Blue Frog is a live performance club in Mumbai. It has hosted quite a few spectacular gigs, welcoming musicians from all genres and places. . Yesterday, a beautiful evening with wind in the air and water sprinkling fans helped set up the mood for the LEH LADAKH CONFLUECE hit Band- Rajasthan Roots.
Rajasthan roots is a group of folk musicians promoting the Rajasthan music and culture. . They say, they mix the traditional Indian instruments with Western Instruments to bring out fusion, making it exciting and new. . For example, Indian instruments like the Dhol, Nagada, flute and Khartal mixed with the electric guitar and a saxophone. . The band has over 20 members . . however, Yesterday only five made an appearance.
The stage was set up with a nagada and Tabla (Percussions), an adeetar ( his very own tiny fretless guitar), 5 different flutes, an acoustic guitar and an electric guitar. This bunch of midde aged men had the energy of a 5 year old in a candy store. Their strength was the percussionist Nathu Lal Solanki who has spent the last 25 years teaching the Nagada to Indian and foreign students. Adi Das who was th interactor and the Adeetar player, also wore ghungrus in his feet (an anket with little bell like things which gives a sound similar to the Tamborine). He also was the back- up vocalist to Kutle Khan, a multi Talented Musician and Vocalist. He did wonders with the “one string fiddle” also known as the Bhapang.
The band started by remembering Bulle Shah and continued to play the Yog Rag song composed by the flautist, Kusumakar Pandaya. The concept behind the song was that this particular rag (note) is used in almost all Indian songs, so almost as a tribute to it, they gave us the pleasure of hearing it.
The night started with a bang , obviously being back on public demand and getting such a fantastic response. Though, as they continued playing one song after another, they almost became predictable. A major disappointment was an old folk song cover, “Nimbuda”. The loud mess of instruments playing all together, all at once gave quite a few people a headache.
Not to say that the performance overall was bad, but it wasn’t even as good as it was made up to be. The band was hardly fusion and mostly folk. I guess it just wasn’t their day, with 1/4th the band than usual. Though I give them a major thumbs- up for getting the crowd on its feet and getting them to clap along. . On a personal note, the percussionist could go solo and do the same. (Actually, he did).
Anyway, The night ended on a good note, leaving behind no bitter taste (yes, also thanks to the food). So I guess this is where they get the saying from, “All’s well that ends well”. . (It does)

babbam bam

top- Saahil Kapoor, Left- Ipshita Bali, Right- Hitkarsh Chanana

Breaking through a bunch of corporate types (with slow and perfectly accented speeches, not a hair out of place and shirt tie and blazers. . . you know) and getting them to sing and clap along with you is tough. It’s scary and at times unachievable. Surprisingly enough, For Saahil Kapoor, Sargam Ipshita Bali and Hitkarsh Chanana it seemed like piece of cake. In under 25 minutes, these 3 had the crowd at the Tedx Chandigarh conference screaming for KK and Elvis.
Saahil Kapoor is a fulltime musician, singer and writer. The 24 year old from Mumbai holding a guitar in one hand and a smoke in the other, wearing a crushed shirt and faded denims and shoes without any socks *gasps* (Yes, the immaculately dressed attendees almost had a heart attack) seemed totally at ease before the performance. “I’ve been playing for over four years now and I quite enjoy it”. I understood what he meant when I saw him on the stage, with a huge smile on his face; he covered Kailash Kher, Elvis Presley, KK effortlessly.
Sargam Ipshita Bali (stresses on Ipshita, “its not ishita or ipita. . its IPSHITA”) a BSc graduate, the female vocalist of the band impressed everyone with her Classical Indian fancy notes. Like that wasn’t enough she went on to surprise everyone with the sudden change from classical to Soul with a cover of Killing me Softly. . I almost kept my camera down to sit back, close my eyes and just listen to her. . . but since I couldn’t, I made her promise me a private concert. 
The shining star of the event was the 15 year old lead guitarist- Hitkarsh Chanana. He sat on one knee all throughout (because of lack of chairs) and played the electric guitar. The musical talent the boy has is beyond brilliant, the fact that he’s 15 and super cute just adds to the ‘oooooohhhh’ factor. His band mates had nothing but praises for the young one. A girl from the audience also contributed and said “I’d pay big money to watch him play”
Persian, Hindi, English and Punjabi, the trio covered all four languages, starting with famous commercials song- Nerolac and Desert Rose as sound check. . they continued with the set. The playlist for the evening had Babum bum bum by Kailash Kher, Little less conversation by Elvis Presley, Aapki dua, Killing me softly, Jugni and a couple of originals
And I quote an attendee, “Its like a lease of fresh air in a rather tepid event. Amazing music being played by Saahil & Ipshita” All in all, it was a fun time for all those who were present there. . . Like they say, “All work and no ‘play’ makes Ted a dull boy!” erm. . nevermind. .
Here’s to Saahil,Ipshita and Hitkarsh!

cheers and beers. :)

Till about 4 years back, in order to hear some good live music in India, you’d have to make a trip to Bangalore or Mumbai. Thankfully, thats not the scene anymore. . An example of the same. The Open Mic Night held at Cafe Oz, New Delhi. An event organized by the Bombay Electric Project. It was a mighty good decision made by the Café, hosting the event! The organizers of the show had their hands and notebooks filled from a week before the event. There were about 16 performers eager and ready to perform. And about 70 other people eager to listen. The top floor of the venue, made for 25 guests, actually entertained 70 people and guitars. A good night!!

Now, just a brief up, For those of you who don’t know, the Open Mic Nights welcome musicians from all genres, backgrounds and tastes to come and perform on their stage. They all have their own set of rules. This one limited the number of songs to 3 including originals and covers, though originals were preferred and more appreciated. And after the rules were repeatedly clarified another ten times for those who were busy watching the  Semi- Final between Australia and Pakistan. . . The Night Finally began!

Like at every show, there were some good moments, and there were some bad.A few of them were brilliant and all set to record, and some of the others, not so much.

It was silly how noone out of the 16 performers wanted to go first. And then came Saahil Kapoor  (christened Alpha Male, by his fellow musician mates). He was welcomed by a loud applause and deafening shrieks. After a good long introduction, Saahil started with his original, and for a visual appeal, he got his friend to dance along to the words of the song. . . The song was adorable, a good catchy melody and nice simple words. .  the audience was all smiles. . . The next two songs he played, confirmed how passionate he truly is, the lyrics, music and voice. With just a guitar in his his hands and a very powerful voice, the evening started on a perfect note (no pun intended, well, it is. . :-))

Another one who was quite good, was a member of a 4 piece band, you.8.noise .  . a pleasant, soft voice and a smile on his face, Leon Lu. After performing 2 originals, one about pretentious girls and the other for his friends, he covered Jack Johnson and played the Banana Pancakes, which was one of the true highlight of the day. Though, inspired by Red Hot Chilli Peppers and John Mayer (which could easily be made out from his songs) the graduate from St. Stephens College was born to sing Jack Johnson. And it was clear from his performance, he was by far the most popular ‘boy’ amongst the girls and the ladies.

Rupin Pahwa, the boy with a oh-so-cute face and two originals. The 22 year old, has been training himself vocally and it clearly showed. He also covered Script with their song, The Man Who Can’t Be Moved. Him being an avid John Mayer, Coldplay, Matchbox 20 and Staind fan is totally justified. I can’t think of any other way to describe his song and voice,  except maybe, Nice. Simple And Nice.

And now, The highlight of the evening- Big Bang Blues. Not only is the name of the Band fun, so are the songs. Their Strength is clearly their lead vocalist, Ipshita Roy. There is such a BIG voice inside that tiny body, you couldn’t tell. The band of 6 call themselves a blues band and remain true to their word. The funny thing is, that all the while Ipshita sang, there was not one time she was in sync with the Djembe- played by Rahul Sengupta or the guitar- played by Sushant Thakur, but because her voice was so big and full and hypnotizing (not kidding), no one noticed. Good for them. Their one major inspiration, is a band called Soul Mate. Big Bang Blues have a Beautiful sound and OH- MY- GOD, what a voice.

The performances in the later half of the day were mostly energy-less, sad and dull. They were amateur musicians who could not keep up with the pace of the professionals. Most of them who were conscious of their guitar playing skills couldn’t manage to sing and play at the same time. There were some, who could hum a melody and strum the guitar but insisted on doing so much more. There were others who would sing, but awful lyrics with no heads or tails.

Take the Rapper (no real name, because, apparently, there isn’t any), who rapped a 2 minute song. The lyrics to the song were rather easy. Between all the f***’s there were buts and ifs and thens. The low point of the evening was him being asked to step down, which was then followed by a brawl. One of the last performances was by Tritha Sinha. A professional singer who has traveled all over the country and abroad to make “simple music”.  A mix of classical Indian and all the other music genres from all over the world. It sounds rather complicated, but all the complications are handled very well by her white devil with the apple on top (MAC). The simplicity in her voice eased everyone. (yes, even the Rapper).

All in all, it was a very nice and happy evening full if music and claps and cheers and beers, (ooh. . . that rhymes ) while it was a great platform for some, it was quite a learning experience for most . . .  though, looking at the whole bunch. .  I know for a fact, that they’re not going to give up! Good for. . .  them. . . and us! ! !

Note- a few good bands to check out. .

http://www.myspace.com/mindflewmusic

www.myspace.com/bigbangblues

www.myspace.com/tritha

www.myspace.com/rupinpahwa

Usually, we don’t like to plug specific artists on our blog. Our blog and website is really a place for music fans to hang out and find about the upcoming gigs from various different artists and choose the ones that take their fancy.

However, there are artists who are just awesome, and still resist the urge to join the labels and sign their life away. It’s an uphill road, but one worth taking. Tess Henley and her brother Carson Henley are just two such artists. I have had the pleasure of seeing Tess and Carson perform live myself, and couldn’t believe that they were not signed by a label. Their music is soulful, passionate and vivacious. Their stage presence is fantastic and it’s a real joy to see them live. The BGP and Maggy Ferguson will be performing there as well.

They are performing on October 20th at the famous The Crocodile in Seattle. Rock bands, punk bands, dance bands, jam bands and bands from nearly every other genre you can invent have played at The Croc. I can go on and on about their performance, but why not watch one of Tess’s videos for yourself? You can buy tickets here.

Usually, we tend to write music focussed posts on this blog. But every once in a while, we also write about things that are of interest to us, as well as to the community at large. We have been running gigzee on Ruby on Rails, and like everyone else, we upgraded to Rails 2.3 a few weeks ago. We also use a customized version of the acts_as_favorite plugin internally to track which artists, gigs and venues people like. So, it was very disconcerting when after the upgrade the acts_as_favorite plugin stopped working for us. Worse, since user favorites is a central theme of our website, it pretty much brought down our entire system.

After lot of looking around the web, and poking around on our servers, we figured out the problem, and are posting our solution so that other people can find it useful. The problem, as we found, is that the acts_as_favorite overloads method_missing to extend the methods for the base class, say the User model. This way, it is able to provide new methods to that class, for example user.favorite_blogs.

Unfortunately, in rails 2.3.4, the file /Library/Ruby/Gems/1.8/gems/activerecord-2.3.4/lib/active_record/associations/association_proxy.rb got changed, to include the highlighted lines. These end up raising a NoMethodError before the overloaded method_missing is called for the @target.


def method_missing(method, *args)
if load_target
unless @target.respond_to?(method)
message = "undefined method `#{method.to_s}' for \"#{@target}\":#{@target.class.to_s}"
raise NoMethodError, message
end

if block_given?
@target.send(method, *args)  { |*block_args| yield(*block_args) }
else
@target.send(method, *args)
end
end
end

Instead of messing with the gem itself, and breaking who-knows-what-else, we decided to simply overload the respond_to? method for the user class.

Our code (in app/models/user.rb):


def respond_to?(method_sym)
if method_sym.to_s =~ Regexp.new("^favorite_(\\w+)")
return true
elsif method_sym.to_s =~ Regexp.new("^old_favorite_(\\w+)")
return true
elsif method_sym.to_s =~ Regexp.new("^has_favorite_(\\w+)\\?")
return true
elsif method_sym.to_s =~ Regexp.new("^has_old_favorite_(\\w+)\\?")
return true
else
super
end
rescue
super
end


This essentially goes around the problem by telling ActiveRecord that these methods do exist for the User model, and then the method_missing from the acts_as_favorite plugin is called.

Simple fix, and I hope it can save other people a lot of headache too.

Cheers,

Anu

The Roots

I was super psyched when I got tickets to see The Roots at the Hollywood Bowl last Sunday night. Personally, I would say The Roots are easily one of my favorite bands.  The genius of Questlove’s beats, and their jazzy, innovative approach to hip hop with live instrumentals makes them one of the best bands to see live these days in my opinion. Needless to say, I was looking forward to getting that actual experience that I could almost feel the moment I got those tickets.

However when I got to the Bowl, the concert was not anything near the sick bass lines, jamming beats that I expected from The Roots.  The performance was inspired by the late poet Langston Hughes’ poems, Ask Your Mama: 12 Moods for Jazz.  The concert featured a opera singer paired with jazz from the Roots, and classical music from the LA Philharmonic, and other singers, which did not mix well for the summer jam I expected.  Although, Questlove love stole the show in one movement where he had a 5 minute solo.  In the twelve movements, you could also hear Hughes speak many of his poems which went well with the music. Composer Laura Karpman explains, it’s ”Creating a piece of music that crosses genres, Jazz, Classical, Hip-Hop — to see all of them interact together in a meaningful way, is transformative.”  The concert was more educational, and metaphorical than jammable, with lyrics centered around race, the black movement, and struggles in America.  Although I found the concert interesting and artistically successful in portraying poetry through the sounds of the music, it was not what I wanted to see.

One thing I learned Sunday night is to not be so quick to go to a concert based on preconceived notions. (Not to dismiss that The Roots are great live, they are).  Some of the best concerts I have seen have been at small, lowkey venues with unknown artists, who perform amazing live. I think The Roots still honor this concept of playing small close venues as well, however.  The Roots play in “jam” style setting, every so often in NYC, for a small audience of about 100, for a 10 dollar cover charge.  They still understand and appreciate the concept of a small gig atmosphere.

But the larger point is that just going to familiar, mainstream shows is not always a winner.  Often, you will come to hear a certain song, and the artist won’t even end up playing it, leaving you disappointed.  Some of the best live music experiences are from new small artists you know not much about.

I am not saying that I won’t be going to those big concerts with huge expectations in the future, but I think we all need to remind ourselves of discovering those raw unadulterated shows every now and again.

- Will

Promoting your new album is hard, especially in this turbulent world of the music industry. Fans have so many choices, and there are so many artists that even the top ones are finding it difficult to find mass appeal. So how do you stand out?

Promoting your album

1. Prolong the release date of the album as long as possible to get more hype. This technique has been used a lot lately, especially in the rap industry. Artists claim their album will come out a certain date, and just prolong the album to get more attention and coverage. Eminem did this, and it worked great for his album, Relapse, which debuted at #1 Billboard chart after selling 608,000 copies in the first week.
2. Get your music on itunes. Putting your name on itunes for many fans will make you appear more official, or legitimate. Even if you don’t think you will sell a lot, appearing on itunes is a great marketing strategy for yourself to get your name, and sound out there. Here is a guide of how to get your music on itunes - http://bit.ly/2mr80M.
3. Give people an incentive to buy your album, other than the music. If you plant prizes in your album (i.e. concert tickets, money, autographs, etc.), that will add to more album sales and exposure for your new album. Also, including other parties for your prizes, like giving away a gift card to Guitar Center, will possibly open up more doors and connections with those companies. Chamillionaire is a pro at additional incentives for his fans. You can see this with his new album, where he is giving away select albums with special artwork, and $100 to those that win his contest.
4. Appeal to a wider variety of crowds. If you limit your crowd base to one type people, you will get much less exposure and fans, thus, less album sales. If you can appeal to many types of people, from all kinds of backgrounds, you will get a much larger fan base and album sales. MJ was a master at this, as he broke nearly all the boundaries of genres and crowds and still to this day has the #1 selling album of all time.
5. Your music needs to be catchy. You can’t have sales without a good product. Thriller is one of the best sounding albums as well. No matter how much hype, or marketing you have, you must have a good sounding album to get sales.
6. Overall look and theme of the album can draw fans. Your album’s theme, cover and the overall look of you (or your group/band) can have a influence on whether or not someone buys the album- especially at stores. If you, the name, or the album look cool people may buy it for that reason alone.
7. Be able to rock live performances. A great live performance will not only give a greater appreciation for your music, but it can also be the birthplace for more fans to appreciate your music and check you out. If I ever see a band that is amazing live, I always want to see what they can do in a recording studio.

Are there other ideas that we have missed out? Let us know in the comments!

-Will

So here it is, the continuation of our own summer music awards (Parody).

Most Overplayed Song of the Summer: Black Eyed Peas - I Gotta Feeling

Black Eyed Peas

The first 50 times I heard it, I liked it, pretty catchy. About 2,000 playtimes later on the radio, internet, and my little sister’s bedroom, I got a feeling that if I hear it again I am going to go crazy! If you want to see the video, you can catch it here on youtube.

Best cover released this summer: The Fray - Heartless
Genius cover of Kanye’s story about his heartbreak. The Fray twisted Kanye’s self proclaimed “Pop Art” genre to a deeper, slower, acoustic version. Basically more emo = better for this song.

Best tribute to Michael: Michael Jackson - Smile

Not only is this the King of Pop’s favorite song of all time, but is also has an amazing message, and the quintessential ‘perfect’ Michael Jackson voice we all love.

Check out the video here on youtube


The best musician to follow on Twitter -  @thesonicyouth (Sonic Youth)

The band gives insight to their recording process, and is quick to reply to most. Straight twitterholic. Must follow!

Any other ideas of great awards? Let us know in the comments!

-Will

Hi there! I am glad to introduce the newest addition to our team - Will Dickinson! Will joins us from Los Angeles, and you probably already see his zany tweets and posts on our twitter page, as well as our facebook fan page.

Here is Will in his own words:

An avid music listener, I really like all kinds of music.  You can honestly name a genre of music, and I’ll tell you an artist I like in it.  I am mainly  into old school hip-hop, modern day indie, reggae pop, and Bob Dylan (Dylan is a genre of his own to me).  I play guitar, saxophone, and sing, and love to jam anytime with my friends.  In my spare time I like any activity associated with the beach, traveling, meeting new people, and finding new music on the internet.

We are glad to have Will join our team. He brings with him a passion for music of all kinds, and a further passion to spread the love of music amongst the world! We couldn’t have asked for a better person to help us in our mission.

-Anu