own desi version of Vanilla Ice, Mr Baba 'Thanda Thanda Paani' Sehgal was churning out album after album with utmost sincerity. This was a time when rap was cool. Rap in Hindi, ubercool. Indipop was taking root and soon many artistes followed. Mehnaz with Ms India promised much but disappeared into oblivion too quickly. Her competitor in chief, Anaida, was a looker, but her looks only took her thus far. If only she had a voice to match her self-proclaimed patli kamariya things would have worked out much better. She too disappeared much like Mehnaz within the blink of an eye. Alisha Chinoy was the more consistent among the 3 female Indipop artistes of the early 90's. Acts like the Colonial Cousins came up and delivered a good song or two.

Moving away from Boyband litter

By the late 90's I was completely lopping up whatever crap was being dished out on TV, Channel [V] to be precise. Boyzone, Backstreet Boys, 'N Sync, Ricky Martin, Savage Garden were regulars on the playlist. To add to the English crap was middle eastern spice in the form of Khaled, Alabina, Tarkan, Araba, Cheb Mami and others I don't recall. Yes, I listened to all that crap too. At the same time, MTV had one show on Sunday evenings which played the latest in house/techno/experimental electronica with artistes like Josh Wink, Daft Punk, Chicane, Paul van Dyk, ATB, Groove Armada, FSOL etc and I began to completely enjoy this form of music. Apparently, the only place to lay hands on such music on tapes at that time in Pune was Vibrations on good ole' Main Street. Soon Vibrations was my temple with weekly visits and near monthly dosages of new techno music.

For those about to rock

It was all going well and good in much the same vein until the third year of engineering school when I was introduced to Metallica. I was a late bloomer on the rock scene but got hooked and caught on really quickly. Again, like most people, I started off with the Black album and just couldn't get enough. Soon, I was listening to a whole lot of Pantera, Sepultura, Sabbath, Van Halen, Iron Maiden and I found a weird sense of peace within the music that sounded like cacophony just some time back. Within no time, I had transformed myself from a happy go lucky trigger hippie to a serious headbanger. My love affair with rock music continued during my Masters and I found great music from alternative/grunge bands like Oasis, Nirvana, AIC, STP, Radiohead, RHCP, GGD, etc etc etc Ofcourse classic rock could not be ignored and I was also frequently listening to music from the holy trinity - Black Sabbath, Led Zeppelin and Deep Purple.

Back to the roots

One fine evening in the US I realised how much I missed listening to the Marathi songs that were played on the radio early morning as mom went through her daily household routine, radio in tow. I think I snatched all available marathi songs off coolgoose that night =)) In the meantime, thanks to my roomies, I was also being brought back steadily on the Bollywood diet.

More styles

During my techno/trance tripping days I had found some music from Infected Mushroom and Astral Projection. As soon as I got my first laptop I was ready for more music and Soulseek obliged. I hunted down an insane amount of psy trance and once again started jumping the happy hippie way listening to IM, AP, Skazi, Talamasca, CPU, Hujaboy and their ilk. With psytrance on, it's pole opposite, ambientcouldnt be far behind. Artistes like Shpongle, Hallucinogen, Ishq, Adham Shaikh, Aphex Twin, Kraftwerk etc soon found their way on to my hard drive. Aphex Twin also led me to exploring some more IDM, but some listening to Venetian Snares and Squarepusher convinced me that IDM didn't have so much of an I in it. Ambient naturally progressed towards an eastern influence and I found an artiste by the name of Karunesh. Karunesh was the tip of the iceberg for the whole asian electronica scene that I then discovered.

I listened to Talvin Singh's Butterfly and I knew I wanted more of this kind of music. I had earlier listened to OK but wasn't impressed back then. More digging around and I was listening to Karsh Kale, Midival Punditz, TJ Rehmi, Badmarsh & Shri, Niraj Chag - the whole asian electronica scene. I was so impressed by the marriage of tabla with electronica that I knew I had to check out what Indian classical sounded like by itself. Then came Ustad Zakir Hussain, Ustad Sultan Khan, Hariprasad Chaurasiya, Anoushka Shankar etc but I found it a little too bland for my palate.

A trip to the pind

With so much Brit influence in the asian electronica scene, I slowly moved towards the old Brit favorite, DnB. Bally Sagoo has incorporated a lot of DnB influence in his albums and while listening to some of his songs I started enjoying Bhangra. Soon I was all hands in air to the tunes of Panjabi MC, Juggy D, Lehmber, Malkit Singh and all their punjabi brethren. I couldnt understand a word of what was being said, for all I knew, the music was really cool :)

Choose one?

With so many different genres of music, it is no surprise that I find myself being thrown in all directions wherever I find new music. No harm in sampling new music anyway, like it - find more of a similar style, don't - trash it. Keeping this simple mantra at the back of my mind I have been enjoying all my music so far. Nowadays I often find that my mood dictates my choice of music. If I'm in a reflective mood, I listen to some alternative rock, marathi or some old hindi songs which make sense. If I'm in a chaotic state I turn up the music to some hard rock. In happy carefree moods I usually dont care what I'm listening to as long as it is upbeat, could be bhangra, could be electronica, could be classic rock or it could even be some jhatang bollywood music.

Well, as long as the music keeps playing, I'm eager to soak it all in. Let the music play ...

Post Title: Shamur - Let the music play

Marriage Misconceptions

You can tell how much everyone is waiting for the weekend when we're out at Joey's Smokin' BBQ for lunch on a Thursday. As we were waiting for our food, talk veered towards marriages. C is about to become a father soon and has no plans for a wedding yet. He started talking about how both of them think it will be a big waste to spend a lot of money on the wedding and instead plan to do something on a smaller scale. Everyone seemed to agree with his point of view. S told us how a friend of his bought a boat with the money he had saved up for his wedding and just threw a small party at some local hotel later. Needless to say, everyone was in splits on hearing that. And from there on the topic of arranged marriages cropped up and I was left to defend all of their misconceptions.

R always thought that arranged marriages meant you just show up on wedding day and get married. You dont know who the girl is, what she does, your parents choose a girl and the deal is sealed. So I went on to explain how it works and not how he imagined things were. That left him a little relieved and he said 'yeah cos I was about to say. What if things don't work out for the two of you? Can you take her back to your parents house and tell them 'You liked her. Keep her in your house. I don't want her.' He was convinced though that this was a good system. 'Not like they do it over here. Call you each year on your birthday and go 'You're getting older now. Better get married' and I'm like what do you want me to do? Go to a bar, get trashed and start hitting on every chick I see there?'

C suggested that one should atleast get to see pictures of the girl before meeting her. So I told him, it actually worked that way. Ofcourse he had a brilliant idea immediately. 'So if you don't like any of the pictures that your parents send you, just call them up and tell them 'Can't come to India. My manager gave me a lot of work' Blame your manager, there's nothing anyone can do about it.' He knew what he was talking, he is my manager =)) At this point R asked if there was a lot of alcohol in marriages. I told him that in some communities it does, but not in ours. He went 'You know what you could've done then. If the girl is not pretty enough, drink till she starts looking pretty!'

If this was brilliant S had reserved the best for the last. 'So when you meet her can you take her to a beach or something? Get to see her in a bikini?' He definitely had the right ideas but I did not have the heart to tell him that desi girls' beach attire comprises of punjabi suits/jeans/capris rolled up to their knees. That would have certainly left him choking on his pulled pork sandwich. So I told him that the place where I live in India there is no beach close-by. He went 'Oh! Thats easy then. Tell your parents I want every girl to participate in a wet t-shirt contest and ask them to send those snaps over. Tell them that's how we do it in America!'

We finally finished off our lunch laughing our asses off like drunk idiots and drove back to work. I was definitely amused by everyone's suggestions on approaching arranged marriage with an American mindset.

Ramble On

... 'cos still so much is left unsaid. My intentions are clear. I write purely to vent. It is poetic justice that I find such a beautiful song to go along.

Leaves are falling all around,
Its time I was on my way.
Thanks to you, Im much obliged
For such a pleasant stay.

I leave with nothing but pleasant memories. Of what should have been. Some bitter thoughts, but nothing against you. It is the bitterness from the situation that leaves a bad taste in my mouth. Who's to blame then? Isn't you, isn't me, is it things that I can't see? Does not really matter. The end result is disastrous any which way. I think I should've known better than to go down the same road again; but I've made mistakes, I'm just a man. Everybody does. The important part is to not keep brooding over it and move on. I know my time has come and I thank you for the memories; self-constructed nevertheless. If there is one thing I should learn, it is to not take anything for granted before I move on.

But now its time for me to go,
The autumn moon lights my way.
For now I smell the rain,
And with it pain,
And its headed my way.
Ah, sometimes I grow so tired,
But I know Ive got one thing I got to do,

I can't stay in the same place any longer. I did. I waited long enough. You always tried my patience and you always won. Think about it. Did you win or did you lose? Did you enjoy testing my patience knowing that I spent sleepless nights with but the one thing on my mind? You never really cared. You always played me for a fool. What was that thing I said before? Ahh yes, I should not have taken things for granted. How naive of me. I should have seen things straight. My love for you never let me do that. There. I just said I love you. Was this what you were waiting for? I couldn't say this all along because I feared my love would go unrequited. But now there is no hope. Losing all hope is freedom. It's only when you have lost everything that you are free to do anything. Someone has rightly said love is blind. I'd like to add on - love makes people stupid. Ofcourse I was wrong. How did I let emotions win over my rational mind? That's what happens in love, no place for logic. Didn't I just mention love makes people stupid? Oh great, hindsight is 20/20 vision indeed.

I do smell the rain. You know how I hate the rains. It's been raining since you left me and now I'm drowning in the flood. You always knew how to break through my defenses. Always left me tattered and torn. Did you take a look at yourself in the mirror then? Who's shattered now? I know this pain that's headed my way. I've been through it once and I'm ready for it again. It won't bother me so much this time around. It's been but my only companion over the last few years. Infact we are quite fond of each other now. I feel ashamed for having walked out on you though. Your pain was a stranger to me and I do not have the time now. Because there's one thing I need to do ...

Ramble on,
And nows the time, the time is now
To sing my song.
Im goin round the world,
I got to find my girl, on my way.
Ive been this way ten years to the day, ramble on,
Gotta find the queen of all my dreams.

Got no time to for spreadin roots,
The time has come to be gone.
And tho our health we drank a thousand times,
Its time to ramble on.

I'm leaving on a jet plane, don't know when I'll be back again. I need to get far far away from this place that invokes all memories of you and I. You and I, not us. There never was an us. It hurts. But nobody said it was easy. I can't be stuck in the same place for too long. You know how familiarity breeds contempt. My contempt gets delivered overnight. And I owe it to myself to get the hell outta here. I have nothing to dwell on. I've learnt my lessons, I'll live through the pain. I'm young. Got a whole life ahead of me. I'm gonna go half the way across the globe and find my girl. I hope you find the strength to pull yourself out of that hole too. I don't have anymore energy to try and lift you out. One word of commitment from you and I would have gladly died waiting. You just never had any intentions for me, never gave me a chance to prove myself.

I aint tellin no lie.
Mines a tale that cant be told,
My freedom I hold dear;
How years ago in days of old
When magic filled the air,
Twas in the darkest depths of mordor
I met a girl so fair,
But gollum, and the evil one crept up
And slipped away with her.
Her, her....yea.
Aint nothing I can do, no.

You know I never lied. You know I never cried. But the thought of you and I not being able to make it till the end of our lives brought a million tears to my eyes and I cried a river. Did you know you had so much power in you? What was that line? No woman is worth your tears; if she is, she won't make you cry. I guess there is some truth to that after all. Too bad I chose to ignore conventional wisdom. And now that I know what I need, I also know what I can't have. And I can't tell anyone what it is. I can't proclaim my failure with any hint of self-respect left. My only saving grace is, I know I gave it all I had. God knows I gave it all I had. But it really is about winning and not how you play the game. Such talk is best left for the losers' locker rooms.

Gollum struck just when I wasn't there. Oh who am I kidding. I was never there. I thought I was, but I found out I was living in my own dreams. Gollum cast such a spell on you that you chose not to see beyond him. Such a shame then that while you cry in despair over Gollum I cry for you. Ofcourse I couldnt care less for Gollum, may his tribe burn in hell. But I did care for you. Too bad for you, you never realised what you could be missing on. But now it's all gone. Come to think of it, you still are in a better position. Atleast your feelings were reciprocated. Imagine how lowly I feel. But I guess I had to learn this the hard way and I'll do what it takes to get over this. I hope you too will find the srength to pull yourself out of this self-inflicted misery. Forgive me, if you may, for not being there in your time of need. I do wish you well. Now we can never get what could have been, but what we had will remain till eternity. And now, there's only one thing left for me to do ..

Ramble on,
And nows the time, the time is now
To sing my song.
Im goin round the world,
I got to find my girl, on my way.
Ive been this way ten years to the day, ramble on,
Gotta find the queen of all my dreams.

PS: An absolute waste of time trying my hand at abstract fiction. I know I can't do this well. Look at me pilfering lines from songs, movies, sitcoms and what not LOL Emotion is not me. I should stick to sarcasm.

Post Title: Led Zeppelin - Ramble On

Who would've thought .. it figures

My song for the day. Sums up.



Post Title: Alanis Morissette - Ironic

Too late Too late

Timing is everything baby! It's what makes the difference between ordinary and extra-ordinary. It's what separates the could-have-been's from the has-been's. Think of a box of mangoes kept too long; wait too long and the sweetness is gone. You might eat the mangoes nevertheless, but where's the fun?

That's exactly what happened with our Men in Blue. Lost their sense of timing, lost the plot and the series. One look at the scorecard might suggest they gave it all they had, but to what good is such an effort when there is nothing left to fight for? If you don't play to win, it's not worth playing at all. Now they might, just might, go on to win the last match in Mumbai (although history isn't in favor of the Indian Cricket Team while playing in Mumbai) and try to 'salvage some lost pride'. Instead, I think, they should search for their pride in some rusty salvage yard near Nal Bazaar after the series is done and over with.

A classic case of too little, too late. Hope Team India get their act together in the next series and don't leave all the efforts to the last minute.

Post Title: Metallica - Too late Too late

You can't fix stupid!

Boring Monday morning, I walked into my cubicle. I was still half asleep even though it was way past 9 am. Don't blame me. No amount of sleep on the weekends is ever enough to bring a spring into my step to get to work on Monday. Every week, I suffer from a severe case of the Mondays.

As I browsed through the crapload of emails in Outlook I realised that the bossman was out of town for the week. Yay, I went for a split second without any tangible reason. I don't know what it is that when the boss is not around I feel more relaxed, because it's never like he's on my ass when he's around. This week though I didn't have much time to relax since there was a lot of crap flying all over the place which needed to be put back where it belonged. I had been delaying some things for quite a while now and had come to the conclusion that it had to be sorted out quickly. Technically, I have 8 weeks to get it done this year. At the end of the 8th week, I'll be on a monthlong vacation. Sweeeet!

Sipping on some green tea, I started working. Nothing gets me in the mood to complete work than the thought of an upcoming vacation :) Fifteen minutes later I got an email marked with High priority. This was sent by a user for whom I'd setup some Test cases for UAT. First thought - Daim! What did I miss now?! Then I went through his email and by the time I got to the end I fell off my chair laughing.

This guy was trying to logon to the system and was having issues. So he sent me stepwise screenshots of what he was doing and how he was unable to get in. Ofcourse the system was up and running. But how the hell can you login to a system if you hit CANCEL after entering your username and password?!?! I mean come on! That I am the system admin does not mean that I need to tell people to hit OK or press the Enter key on the keyboard to login. Isn't that basic computer sense? This coming from a 40 something guy who is a Business Analyst. Really? Gawd! How can someone not realise such a basic mistake after having attempted it a couple of times already and then while doing the same thing to take screenshots of the process?

Mr Ron White, your words are gospel. If something was wrong with the system I would've gone and fixed it. But "You can't fix stupid. There's not a pill you can take; there's not a class you can go to. Stupid is forever." Amen.

Sticky song

I was out for lunch Thursday afternoon at a nearby desi restaurant where I heard this song for the first time and it's been stuck in my head ever since. I checked my Winamp counter, I've played it 11 times already. Add to it the number of times I've played it on my work computer and on youtube and it could total a scary number. While the song isn't all that great, the lyrics scream 'I'm a fucking loser' and it almost sounds like Atif pronounces bin as bill, there's something about this song that it's stayed on my mind.

To quote George Costanza, from Seinfeld "I can’t get it out of my head. I just keep singing it over and over. It just comes out. I have no control over it. I’m singin’ it on elevators, buses. I’m singin’ it in front of clients. It’s taken over my life."

I haven't reached that extent yet but here's the video off youtube.

Anoushka Shankar and Karsh Kale - Breathing Under Water

Just as I was thinking of writing a review for this album, I happened to glance over to ET where Derek has written a truly mind-blowing review for this masterpiece [Link]

Words really fail to deliver any justice to this near-orgasm-inducing mish mash of sitar, tabla, electronica, soulful lyrics and stunning vocal acts that is 'Breathing Under Water'. Sunidhi Chauhan on Ghost Story ... oh my gawd!! Definitely the high point of this album for me.

Good thing I checked the website first, my literary skills would've never measured up to such standards :)) This is the first of Anoushka's albums that I've enjoyed completely and I pray this is just the beginning of more great stuff coming along the way. Now if you'll excuse me, I've got some music to listen to.