So Bill approached me at work today.
"Yo, K-Man", said Bill.
That's what Bill calls me. By the time I had developed a dislike for this nick, it was too late.
"Yo, K-Man. I'm going to this bluegrass festival in the Poconos this weekend. Wanna go?"
"Isn't that like a redneck thing?", I said. "Tell me the name of the town, so I know where to stay away from."
"Why?", said Bill. "You know, you should really go, you might like it."
"Nah man, I said. "Most of you might not have seen an Indian guy before. I am afraid I'll be hunted for my skin or something. Maybe captured and locked up in a cage for observation. Declared a new species and pickled in formaldehyde."
"And if you're lucky, that's all they'll do to you", said another colleague who happened to be passing by. He left, laughing at his own joke.
"You know what I realized", said Bill, "I think you're confusing rednecks with hillbillies."
"What's the difference?", I said.
"Rednecks are racist of their own volition", replied Bill. "Hillbillies are racist because they know no better."
"Ah, I see", I said. "So you rednecks are well-informed racists. You haven't taken the decision to be racist lightly. You've given it considerable thought, mulled it over. Weighed the pros and cons, done your research."
"Exactly", said Bill. "Whereas a hillbilly is born into racism. Kind of like how one is born into a religion. Rednecks, on the other hand, are the free-thinkers of racism."
"That's a great way to put it", I said. "Nobody's explained it to me in those terms before. But still, how does this affect me? Regardless of the nature of your racism, I'll still be in danger, right?"
"Rednecks are harmless", said Bill, "The nature of our racist tendency implies that we are capable of making a conscious effort not to harm you. Whereas hillbillies will come at you like a bear after honey. It's a primal urge."
"And you're saying there will be more rednecks at this gig than hillbillies?" I asked.
"Yes, very few hillbillies in Southeastern PA", said Bill." So will you go?"
"Doesn't bluegrass involve those tiny guitar-like things that sound like someone strumming on his pubes?"
"Yes", said Bill. "Banjos".
"Sorry, I like my guitar heavy", I said. "But have fun. You gonna take your livestock along with you?".
"That's hillbilly", said Bill. "I take dead flesh".
"Oops, gotcha".
Showing posts with label music. Show all posts
Showing posts with label music. Show all posts
Wednesday, June 10, 2009
Tuesday, February 17, 2009
The Stupid Shuffle
Here is something stupid people do in nightclubs. I seen it with my very own two eyes. The night is moving along nicely and the beautiful people are busy laying the groundwork for a possible crotch-to-buttock application scenario and then suddenly, there is a lull in the music and the DJ puts on this song they call the "Cupid Shuffle". And what happens? The Stupid takes over. Takes over everybody. Don't matter if you're a salesgirl from Macys or a professor of advanced thermodynamics from Princeton with tenure. When the song comes on, if at that moment you find yourself on the dance floor, you are obligated to and will have to perform the Cupid Shuffle. It begins with everybody filing into a military type formation in multiple rows. At this point it would be wise to steal a quick glance at the person beside you in order to gauge the degrees of freedom you will be afforded during the shuffle. And then the shuffle begins.
The song consists of a series of instructions to the audience on how and where to position their bodies for the next few minutes. It goes like this :
“To the right, to the right, to the right, to the right”. Here, Mr Cupid expects you to slide your body to the right. You can do the bare minimum, as in just walk over to the right. Or if you are a humongous fan of the song, you could perform some kind of elaborate hand-leg routine while doing it.
Next, the song goes :
“To the left, to the left, to the left, to the left”. Now you have to go walk to the left. If you hate walking, too late, pal.
“Now kick, now kick, now kick, now kick”. Here it is mandated that you kick your feet in front you, making sure you only kick one foot at a time. You may laugh now but when you are in that room, the stupid can get to you.
“Now walk it by yourself, now walk it by yourself”. This is probably the most difficult move in the song because you are being asked to walk it by yourself while being in the midst of a human limb porridge. But don't lose heart, just do your best. Think of yourself as being in a vast meadow with no one in sight and just the blue sky reaching out to the horizon. As far as you are concerned, you are now walking it by yourself. By the way, don't you wish you were actually in that meadow instead of in this shithole, walking left and right and kicking at stuff?
Now granted, I have no first hand experience of how it feels to do the Cupid Shuffle, having contented myself with watching other people doing it (kind of a common theme of my life), but regardless, I still have a really hard time trying to fathom the source of pleasure these people experience while doing the shuffle. Or is it that Americans will obey any set of asinine instructions as long as they have been delivered in rap form? Case in point, even in today's dire economy with the banks tumbling and the jobs disappearing and stock market crashing, if a rapper asks us to wave our hands in the air as if we just don't care, will we tell him to kindly fuck off? No, we will stop caring and start waving. Why? Because he's got the full authority of a beat behind him. And if you don't, well, as a wise lady once said, "the Rhythm's gonna get you."
The song consists of a series of instructions to the audience on how and where to position their bodies for the next few minutes. It goes like this :
“To the right, to the right, to the right, to the right”. Here, Mr Cupid expects you to slide your body to the right. You can do the bare minimum, as in just walk over to the right. Or if you are a humongous fan of the song, you could perform some kind of elaborate hand-leg routine while doing it.
Next, the song goes :
“To the left, to the left, to the left, to the left”. Now you have to go walk to the left. If you hate walking, too late, pal.
“Now kick, now kick, now kick, now kick”. Here it is mandated that you kick your feet in front you, making sure you only kick one foot at a time. You may laugh now but when you are in that room, the stupid can get to you.
“Now walk it by yourself, now walk it by yourself”. This is probably the most difficult move in the song because you are being asked to walk it by yourself while being in the midst of a human limb porridge. But don't lose heart, just do your best. Think of yourself as being in a vast meadow with no one in sight and just the blue sky reaching out to the horizon. As far as you are concerned, you are now walking it by yourself. By the way, don't you wish you were actually in that meadow instead of in this shithole, walking left and right and kicking at stuff?
Now granted, I have no first hand experience of how it feels to do the Cupid Shuffle, having contented myself with watching other people doing it (kind of a common theme of my life), but regardless, I still have a really hard time trying to fathom the source of pleasure these people experience while doing the shuffle. Or is it that Americans will obey any set of asinine instructions as long as they have been delivered in rap form? Case in point, even in today's dire economy with the banks tumbling and the jobs disappearing and stock market crashing, if a rapper asks us to wave our hands in the air as if we just don't care, will we tell him to kindly fuck off? No, we will stop caring and start waving. Why? Because he's got the full authority of a beat behind him. And if you don't, well, as a wise lady once said, "the Rhythm's gonna get you."
Friday, January 23, 2009
Behold
I finally had enough of computer speakers, headphones, graduate era discount stereo systems and movie-based home theater systems. It was time to move on. Time to splurge a bit and experience music as it should be. Behold the purveyor of aural bliss or as I call it, "He that comes in your ear and makes you come too".
(Native Indian warrior Chief Snorting Horse shown for scale, also coming in somebody's ear)
(Native Indian warrior Chief Snorting Horse shown for scale, also coming in somebody's ear)Saturday, November 08, 2008
Sunday, March 09, 2008
Video of the day, high on daylight savings edition
If you're like me, if you are into late night drunken music sessions and at 2:00 am, suddenly notice that the clock says it's actually 3:00 am and the resulting heartache makes you drink some more and listen to some more music, here is what you need. Sigur Ros, Svefn g englar. Notice the violin rod on guitar string action. Also, the singing into the guitar mic action.
(link)
(link)
Tuesday, March 04, 2008
Classically mild
(link)
We likes. We thinks it's brilliant. And not just because we's had a long and fruitful relationship with Raaga Des right through our childhood. We likes even though it contains shirtless Sonu Nigam dressed like a naked warrior.
We also listened to the rest of the album on raaga.com. The rest of the album is okay. It's like, you can see that the intention to blow your mind is there in the album, but actual mind-blowing only happens in this particular song. It's a great concept, fusion of Hindustani classical music with the discordant chords of jazz, previously adopted by Sushila Raman and maybe others. But the discordance, the vocal gyrations of classical music, combined with the frenetic pace of jazz only occur in this song. The rest of the album is less jazzy and more mainstream Indian pop.
I don't know, perhaps with repeated listens, it will grow on me like a french beard.
Friday, February 29, 2008
Tu
Back home in Pune when I was still "studying" engineering, there used to be an intercollegiate orchestra competition called "Kalyani". One of the items in the competition was that a couple of days before the actual competition, the organizers would give each college band that was participating a poem written by some random guy. This poem was in marathi. The band had to set this poem to music and play it on stage during the competition, along with every other song they had practiced.
During the second year (in a row) that my band won the Kalyani Cup for our college, the poem that they gave us was called "tu astas tar". It basically means "If you were here...". The poem outlines a series of environmental changes that would transpire, were the object of the poet's affection to suddenly appear in the immediate vicinity. For example, it goes on to say that he / she would immediately have converted the harsh sunlight into gentle starlight and silence into sweet song and so on and so forth. We Maharashtrians hate sunlight with a passion that is rivaled only by our hatred for silence. I don't know what we're gonna do if this global warming thing turns out to be true. Or if those Bose sound-canceling headphones actually turn out to work.
But getting back to the point, for the second year in a row, it was up to me to set this poem to music. And now, about ten years later, I have finally managed to reconstitute that sophomore effort on my home synthesizer and make it available to the music industry executives who frequent my blog. Now although the original musical performance included a drummer, a guitarist, a bass guitarist, a tabla player, two keyboardists and a dedicated sound mixer, unfortunately I did not have any of these in my apartment and so I had to play every instrument myself on the synth. Also, since I have a hideous voice, please imagine that the trumpety thing playing throughout the song is actually the voice of a marathi lass singing marathi lyrics.
So, here's the song :
(link)
During the second year (in a row) that my band won the Kalyani Cup for our college, the poem that they gave us was called "tu astas tar". It basically means "If you were here...". The poem outlines a series of environmental changes that would transpire, were the object of the poet's affection to suddenly appear in the immediate vicinity. For example, it goes on to say that he / she would immediately have converted the harsh sunlight into gentle starlight and silence into sweet song and so on and so forth. We Maharashtrians hate sunlight with a passion that is rivaled only by our hatred for silence. I don't know what we're gonna do if this global warming thing turns out to be true. Or if those Bose sound-canceling headphones actually turn out to work.
But getting back to the point, for the second year in a row, it was up to me to set this poem to music. And now, about ten years later, I have finally managed to reconstitute that sophomore effort on my home synthesizer and make it available to the music industry executives who frequent my blog. Now although the original musical performance included a drummer, a guitarist, a bass guitarist, a tabla player, two keyboardists and a dedicated sound mixer, unfortunately I did not have any of these in my apartment and so I had to play every instrument myself on the synth. Also, since I have a hideous voice, please imagine that the trumpety thing playing throughout the song is actually the voice of a marathi lass singing marathi lyrics.
So, here's the song :
(link)
Saturday, February 23, 2008
3
When I came to the US, these are the three music cds I purchased with the first paycheck of my graduate assistantship. And they continue to be the top three favorites in my collection.
Antichrist Superstar
Aenima
Mezzanine
Antichrist Superstar
Aenima
Mezzanine
Tuesday, January 29, 2008
Not good
Not good, not good at all. The guy living next door to me, it turns out that he is in a band. And not only that, he likes to indulge in jamming sessions with his fellow band members in his basement. Sadly, they aren't one of those boy bands because a bunch of pretty men doing aerobics and lip syncing to a boom box, that wouldn't have been so bad, in fact, it would have been kinda relaxing for no particular reason. But these guys that I have here, man, they are the real deal. They have drums and they use guitars, one of which is the bass guitar. Anyone who has played a bass guitar in a confined space is probably aware that when a bass guitar is played in a confined space, it does not remain confined within that space but also leaks into and fills up the space adjacent to it. That space would be my space.
And so it went down sunday afternoon. It started out with a dull thud thudding. At first, I thought that my neighbor was banging on my wall to ask me to turn my television down because historically, that is what that thud thudding sound has usually meant wherever I have lived. So I turned down the volume on my tv. But the thudding got worse and it turned out to be drumming and not just drumming but actual arrhythmic drumming on a drum and I would know, being a pretty arrhythmic drummer myself. It was then that the bass guitar began its introductory riff and I don't remember the rest of what I was thinking because I couldn't hear my thoughts. I had a hushed conference with my wife. We were actually yelling, but it was hushed compared to the bass guitar. I asked my wife for confirmation. "Can you hear me think?", I asked her. She couldn't, so obviously it wasn't just me. Those fuckers were really very loud.
Thing is, the previous owners told me that my next door neighbor was a carpenter and if I ever had any issues with wood, of which I have a lot because let's just say, me and fucking wood, we have a lot of unresolved animosities to work out, to go ask him for help. No one said anything about heavy metal. Well maybe this would be a good time to request him to build me some wooden earmuffs. And a wooden hammer to hit myself on the head with when the bass guitar starts to riff. And a wooden plow would be nice too because I am planning to grow tomatoes in the spring. And someday maybe he could chop me up some wood for my fireplace. Ah a warm crackling fireplace. Just the thing you need to get drunk with when a bass guitar is wiping the floor with your brain.
But hopefully it's just a sunday thing and and maybe, with that arrhythmic drummer that they have, they won't be tasting any major commercial success anytime soon. Or maybe, on the other hand, I could join their band as a backup drummer and help them achieve stardom. I have a choice to make here.
And so it went down sunday afternoon. It started out with a dull thud thudding. At first, I thought that my neighbor was banging on my wall to ask me to turn my television down because historically, that is what that thud thudding sound has usually meant wherever I have lived. So I turned down the volume on my tv. But the thudding got worse and it turned out to be drumming and not just drumming but actual arrhythmic drumming on a drum and I would know, being a pretty arrhythmic drummer myself. It was then that the bass guitar began its introductory riff and I don't remember the rest of what I was thinking because I couldn't hear my thoughts. I had a hushed conference with my wife. We were actually yelling, but it was hushed compared to the bass guitar. I asked my wife for confirmation. "Can you hear me think?", I asked her. She couldn't, so obviously it wasn't just me. Those fuckers were really very loud.
Thing is, the previous owners told me that my next door neighbor was a carpenter and if I ever had any issues with wood, of which I have a lot because let's just say, me and fucking wood, we have a lot of unresolved animosities to work out, to go ask him for help. No one said anything about heavy metal. Well maybe this would be a good time to request him to build me some wooden earmuffs. And a wooden hammer to hit myself on the head with when the bass guitar starts to riff. And a wooden plow would be nice too because I am planning to grow tomatoes in the spring. And someday maybe he could chop me up some wood for my fireplace. Ah a warm crackling fireplace. Just the thing you need to get drunk with when a bass guitar is wiping the floor with your brain.
But hopefully it's just a sunday thing and and maybe, with that arrhythmic drummer that they have, they won't be tasting any major commercial success anytime soon. Or maybe, on the other hand, I could join their band as a backup drummer and help them achieve stardom. I have a choice to make here.
Thursday, August 09, 2007
Sitar
During my last visit to India, I purchased a miniature fake sitar souvenir in Bangalore for one of my office colleagues. I did this because whenever the topic of India comes up during our conversations, this colleague has a habit of raising his arms as if he were holding an imaginary sitar and uttering the phrase "tingalingaling". If you feel that the novelty value of this behavior would likely wear off after just a couple of performances, you haven't seen him impersonate 1.> an Indian flying carpet cab driver, 2.> a snake charmer having HR problems, or 3.> a snake charmer playing the sitar on a flying carpet.
So anyways, today my colleague informed me that he was pleased to report that yesterday his two year old daughter took her first baby steps towards becoming a sitar virtuoso by learning how to play the fake sitar souvenir. I guess Anoushka Shankar will be having some stiff foreign-born competition soon.
So anyways, today my colleague informed me that he was pleased to report that yesterday his two year old daughter took her first baby steps towards becoming a sitar virtuoso by learning how to play the fake sitar souvenir. I guess Anoushka Shankar will be having some stiff foreign-born competition soon.
Friday, March 02, 2007
Flugufrelsarinn
Sigur Ros : Flugufrelsarinn.
These guys are from Iceland and they sing in Hopelandic, which is a mixture of Icelandic, English and Piglatin. They strum their guitars with a violin bow, creating waves of sound that are vividly reminiscent of the icy volcanic landscape they arose from. Simply gorgeous.
These guys are from Iceland and they sing in Hopelandic, which is a mixture of Icelandic, English and Piglatin. They strum their guitars with a violin bow, creating waves of sound that are vividly reminiscent of the icy volcanic landscape they arose from. Simply gorgeous.
Friday, January 05, 2007
Friday, December 01, 2006
Don't stop your swaying
We were eating lunch in an Indian restaurant, me and my American colleagues. Some trashy song from contemporary Bollywood was playing. One of my colleagues was obviously enjoying it to the extent that his head began to sway to the rhythm.
"Do you have this cd?", he asked me.
"No", I replied.
"Why not?"
"Frankly, this music is garbage", I replied.
"Really? In what way?"
"Well, it is exactly similar to the thousands of other songs being churned out currently in Bollywood", I said.
"I see", he replied.
I noticed that he had stopped swaying to the music. I felt bad.
"Listen", I said, "you don't have to stop swaying just because I said the music is bad. Please continue your swaying, don't mind me".
"I stopped swaying to eat", he said, but I wasn't buying it and even after putting food into his mouth he continued to not sway. Now I felt really bad. After a while, a different song came on, I don't remember what the fuck it was, but I liked it.
"Okay, this is good music right here", I said to the swayer. "This would be a good song to sway to."
"Shut up", he replied with a noticeable lack of gratitude.
Sometimes, the best gestures go under-appreciated.
"Do you have this cd?", he asked me.
"No", I replied.
"Why not?"
"Frankly, this music is garbage", I replied.
"Really? In what way?"
"Well, it is exactly similar to the thousands of other songs being churned out currently in Bollywood", I said.
"I see", he replied.
I noticed that he had stopped swaying to the music. I felt bad.
"Listen", I said, "you don't have to stop swaying just because I said the music is bad. Please continue your swaying, don't mind me".
"I stopped swaying to eat", he said, but I wasn't buying it and even after putting food into his mouth he continued to not sway. Now I felt really bad. After a while, a different song came on, I don't remember what the fuck it was, but I liked it.
"Okay, this is good music right here", I said to the swayer. "This would be a good song to sway to."
"Shut up", he replied with a noticeable lack of gratitude.
Sometimes, the best gestures go under-appreciated.
Song of the day
Dayaghana by Suresh Wadkar
Original song here.
Excellent, excellent cover of this song by another artist that I found on the internet here.
Listening to this song always, as we say in marathi, "erects a thorn on the body". Translated into English, it basically means that the song gives you goose pimples. The song is composed in Raaga Poorvi. Since I already have an Indian classical music post this week, I will postpone my reverent paean for this raaga to some other time.
Original song here.
Excellent, excellent cover of this song by another artist that I found on the internet here.
Listening to this song always, as we say in marathi, "erects a thorn on the body". Translated into English, it basically means that the song gives you goose pimples. The song is composed in Raaga Poorvi. Since I already have an Indian classical music post this week, I will postpone my reverent paean for this raaga to some other time.
Tuesday, November 28, 2006
No laurels for me
If you are an expert connoisseur of Indian classical music like I pretend to be, you might be aware of this very graceful, very melodious raaga called "Rageshri". Or "Rageshwari", if you are a fan of extra syllables. This raaga has the following aaroha and avroha :
ni(komal) Sa Ga ma Dha ni(komal) Sa
Sa ni(komal) Dha Ga ma Re Sa
The symbiotic and extremely rare non-hostile interaction of the komal Nishad with the shuddha Gandhar in this raaga is what gives the raaga its signature euphony. Rare because the komal Nishad is usually paired with the komal Gandhar with whom it enjoys a very close personal as well as professional relationship. This mutual chemistry has manifested itself in a number of breathtaking raagas such as Asaavari, Bageshri, Bhimpalasi, Malkauns, etc. However, this didn't sit well with the shuddha Gandhar, kind of a jealous soul who, out of spite, decided to be extra nice to the shuddha Madhyam, just to show the komal Nishad that it wasn't the only fish in the sea. And things have been bad between the two ever since. Till now. Rageshri appears to have been the moment when these two decided to lay aside their differences for a while and concentrate on making beautiful music.
But to me there was always this one flaw in the raaga, namely, the anti-climactic entry of the Rishabh (Re) in the closing section of the avaroha. It was kind of a let down. Sure, there had to be a way to connect the Madhyam (Ma) to the Shadja (Sa), but it felt like the Rishab wasn't quite up to the challenge. And so, this led to me thinking, hey, what if I were to remove the Rishab entirely and substitute it with the komal Gandhar instead?
In fact, I realized that basically what I wanted to do was to create a raaga "Jog" like effect in the avaroha. Raaga Jog, pronounced "joag", has the following avaroha :
Sa ni (komal) Pa ma Ga (shuddha) Sa ga (komal) Sa
Notice the similarity? A juxtaposition of komal and shuddha Gandhars, akin to my intent in modifying Rageshri. This juxtaposition would replace the unimpressive, vacuous Rishab with the subdued enigmatic komal Gandhar. The final result being, the avaroha would look something like this :
Sa ni(komal) Dha Ga(shuddha) ma ga(komal) Sa
After mulling it over for a while, it appeared to me that I had discovered quite a winning combination. The unrequited passion of the shuddha Gandhar for the komal Nishad, co-existing with the komal Nishad's chemistry with the komal Gandhar had created the perfect love-triangle of a raaga. I decided to call my concoction "Raaga Jogeshwari". You know, a combination of "Rageshwari" and "Jog". 'Cause "Rog" didn't appear to possess the same pizazz.
And for a few days, I basked in the glory of having a raaga to my credit. But soon, as usual, after engaging in a considerable amount of research involving Google and the enter button, the house of cards I had built came crashing down all around me, ten of spades and all. I discovered that Pandit Ravishankar, the Indian sitar virtuoso, had already been there and as they say, done that. In fact, as if to rub rusty sitar strings into my open wound, he had even named his creation "Raaga Jogeshwari". Not Bandra, not Andheri, but Jogeshwari. Goddammit.
It is said of many people that they were so far ahead of their time that they were never appreciated during their lifetimes. I, on the other hand, will be known as someone who was never appreciated during his lifetime because he was so very far behind his time.
ni(komal) Sa Ga ma Dha ni(komal) Sa
Sa ni(komal) Dha Ga ma Re Sa
The symbiotic and extremely rare non-hostile interaction of the komal Nishad with the shuddha Gandhar in this raaga is what gives the raaga its signature euphony. Rare because the komal Nishad is usually paired with the komal Gandhar with whom it enjoys a very close personal as well as professional relationship. This mutual chemistry has manifested itself in a number of breathtaking raagas such as Asaavari, Bageshri, Bhimpalasi, Malkauns, etc. However, this didn't sit well with the shuddha Gandhar, kind of a jealous soul who, out of spite, decided to be extra nice to the shuddha Madhyam, just to show the komal Nishad that it wasn't the only fish in the sea. And things have been bad between the two ever since. Till now. Rageshri appears to have been the moment when these two decided to lay aside their differences for a while and concentrate on making beautiful music.
But to me there was always this one flaw in the raaga, namely, the anti-climactic entry of the Rishabh (Re) in the closing section of the avaroha. It was kind of a let down. Sure, there had to be a way to connect the Madhyam (Ma) to the Shadja (Sa), but it felt like the Rishab wasn't quite up to the challenge. And so, this led to me thinking, hey, what if I were to remove the Rishab entirely and substitute it with the komal Gandhar instead?
In fact, I realized that basically what I wanted to do was to create a raaga "Jog" like effect in the avaroha. Raaga Jog, pronounced "joag", has the following avaroha :
Sa ni (komal) Pa ma Ga (shuddha) Sa ga (komal) Sa
Notice the similarity? A juxtaposition of komal and shuddha Gandhars, akin to my intent in modifying Rageshri. This juxtaposition would replace the unimpressive, vacuous Rishab with the subdued enigmatic komal Gandhar. The final result being, the avaroha would look something like this :
Sa ni(komal) Dha Ga(shuddha) ma ga(komal) Sa
After mulling it over for a while, it appeared to me that I had discovered quite a winning combination. The unrequited passion of the shuddha Gandhar for the komal Nishad, co-existing with the komal Nishad's chemistry with the komal Gandhar had created the perfect love-triangle of a raaga. I decided to call my concoction "Raaga Jogeshwari". You know, a combination of "Rageshwari" and "Jog". 'Cause "Rog" didn't appear to possess the same pizazz.
And for a few days, I basked in the glory of having a raaga to my credit. But soon, as usual, after engaging in a considerable amount of research involving Google and the enter button, the house of cards I had built came crashing down all around me, ten of spades and all. I discovered that Pandit Ravishankar, the Indian sitar virtuoso, had already been there and as they say, done that. In fact, as if to rub rusty sitar strings into my open wound, he had even named his creation "Raaga Jogeshwari". Not Bandra, not Andheri, but Jogeshwari. Goddammit.
It is said of many people that they were so far ahead of their time that they were never appreciated during their lifetimes. I, on the other hand, will be known as someone who was never appreciated during his lifetime because he was so very far behind his time.
Friday, August 25, 2006
Raaga of the day : Bhatiyar
Bhatiyar. What a raaga. Infinitely complex and extremely puzzling to the ears. It is a morning raaga, which, in the words of Mr Rajan Parrikar, "is heard at the crack of dawn, attendant with the quotidian, crepuscular rite where Indian ladies, armed with state-of-the-art spices, take control of their sovereign space to negotiate the day's culinary projects."
Despite my relative unfamiliarity with quotidian crepuscular rites, I have very little doubt that this richly tapestried pastiche of bizarrely juxtaposed words accurately describes this amazing raaga. Bhatiyar is a raaga with an edge. It is a raaga of apparent calm on the surface and a whirlpool of seething emotions underneath. I like to compare a Bhatiyar recital to, say, being a psychiatrist in a therapy session with a new patient who is chronicling, in detail, the happenings of his day as he sits across the table from you. This particular patient of yours is well-educated, clean-shaven and appears to be leading a well-adjusted life. Why, you wonder is he here and what does he want from you?
And so Bhatiyar begins quite innocuously, with every note shuddha (pure), Sa Ma Pa Dha Ni and you relax and settle back into your seat, expecting it to be a smooth listen. You pour yourself a big one.
And so, as your patient begins to talk about his life, his work, his hobbies, you begin to think that perhaps this will be an easy case, just some guy who has no one to talk to. And you are lulled into a state of tranquility as your patient drones on and on about his daughter's spending habits and his wife's preoccupation with jewellery and your attention begins to wander. And then, just as you are about to nod off, your patient exclaims, "Oh oh, let me tell you a story, this is funny, I killed my neighbour today, hacked him with a chainsaw, chopped off his head and made love to the torso".
And that is when Bhatiyar, inexplicably, takes a deep breath while on the Nishad, skips the higher Shadja and leaps onto the komal Rishabh, screaming out the intense sorrow and rage that has always been lurking beneath the outward serenity of the pure notes of the raaga.
But once that single hysterical outburst is done, Bhatiyar returns back to normalcy as a sober clean-shaven law-abiding melody, just like your patient, who continues to ramble on about how he just purchased a new garden rake because summer is almost over and he's got a lot of wooded acres in his backyard and they keep the house cool during the hot months but clearing all the leaves becomes a bitch in autumn, but as you are listening to him, you can't help but brace yourself for the next psychotic zinger he will surely be throwing at you, just as you brace yourself for Bhatiyar's next foray into the high octave komal Rishabh.
Here is a clip of Pandit Jasraj's rendition of Raaga Bhatiyar. Listen to the final moments of the clip. Don't be fooled by its apparent placidity, it is a homicidal raaga with a repressed childhood.
Despite my relative unfamiliarity with quotidian crepuscular rites, I have very little doubt that this richly tapestried pastiche of bizarrely juxtaposed words accurately describes this amazing raaga. Bhatiyar is a raaga with an edge. It is a raaga of apparent calm on the surface and a whirlpool of seething emotions underneath. I like to compare a Bhatiyar recital to, say, being a psychiatrist in a therapy session with a new patient who is chronicling, in detail, the happenings of his day as he sits across the table from you. This particular patient of yours is well-educated, clean-shaven and appears to be leading a well-adjusted life. Why, you wonder is he here and what does he want from you?
And so Bhatiyar begins quite innocuously, with every note shuddha (pure), Sa Ma Pa Dha Ni and you relax and settle back into your seat, expecting it to be a smooth listen. You pour yourself a big one.
And so, as your patient begins to talk about his life, his work, his hobbies, you begin to think that perhaps this will be an easy case, just some guy who has no one to talk to. And you are lulled into a state of tranquility as your patient drones on and on about his daughter's spending habits and his wife's preoccupation with jewellery and your attention begins to wander. And then, just as you are about to nod off, your patient exclaims, "Oh oh, let me tell you a story, this is funny, I killed my neighbour today, hacked him with a chainsaw, chopped off his head and made love to the torso".
And that is when Bhatiyar, inexplicably, takes a deep breath while on the Nishad, skips the higher Shadja and leaps onto the komal Rishabh, screaming out the intense sorrow and rage that has always been lurking beneath the outward serenity of the pure notes of the raaga.
But once that single hysterical outburst is done, Bhatiyar returns back to normalcy as a sober clean-shaven law-abiding melody, just like your patient, who continues to ramble on about how he just purchased a new garden rake because summer is almost over and he's got a lot of wooded acres in his backyard and they keep the house cool during the hot months but clearing all the leaves becomes a bitch in autumn, but as you are listening to him, you can't help but brace yourself for the next psychotic zinger he will surely be throwing at you, just as you brace yourself for Bhatiyar's next foray into the high octave komal Rishabh.
Here is a clip of Pandit Jasraj's rendition of Raaga Bhatiyar. Listen to the final moments of the clip. Don't be fooled by its apparent placidity, it is a homicidal raaga with a repressed childhood.
Thursday, August 10, 2006
These are my thoughts for thursday
This nigga is back in the hizzouse. Youknowamsayin? That's what gangsta rappers keep asking us. "Youknowamsayin?" even if they haven't said anything yet. For example, Dr Dre, my favorite gangsta rapper of all time, opens his album, "The Chronic", my favorite rap album of all time, with the following lines :
"Hell yeah. Youknowamsayin?"
Yes, I say to the good doctor, you said hell yeah, and there was no way I could have misunderstood your point. See, what gangsta rappers should do is go through at least one full song before taking a break in order to ask the question "youknowamsayin". Kinda like how Ann Coulter pauses AFTER her liberal-bashing speeches to answer questions like, "So Ms Coulter, do you like your babies fried or merely sauted", or "What kinds of condiments do you usually add to your baby sandwich, does bacon merely augment or entirely overwhelm that fresh baby taste?"
Similarly, gangsta rappers should inquire "Youknowamsaying" after they have finished saying something, thus giving their audience an opportunity to reply, no, I did not really understand what you just said but I will now replay the record and listen to it with rapter attention.
But why was I even listening to rap? I was listening to my MP3 player on the train, my car being out of service. She was in the dealership yesterday because lately, the fact that wealth had been piling up in my wallet was kinda bugging me and my conscience reminded me that it was time for its redistribution. So I took her to the dealer for an oil change and left her there, safe in the knowledge that transfer of cash and cows from the bourgeoisie to the proletariat would soon ensue.
So then I took the train to work and back. Philadelphia has an interesting metro rail network, called SEPTA, not that it matters. The basic principle behind its architecture is that in order to travel from point A to point B, which is, say, distance "c", you always have to travel through point D say, at a distance "e" from point A where e = (c + x) miles, where x = distance equivalent to the time it takes you to be late for work. Point D is usually Center City, Philadelphia. So if you want to travel from your home which is in suburb A, to your workplace which is in suburb B, you get to visit the mighty City of Brotherly Love on the way, passing through Mexico in the process.
The very first thing you observe when you enter the city on the R5 regional rail line is a huge glass building standing by itself outside the 30th Street station. The moment you see the building, the first thought that enters your mind is, my, what a humongous penis of a skyscraper. I often wonder why every tall edifice in existence always gets compared to the male member.
When I was in UMass, our university library, called Dubois Library (shown on the left), a pretty gay name for a library, which might have something to do with it, was always compared to a penis. Indian graduate students used to call it "the lawda". I've got to visit the lawda, we used to say when it was time to return our books.
Other things that have been compared to the penis include the Washington memorial, the Eiffel tower and George W. Bush, all of which, excepting the last one have been called so because they suffer from the ignominy of being gargantuan erections of concrete or metal.
The question, therefore is, why aren't similarly human creations of humongous concavity ever compared to the female genitalia? For example, why isn't there anyone who has ever looked at the Pacific Ocean and breathed in wonder, wow, that is one giant vagina. Or how about those tourists who pass the Washington memorial and immediately bestow a look of contempt upon their own crotch in order to shame it out of its lethargy? Would these same people scream, Wooo Hooo here we go, into the vagina, when their car plunges into the Holland tunnel?
But I think I know the reason behind this apparent discrimination between the sexes. See, the vagina is a shy creature, hiding coyly behind not one, not two, but three different pairs of curtains, assuming you are not on the cover of "Shaven" magazine. The penis on the other hand, proudly rears its ugly head aloft in order to be seen and heard by society. The penis craves publicity, the vagina shies away from it. And that is why society tends to project the image of the penis onto anything that even vaguely resembles it while the vagina gets to enjoy a life of relative privacy, away from the public eye.
Good for the vagina, I say.
"Hell yeah. Youknowamsayin?"
Yes, I say to the good doctor, you said hell yeah, and there was no way I could have misunderstood your point. See, what gangsta rappers should do is go through at least one full song before taking a break in order to ask the question "youknowamsayin". Kinda like how Ann Coulter pauses AFTER her liberal-bashing speeches to answer questions like, "So Ms Coulter, do you like your babies fried or merely sauted", or "What kinds of condiments do you usually add to your baby sandwich, does bacon merely augment or entirely overwhelm that fresh baby taste?"
Similarly, gangsta rappers should inquire "Youknowamsaying" after they have finished saying something, thus giving their audience an opportunity to reply, no, I did not really understand what you just said but I will now replay the record and listen to it with rapter attention.
But why was I even listening to rap? I was listening to my MP3 player on the train, my car being out of service. She was in the dealership yesterday because lately, the fact that wealth had been piling up in my wallet was kinda bugging me and my conscience reminded me that it was time for its redistribution. So I took her to the dealer for an oil change and left her there, safe in the knowledge that transfer of cash and cows from the bourgeoisie to the proletariat would soon ensue.
So then I took the train to work and back. Philadelphia has an interesting metro rail network, called SEPTA, not that it matters. The basic principle behind its architecture is that in order to travel from point A to point B, which is, say, distance "c", you always have to travel through point D say, at a distance "e" from point A where e = (c + x) miles, where x = distance equivalent to the time it takes you to be late for work. Point D is usually Center City, Philadelphia. So if you want to travel from your home which is in suburb A, to your workplace which is in suburb B, you get to visit the mighty City of Brotherly Love on the way, passing through Mexico in the process.
The very first thing you observe when you enter the city on the R5 regional rail line is a huge glass building standing by itself outside the 30th Street station. The moment you see the building, the first thought that enters your mind is, my, what a humongous penis of a skyscraper. I often wonder why every tall edifice in existence always gets compared to the male member.
When I was in UMass, our university library, called Dubois Library (shown on the left), a pretty gay name for a library, which might have something to do with it, was always compared to a penis. Indian graduate students used to call it "the lawda". I've got to visit the lawda, we used to say when it was time to return our books.Other things that have been compared to the penis include the Washington memorial, the Eiffel tower and George W. Bush, all of which, excepting the last one have been called so because they suffer from the ignominy of being gargantuan erections of concrete or metal.
The question, therefore is, why aren't similarly human creations of humongous concavity ever compared to the female genitalia? For example, why isn't there anyone who has ever looked at the Pacific Ocean and breathed in wonder, wow, that is one giant vagina. Or how about those tourists who pass the Washington memorial and immediately bestow a look of contempt upon their own crotch in order to shame it out of its lethargy? Would these same people scream, Wooo Hooo here we go, into the vagina, when their car plunges into the Holland tunnel?
But I think I know the reason behind this apparent discrimination between the sexes. See, the vagina is a shy creature, hiding coyly behind not one, not two, but three different pairs of curtains, assuming you are not on the cover of "Shaven" magazine. The penis on the other hand, proudly rears its ugly head aloft in order to be seen and heard by society. The penis craves publicity, the vagina shies away from it. And that is why society tends to project the image of the penis onto anything that even vaguely resembles it while the vagina gets to enjoy a life of relative privacy, away from the public eye.
Good for the vagina, I say.
Friday, August 04, 2006
When in doubt, let the alcohol talk
I think Flea of the Red Hot Chili Peppers would be a very cute man if he weren't so disgusting looks-wise. Also, he somehow reminds me of Condoleezzaa Rice, assuming she has those two a's at the end which I strongly doubt.
Also, there is but one thing that can be done when all the employees of a company go off to partake of lunch, locking the door behind them and on returning, realize that no one has the key to unlock it. No one except the boss, who has disappeared as well. And that one thing is the playing of wholesome family games in the training room.
Some on the Religious Right might rightfully point out that to play family games with office employees denigrates and endangers the sanctity of a real family. What next, eating together under a single roof? Raising little office children with post-it eyes and staplermouths? Where do we draw the line?
But the games did take place regardless of these very valid hypothetical arguments. The festivities began with a game of minesweeper with me competing against the clock and heckling bystanders. It took me 184 seconds to complete the beginners level. I was followed by an elderly gentleman who shamed me and my ancestral cottage in Goa by accomplishing the same in 27 seconds. He was amply rewarded with the tabling and passage through popular vote of a legislative proposal that seeked to establish that he was, despite his advancing years, good at something other than the mere consumption of oxygen. Yes, we capitalists can be cruel at times.
Other games that subsequently followed were hangman and one that was tentatively called "make fun of the Indian guy". Oh I was so very bad at that one. But then the boss returned and work resumed. On the whole, it was a productive afternoon if you weren't an Indian guy.
Speaking of nothing in particular, I subscribed to emusic.com, this amazing music download service. It is great because you get 40 song downloads a month for only 10 bucks. So it's 25 cents a song which is great because it allows you to set aside some money every month so as to someday save enough to buy that rat poison you saw the other day in the store window and just couldn't stop thinking about because of all the high gas prices.
Emusic.com makes one feel as if he were a bull in a china shop, a bull who wishes he could stuff all that china into the leftist bag slung over his shoulders and take it home with him. But the best part about emusic is that it has loads of Indian classical music. All the greats. And every song, which is basically an entire album, is 25 cents. A fucking bargain. There's all kinds of other hard-to-find shit too, like the Cocteau Twins, Labradford, Sigur Ros, Thievery Corporation and tons of Indie and ethno techno (Karsh Kale, Midival Panditz). Oh and they also have a boatload of Bollywood stuff. Both new and old.
The downside to this service is that they do not have a lot of big record labels signed up. So no mainstream music. But you know what, if you are into mainstream music, you don't deserve it anyways. Boo.
But check it out anyways, even if you are a Lance Bass fan and are wondering if you should let your folks know that you just found out through People magazine that you are gay. Hey, they give you 25 free downloads when you sign up. You could freak out on Himesh Reshammiya, the early years.
Also, there is but one thing that can be done when all the employees of a company go off to partake of lunch, locking the door behind them and on returning, realize that no one has the key to unlock it. No one except the boss, who has disappeared as well. And that one thing is the playing of wholesome family games in the training room.
Some on the Religious Right might rightfully point out that to play family games with office employees denigrates and endangers the sanctity of a real family. What next, eating together under a single roof? Raising little office children with post-it eyes and staplermouths? Where do we draw the line?
But the games did take place regardless of these very valid hypothetical arguments. The festivities began with a game of minesweeper with me competing against the clock and heckling bystanders. It took me 184 seconds to complete the beginners level. I was followed by an elderly gentleman who shamed me and my ancestral cottage in Goa by accomplishing the same in 27 seconds. He was amply rewarded with the tabling and passage through popular vote of a legislative proposal that seeked to establish that he was, despite his advancing years, good at something other than the mere consumption of oxygen. Yes, we capitalists can be cruel at times.
Other games that subsequently followed were hangman and one that was tentatively called "make fun of the Indian guy". Oh I was so very bad at that one. But then the boss returned and work resumed. On the whole, it was a productive afternoon if you weren't an Indian guy.
Speaking of nothing in particular, I subscribed to emusic.com, this amazing music download service. It is great because you get 40 song downloads a month for only 10 bucks. So it's 25 cents a song which is great because it allows you to set aside some money every month so as to someday save enough to buy that rat poison you saw the other day in the store window and just couldn't stop thinking about because of all the high gas prices.
Emusic.com makes one feel as if he were a bull in a china shop, a bull who wishes he could stuff all that china into the leftist bag slung over his shoulders and take it home with him. But the best part about emusic is that it has loads of Indian classical music. All the greats. And every song, which is basically an entire album, is 25 cents. A fucking bargain. There's all kinds of other hard-to-find shit too, like the Cocteau Twins, Labradford, Sigur Ros, Thievery Corporation and tons of Indie and ethno techno (Karsh Kale, Midival Panditz). Oh and they also have a boatload of Bollywood stuff. Both new and old.
The downside to this service is that they do not have a lot of big record labels signed up. So no mainstream music. But you know what, if you are into mainstream music, you don't deserve it anyways. Boo.
But check it out anyways, even if you are a Lance Bass fan and are wondering if you should let your folks know that you just found out through People magazine that you are gay. Hey, they give you 25 free downloads when you sign up. You could freak out on Himesh Reshammiya, the early years.
Friday, May 26, 2006
An investigation into whether blasting music through your car window is productive
In theory, driving around with your car windows open, blaring Himesh Reshammiya's latest number through your speakers would appear to be a pretty intelligent and fulfilling activity for you to indulge in. But is it useful? Does it have any tangible benefits? Let's examine this issue closely. Let's lay out all the facts, subject them to scrutiny and verify if your theory would hold up against the cold hard light of reason or be exposed as an exercize in futility.
The question that needs to be asked first and foremost is, why do you drive around blasting music from an open car window? The answer is simple. It's a window into your life, an opportunity for the rest of the world to get to know you better through the choice of music you listen to. Basically, when you pull up next to me at a traffic light, lower your windows and start gyrating your head to "Who let the dogs out", taking care that you lip sync the "woof woof" part and carry out an accurate enactment of a dog clawing the face off its owner, you are, in your own way, letting me know how much you contribute to the overall hipness of the joint by getting me to notice your impeccable taste in music.
And all this looks pretty good on paper, yes, in fact, you would believe that you've got it all figured out. But is this really true? Is your plan practical? Let's take a look at your target audience.
There are two kinds of road-residents you would wish to cater to : pedestrians and car drivers. Now I have seen very few pedestrians walking around on American streets. Most citizens of this car-crazy nation only pull their vehicles off their bodies right before they jump into bed and that too 'cause they don't want nocturnal emissions spoiling that expensive leather upholstery. So let's take pedestrians off the list of people whose lives you could possibly touch through the medium of your Monsoon sound system.
How about car drivers? There are a number of different categories. For example, those who keep their windows closed while driving. These people would obviously be deaf to everything other than what they are playing inside the car or their own heavy breathing, assuming they are suburban white men pleasuring themselves to Rush Limbaugh's oxycontin drawl. Let us then take those guys off that list as well.
Well, now we have the open window drivers. There are again two types here; The ones who play their own music, and the ones who don't. Those who play their own music wouldn't be able to hear you anyways since their own stuff would drown out whatever it is that you are playing. Trust me, I have conducted research on test cases and that's my definitive conclusion. Secondly, we have people whose windows are open but are not playing any music. These guys would have been prime candidates for delivering their musical approval to you, except that the very fact that they are not playing any music means they are not musically inclined and so, wouldn't be able to gauge the depth of your character and the decency of your heart based on your fanatical headbanging to "I want it that way".
So who's left? Nobody, really. We have thus proved that all that window-open-music-blasting business accomplishes nothing. So pull up those windows, lower that volume and try a different approach. Here's what you really need to do if you wish to broadcast your musical preferences to the general public.
Be direct. Whenever you overtake another vehicle, catch the driver's attention by first flipping him off, then ask him to lower his window and when you are sure that he's within earshot, yell out that you are currently playing Marilyn Manson and that this makes you a rebellious heretic who will not succumb to societal pressures of conformation.
Or just put up a sign in your window boldly stating that your brutish Hummer is actually resonating with the sensitive yet assertive feministic sonnets of Shania Twain. And then laugh as people try to force you off the road and fail miserably. Those idiots wouldn't know a good thing if it rode up to them on a horse wearing a cowboy hat and sang into their ears.
Of course, none of this applies to you if you're a black guy in LA playing rap music in your 64 Chevy. I can hear you from here and you're a cool dude.
The question that needs to be asked first and foremost is, why do you drive around blasting music from an open car window? The answer is simple. It's a window into your life, an opportunity for the rest of the world to get to know you better through the choice of music you listen to. Basically, when you pull up next to me at a traffic light, lower your windows and start gyrating your head to "Who let the dogs out", taking care that you lip sync the "woof woof" part and carry out an accurate enactment of a dog clawing the face off its owner, you are, in your own way, letting me know how much you contribute to the overall hipness of the joint by getting me to notice your impeccable taste in music.
And all this looks pretty good on paper, yes, in fact, you would believe that you've got it all figured out. But is this really true? Is your plan practical? Let's take a look at your target audience.
There are two kinds of road-residents you would wish to cater to : pedestrians and car drivers. Now I have seen very few pedestrians walking around on American streets. Most citizens of this car-crazy nation only pull their vehicles off their bodies right before they jump into bed and that too 'cause they don't want nocturnal emissions spoiling that expensive leather upholstery. So let's take pedestrians off the list of people whose lives you could possibly touch through the medium of your Monsoon sound system.
How about car drivers? There are a number of different categories. For example, those who keep their windows closed while driving. These people would obviously be deaf to everything other than what they are playing inside the car or their own heavy breathing, assuming they are suburban white men pleasuring themselves to Rush Limbaugh's oxycontin drawl. Let us then take those guys off that list as well.
Well, now we have the open window drivers. There are again two types here; The ones who play their own music, and the ones who don't. Those who play their own music wouldn't be able to hear you anyways since their own stuff would drown out whatever it is that you are playing. Trust me, I have conducted research on test cases and that's my definitive conclusion. Secondly, we have people whose windows are open but are not playing any music. These guys would have been prime candidates for delivering their musical approval to you, except that the very fact that they are not playing any music means they are not musically inclined and so, wouldn't be able to gauge the depth of your character and the decency of your heart based on your fanatical headbanging to "I want it that way".
So who's left? Nobody, really. We have thus proved that all that window-open-music-blasting business accomplishes nothing. So pull up those windows, lower that volume and try a different approach. Here's what you really need to do if you wish to broadcast your musical preferences to the general public.
Be direct. Whenever you overtake another vehicle, catch the driver's attention by first flipping him off, then ask him to lower his window and when you are sure that he's within earshot, yell out that you are currently playing Marilyn Manson and that this makes you a rebellious heretic who will not succumb to societal pressures of conformation.
Or just put up a sign in your window boldly stating that your brutish Hummer is actually resonating with the sensitive yet assertive feministic sonnets of Shania Twain. And then laugh as people try to force you off the road and fail miserably. Those idiots wouldn't know a good thing if it rode up to them on a horse wearing a cowboy hat and sang into their ears.
Of course, none of this applies to you if you're a black guy in LA playing rap music in your 64 Chevy. I can hear you from here and you're a cool dude.
Friday, December 02, 2005
What no-talent musicians hear when they play
I am a bad guitarist. No, wait, hold on, I USED to be a bad guitarist, like 5 years ago. Now I'm just a terrible terrible guitarist. I can play other stuff too, like pretty average keyboards, somewhat good drums and I've got a voice that is the aural equivalent of a finger in the eye. But as to playing the guitar, I suck in style.
So the other day I retrieved my old guitar that had been stashed away in the closet for a while, and in a fit of nostalgia, took it out and attempted to recreate the no-talent musicianship I knew I possessed. But a reality-check awaited me. Not only could I not figure out which chord is which, I couldn't even remember which fucking fret, when plucked would be the "C" note. And it was then that I realized that musical talent isn't like riding a bike. Once you lose it, you lose it. And also, you can't fall off a musical instrument. Unless, of course, you are playing the drums. Although, the stool you are sitting on technically, isn't a part of the drum set. Or is it? But, anyways, I digress.
Yesterday, I was watching a film about Def Leppard, the hard rock band of the 80s and 90s. Incidentally, the band that first turned me on to metal. And during a break, there was a promotional VH1 commercial which showed a no-talent guitarist just like me, trying to play Led Zeppelin's "Stairway to Heaven". The guy was barely able to crawl up the stairway and was hitting every step on the way. He was quite awful. And it was at that moment that I realized, Christ, is that what bad musicians sound like to other people? Is that what I sound like when I play the guitar? No way, man, I sound much better than this. But do I really? Because in theory his technique pretty much mirrored mine. The main principle of that technique being to pluck every note randomly till you find the correct one, then pluck that note, move on to the next one and repeat this sequence of operations.
And then, I realized something very interesting. When you are trying to play a song on your guitar, or anything else, when you hit a bad note, correct it and continue playing, you, the musician, do not actually "hear" the bad note you just played. 'Cause what you hear at that point is the song which is playing in your head, which you are trying to recreate on your guitar. You see what I'm saying? As far as you are concerned, the bad note you just played never happened. So you continue on with your song, safe in the belief that your musical output is of outstanding quality. And when you are done with your abysmal musical performance, you sit there flushed with the success of your recital and wait for audience adulation, which, in most cases, fails to materialize.
Till now, I used to attribute this lack of applause to audience jealousy. No one likes to see someone do well at something they themselves are bad at, right? But now I know, that's not the case. The reason we, bad musicians, fail to get our due is because there is no due to be gotten. We just sound terrible. And we should realize that and move on.
So the other day I retrieved my old guitar that had been stashed away in the closet for a while, and in a fit of nostalgia, took it out and attempted to recreate the no-talent musicianship I knew I possessed. But a reality-check awaited me. Not only could I not figure out which chord is which, I couldn't even remember which fucking fret, when plucked would be the "C" note. And it was then that I realized that musical talent isn't like riding a bike. Once you lose it, you lose it. And also, you can't fall off a musical instrument. Unless, of course, you are playing the drums. Although, the stool you are sitting on technically, isn't a part of the drum set. Or is it? But, anyways, I digress.
Yesterday, I was watching a film about Def Leppard, the hard rock band of the 80s and 90s. Incidentally, the band that first turned me on to metal. And during a break, there was a promotional VH1 commercial which showed a no-talent guitarist just like me, trying to play Led Zeppelin's "Stairway to Heaven". The guy was barely able to crawl up the stairway and was hitting every step on the way. He was quite awful. And it was at that moment that I realized, Christ, is that what bad musicians sound like to other people? Is that what I sound like when I play the guitar? No way, man, I sound much better than this. But do I really? Because in theory his technique pretty much mirrored mine. The main principle of that technique being to pluck every note randomly till you find the correct one, then pluck that note, move on to the next one and repeat this sequence of operations.
And then, I realized something very interesting. When you are trying to play a song on your guitar, or anything else, when you hit a bad note, correct it and continue playing, you, the musician, do not actually "hear" the bad note you just played. 'Cause what you hear at that point is the song which is playing in your head, which you are trying to recreate on your guitar. You see what I'm saying? As far as you are concerned, the bad note you just played never happened. So you continue on with your song, safe in the belief that your musical output is of outstanding quality. And when you are done with your abysmal musical performance, you sit there flushed with the success of your recital and wait for audience adulation, which, in most cases, fails to materialize.
Till now, I used to attribute this lack of applause to audience jealousy. No one likes to see someone do well at something they themselves are bad at, right? But now I know, that's not the case. The reason we, bad musicians, fail to get our due is because there is no due to be gotten. We just sound terrible. And we should realize that and move on.
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