Lets talk Muzik

In the beginning there was silence. I really would'nt know but we'll go with the wise men on that. Then, as if to celebrate its own birth, music erupted, unfolded like the petals of a lotus. Then something really strange happened at some point in space-time..Anu Malik was born. Was that the day music died?

Once upon a time you had your group of friends who were really interested in music and wanted to make a difference.(Saturday night specialists born out of an extra peg of whiskey). This wanting to make a difference probably prompted them to set their differences aside and jam up to create a lil bit of magic. Can you really imagine Mick Jagger and Keith Richards working together in a real job? Infact most of the bands ( The Beatles, The Who, Led Zep, Pink Floyd) which made "good" music were formed that way. However, the sad thing is that today we have come to a point where we often get the impression that music is "manufactured" with the sole purpose of disturbing the silence instead of embroidering it. Then there is of course the case of hostile takeover of silence by brute desperation ( read death metal, thrash..etc etc). How did this happen? When did we lose the plot?

As Thom Yorke of Radiohead very aptly puts it.." Music has a tendency to become lifestyle music. No one intends it but that's what happens". A classic example of the same would probably be hip-hop. A genre that appeals to a generation mass hypnotised by TV and celluloid, misled into believing that "shedding inhibitions" implies shedding clothes. Then of course there is the case of punk rock and death metal. A genre that appeals to kids who mostly come from dysfunctional families and choose to use head banging as a stress release mechanism. I have a friend who tried to get me into Trance....wo bro that is not even music. In fact Trance stands for Trip and dance( yeah its great when you're tripping...:))).

Contemporary Indian music is probably a shade better than Indian film music in the 80's and the 90's which involved copying spanish numbers and adding jhankar beats to Indianize it. Today we have ,at least, a few notable exceptions ( Rahul Sharma, Aman and Ayan Bangesh) who add a touch of freshness to an otherwise decadent art form. I guess that is the real problem. You have the right to choose but there arn't too many right choices. Hence whenever you turn on your TV or radio, 9 out of 10 chances, you would probably catch Himesh Reshammiya doin his thing, whatever that may be. I mean would you really wanna hum "Jhalak Dikhlaa jaa" unless you really wanted to irritate somebody. Does that man pay the channels to play his songs???

Maybe Chaos really does rule and hence most of contemporary music reflects the chaos that is all around us. In future music might be replaced by burps to elucidate the fact that Dark Matter burps. Yeah dark matter burps and that is exactly why it chooses to remain in the dark. We however are far shameless. If only we could take a while and smile and in that smile realize that that the seat of deafening noise is stunning silence.

Peace Out.
The Beatnik Baba

Work in progress... Yeah like you really care