Baiju leaves motherjane

Sad day would be an understatement to describe this day-Novermber 24, 2010. On this day, Baiju, the master guitarist, who is one of the pillars of strength of motherjane, left the band. When Nikhil called me up in the evening with this news, I was hoping that it might be a prank. But then as I headed over to the band's official website and saw the announcement in big bold letters, I was sure that my worst fears had come true. Words can't describe the emptiness that I feel right now, a feeling shared by thousands of die hard Janiacs all over the country.

We've all grown up reading about famous rockstars leaving the big bands. Friedman leaving megadeth, Slash leaving GNR and more recently Frusciante leaving RHCP and Portnoy leaving Dream theater are all fresh in our memory. But, in all this the sadness was distant. I never felt that tinge of pain that makes the sadness personal. Today was different though. motherjane is one band which inspired a generation of rock fans in India. Many young bands cite their name as the sole reason for their existence. From that day many years ago, when I heard 'maya', motherjane's been a part and parcel of my life. There was never a day untouched by their music. There are young die hard fans like Hari who goes to any lengths to watch the band live. More than any of their contemporaries, motherjane managed to touch our lives and connect with us in ways the band would never know. We found a special joy in painting our faces and swaying to the strains of carnatic rock. Those were occasions for us to unleash the spirits within and discover our true selves. Vocalist Suraj Chettan asked us once, "Don't you guys even get bored listening to the same songs in concert after concert?" We just laughed then. The truth is we were left craving for more after each of those concerts.

motherjane is one band who has found success like few other in the Indian scene. But what sets them apart is that the success never went to their heads. Highly approachable, down to earth and lacking all the airs of being such talented musicians, these guys endeared themselves to us fans. And that explains why this band has such a big die hard fan base. Also, their music has a universal appeal with even my rock hating amma saying, "I like this", after listening to 'broken'. Many of the inspiring lyrics like 'walk on' brought in positive energy during tough times. And so, when this news came as a bolt from the blue, when the band are on an all time high, I found it hard to believe. It still hasn't sunk in. Though the band puts up a brave front saying its all on friendly mutual terms, we all know how hard it hurts. Yes, everyone has personal ambitions and we need to respect that. Still, we can just hope that the outpourings from fans will just bring back the man to where he truely belongs, amongst us, as the lead guitarist of motherjane. This is a plea from a true blue Janiac...Please come back Baiju chettaaa!

Its an irony that their own song 'Broken' explains it best, how we all feel right now
We’ve all, We've all been broken
Shattered, left mute with regrets unspoken
We’ve all loved and lost
Been forsaken, repented our deepest trust

We’ve all wondered why
Destiny picked us to cry
Why faith has to be tested,
And life doesn’t turn out the way intended

We’re mended to be broken
Yet human clay believes itself golden
Stunning in its courage to be happy
As wild elations tempered with black melancholy

your crusader Praveen

Octoberfest:motherjane,TAAQ n Indian Ocean! A Treat!

Octoberfest 2009, the annual rock rock fest of Bangalore modelled along the lines of the famous German Ocktoberfest was a veritable treat this time around. 23 of India's best bands were in town to give a treat to Bangaloreans over 3 days. Due to my trip to Manipal for another rock fest, I could catch only the last day of the fest. I missed out on bands like avial which played over the first 2 days. But that one evening was enough to satisfy my apetite as 3 of my all time favorite bands played on the same stage one after the other on the final evening. motherjane, Thermal And A Quarter(TAAQ) and Indian Ocean made palace grounds the place to be on oct 25 and left the audience craving for more.

I've no more words to say about motherjane. They've used up all my words with show after show of unparalleled brilliance. The story was not much different here. We, the janeheads, went with our faces half painted and wearing our custom made 'AMAJANIAC' T shirts. motherjane's following has increased manifold over the past year and it was evident from the big crowd which was there screaming out their names and singing along the lyrics. As always, it was a clinical performance peppered with their trademark friendliness and warm vibes. There were many moments when I thought of hurling the camera away and jumping to the middle of the crowd. Yes, concerts are best enjoyed when you are right in the middle of the pandemonium rather than just walking around clicking from inside the press box. Towards the end of motherjane's show, vocalist Suraj came down from the stage to meet the audience.

motherjane on stage

motherjane-suraj-chasing the sun

motherjane fans in high spirits

suraj with the crowd

The second band of the night was Thermal And A Quarter(TAAQ). Bruce Lee Mani and his funky band is easy on the airs. Be it the song that describes the life of a software engineer or the funny drinking song sprinkled with bruce's burps, they had the audience in a 'forget-everything-else-and-chill out' mood all the way. Their regular bassist was not available but the replacement guy was also as precise as a machine. A highlight of this year's fest was the visuals that accompanied each song in the background. motherjane's visuals were a shade better than the others because it was mostly exact representations of the song's theme.

TAAQ-Bruce Lee Mani

TAAQ-Rajeev Rajagopal

TAAQ-Bruce, up close

TAAQ

TAAQ

The final band of the night was Indian Ocean. From the time I heard Kandisa many years back, its been a dream to watch this socially conscious band live. And that long wait was worth it. They were missing their lead singer cum Tablist Ashim Chakravforthy rom the line up because he suffered a heart attack and was in a coma back in Qatar. His deep vocals were surely missed in this show. But the stand in vocalist and the tablist did a good job. Rahul Ram was oozing with passion as he sung his throat out and at the same time churning out those majestic bass lines. Hearing him sing the lines 'kise kaafir kahega...' from the black Friday song 'Bandeh' gave me goosebumps. Anyone who has ever heard Indian Ocean won't have any doubts on the brilliance and uniqueness of their guitarist Susmit Sen. All those legendary solos were reproduced to perfection on stage. And Amit Kilam, the drummer sometimes left his drums to play some weird percussion instrument(the name of which I dont know), most notably in the song 'maarewa'. And, he proved to be an allrounder as he played the flute in one song too. The crowd went berserk for the most popular song of theirs, 'Kandisa'. Surely this was one of the best ever nights of Indian rock in Bangalore.

Indian ocean- "Kise Kaaaafir Kahegaaaaaaaaaaa"

Indian ocean-Amit Kilam,Rahul Ram,Susmit Sen and the 2 stand in artists for Ashim

Indian ocean-Amit on the flutes, Rahul Ram taming the bass

Indian ocean-Rahul Ram...intensity personified

Indian ocean

The only bad thing was that the 'great indian rock fest' also happened on the same day at the same venue. We could hear the sounds from there when the music stopped here. And sometimes the lights too. The GIR also had a great lineup including international bands from Norway and Sweden. But it was never hard to decide which fest to attend. Yes, Indian rock is too hard to resist. And it has begun its much awaited rise...

Now to the posing part!!!I switched off the cam and gleefully posed with the stalwarts!

me,Raja,Navi and Nikhil with Bruce Lee Mani of TAAQ

me,Sanjeev Thomas(Guitarist-A.R.Rahman,Rainbow bridge),motherjane Clyde,John,Nikhil,Navi

janeheads with Amit Kilam, Indian Ocean's drummer

me,Navi,Nikhil with motherjane Baiju and Benny Dayal

Nikhil and me with Rajeev Rajagopal of TAAQ

with Indian Ocean

Sorry to bombard you with such a big collection of pics. Forgive me until the next big rock fest :)

your crusader Praveen

amajaniac:spirit of a Janehead

The spirit of motherjane

-Raja,Nikhil,Navi,Me

AMAJANIAC- Its a word that symbolises many things. A collective spirit. A sense of belonging. A sense of being part of something big, but which is at the same time small, when compared to what it will become in the near future. An amalgamation of several minds who happen to be swayed by the same magiC, the spell of which is more powerful than the heaviest drug in the world. Its the magic of timeless music fron five unassuming gentlemen, collectively called motherjane. And when each of us in the audience scream 'AMAJANIAC', we just mean, 'am a die hard motherjane fan'.

It was the idea of Navi, the youngest Janiac amongst us, to come up with a T shirt that screamed to the world how much we love this band. And with his artistic cousin Raja, they set out the plan. Me and Nikhil joined in the plot. We had half portion of our faces painted in the Kathakali colours signifying the half human- half spirit idea of motherjane. After almost a day of painstaking painting, most of which was done by Raja, all of it was photographed individually. Then we had it printed on black T shirts. The backside had the chorus part of the new motherjane song, 'Amajaniac'.

Painting...all concentration..

When we went mad posing...

All of it was a top secret operation. We planned well to reveal it as a surprise during the motherjane concert in Hard rock cafe,Bangalore. On the rainy working day, we set out to HRC with normal shirts worn over our prized T shirts. Me and Nikhil reached there after doing a submarine trip on my bike through the half submerged Bangalore roads. Both of us were behaving like stoned idiots as we kept on laughing on our journey wading through water, splashing it head high. HRC is an awesomely designed place with rock memorabilia all around, though we had our own doubts about their authenticity. The majestic stone structure used to be a church.

posing with motherjane wearing our printed Tees

So it was time for our surprise. We called all 5 of them from motherjane together. Then we removed our shirts in a flash revealing our face painted T shirts. The look on their faces was priceless. Surprise, joy, everything was on view. And we were happy too at the success of our perfectly planne doperation. They put up an awesome show as usual winning over new fans in the process. The icing on the cake was when Suraj chettan specially mentioned us diehard fans in between the show. Other similar diehard janeheads were present, like the guy who listened to the 'maktub' album for 65 days staright and the guy who bought the first copy of motherjane's first album 'Insane biography'. This concert also happened to be the anniversary of the release of 'maktub'.

Motherjane rocking HRC

Baiju..ripping it apart..

The rocking day ended with a triples trp on my bike with Nikhil and Raja on the Bangalore roads infested with 'bribe hungry' lawmakers. And we almost got caught as a check point. Thankfully Raja did the escape act before the police noticed. Though later we had a hard time running for food all around Bangalore, this will surely go down among the list of 'best days of my life'.

Adding some lines from the new motherjane song, 'amajaniac', which also appears at the back of our T shirts.

"Who am I?" is still what I am.
But now I have a name
As part of something that grows
And embraces that refrain.
amajaniac!amajaniac!
Here,let me say that again.
I'm a bloody janiac, come sunshine or rain...

PS- Do checkout the awesome poem written by Navi, which will be posted in his blog pretty soon. He sure is the biggest motherjane fan I've seen.

your crusader Praveen

Motherjane with kids:Rocking for a Cause

There are some gestures which mean a lot to the ones who receive it, much more than that is intended by the ones who give it. This Tuesday, me and some of my friends were witness to one such touching gesture. Motherjane, India's premier rock band took time out of their busy schedule and visited Snehadan in Bangalore. They came here as part of a promotional video shoot for the organisation. They spent a whole day there and in the end decided to do a special show for the kids. When we reached there in the evening, the concert had just started out.

The kids, most of them less than 8 years old were sitting right in the front slowly swaying their heads and clapping along with the song. Vocalist Suraj Mani interacted superbly well with the kids, even calling some of them by their names. Some of the kids started standing up and jumping. Thats when Suraj invited them to come and dance on stage. From that moment onwards, the concert changed its character. There was Motherjane on stage belting out their best numbers, surrounded by a big bunch of kids getting their first taste of rock music. All of them were rhythmically dancing and swaying in accordance with the music. Never in my life have I seen such a rock concert were the kids enjoyed with so much fervour. Its a glowing tribute to motherjane's genre bending music that they were able to connect with these kids who are alien to this brand of music. The joy on the kids's face is worth remembering for a long time to come. Some of them went close to Baiju chettan's guitars and watched intently as he jumped around the frets with absolute ease. The real brave among them actually touched the guitars. Another thing worth noting is that their attention didn't waver for a single moment during the whole concert. They eagerly lapped up song after song and kept on asking for more so that they can dance again.

I've been to a hell lot of Motherjane concerts but not a single one of them matches up with this one. This concert in a small hall with a normal sound system was better than many other biggies for the joy they spread, the cause for which they played and for successfully connecting with such an young audience.

PS- More than all this, my rock hater roomie who was dragged along just because we were one bike short, actually loved the show and today reluctantly accepted that he loves Motherjane's music. Now, Motherjane can add that to one of their greatest achievements :D.

My new cam @ rock ethos 09

Motherjane- just after the kathakali makeup

Atlast, I got my hands on my dream camera-Canon Powershot SX 10IS. Its after a long wait for the model to arrive in the grey market and having lost my patience, I headed straight to the cam shop in forum on saturday. The first snap was clicked my the store staff himself, a group pic of me and my roomies. My area of expertise being the real tough mobile photography (:P), right now my state is like an LKG student learning differantiation and integration. Studying the long manual is a boring task. To save me from that boredom, my Guru Vivek was there offering me lot of tips through phone and gtalk.

Me, Raja n Navi with Motherjane

with Bhayanak maut vocalist Vinay

setting the stage on fire

I didn't have to wait long for first photography assignment. Rock ethos 09 concert happened in Palace grounds on Saturday and Sunday. We gave the Saturday show a miss. On Sunday, it was a great day with my favourite band Motherjane. Me, Raja and Navi were there right from the time they put their Kathakali makeups to the time they left the stage. Raja did try his hand in doing the Kathakali face painting while I clicked away. In between, I had a great insightful talk with a freelance photographer Venkitesh, who came to interview Motherjane at their hotel. He talked on how he left a high paying job in IBM to pursue his passion. Then, we headed to the concert venue.

Motherjane on stage

Rain clouds were gathering as we reached Palace grounds. A promising band from north east was on stage then. Backstage, we got to meet the guys from Bhayanak Maut. By the time Motherjane got on stage, rain was pouring thick and fast. After a 30 minute delay during which the crowd got real angry, but peace was restored when Baiju chettan started the proceedings with a nice reworking of 'Vande Mataram'. The PA system and the colourful lights were off because of the incessant rain. But, Motherjane with their 'come rain or shine, we will rock the crowd' attitude went on to do the best show of the evening. With a perfect mix of songs from the new and old album like 'disillusioned', Chasing the sun', 'mindstreet', 'Fields of sound' etc, it was one special show in the rain. The spirit of the crowd which stayed put in the rain and headbanged to glory, is worth mentioning. Then came Bhayanak Maut with their brand of hardcore metal and I just loved their raw energy. The crowd went berserk with some heavy moshing. Vinay, with his long beard and bald head was a show stealer. The final band was myndsnare and except Yasmine's exceptional drumming, it was not upto the mark. And at 10 0 clock, our 'Moral' #$^%%$^ police stopped the show...

Bhayanak Maut on stage

Yasmine Claire-The lady drummer

Myndsnare

PS- No, This wont be a fulltime photblog. Am not good enough for that as of now :P.