Chained Melodies

The earliest piece of music I remember having listened to is Mozart's Symphony No. 40. That was back in my UKG when we used to listen to different composers at bed time. In my dad's eyes, the melody of music outweighs the jingle of coins, so its natural that his offsprings - my older sisters and me did justice to the hundred-rich rack of western classical music. It took me a while to appreciate it, though my sisters were instantly very taken with the likes of Bach, Beethoven and Tchaikovsky. But over time, I grew to love it.

I remember taking my X class board exams with The Beatles playing in some remote corner of my brain. My bro-in-law in the US had sent along a few Beatles CDs, and every evening saw my preparations for the next day's exam coupled with shouts of I wanna hold your hand, Love me do! and Yesterday (that's more of a hum than a shout ;) ). Dad picked up a couple of ABBA and Carpenters audio cassettes from a shop in Brigade Road, Bangalore sometime then, and that was probably the first time I was exposed to Karen Carpenter's entrancing voice that needles even the most un-romantic minds and drives their imagination. I can't pick the better voice between Joan Baez and Karen Carpenter - Diamonds And Rust by Joan Baez is something my sister Deepa took to singing everytime she came back from college, and her treble was simply unbelievable in the sense that she made a very good job of imitating Baez.

Then I entered college, where for some reason, you're considered akin to vermin if you do not listen to the in-thing - hard rock. You name a few kick-ass rock bands and you're instantly part of a happening department or club. It's the time when listening to Iron Maiden and Guns N Roses (for more than one reason ;-) ) brands you as "cool" and in some cases scum like Cradle of Filth (pun intended) is the sole reason why you have friends. You probably won't believe me when I say I hadn't even heard of a chap called Bryan Adams when I entered college. (Someone told me he's still single after all those love songs he's written!). Roxette and Billy Joel are pretty good for timepass numbers. At a point of time, We Didn't Start The Fire became a kind of cult song within my club. I also heard my first U2 number during my first year, and it's a song that never tires me even if it's going into its zillionth repeat. Sigh. I can't live With or Without You. Man.

Second year was when the wave of Pink Floyd hit me, and that was when I started appreciating the art of playing the guitar. I also discovered how Chris Martin of (Coldplay fame) with that amazing voice floored Gwyneth Paltrow into marrying him. Second year was also when I started wishing for traits from various gifted people. I wanted to emulate Don Felder's slide guitar antics in Hotel California, employ Dave Gilmour's booming voice in Coming back to Life, and coo like Chris Martin in Clocks. I couldn't do any of it.

The magic of The Bee Gees hit me during my third year. They lent a different dimension to rock and roll. Maurice Gibb with that one-of-a-kind voice (I really don't know how to classify it) made it big for a certain John Travolta who starred in the late seventies' blockbuster Saturday Night Fever. And there was Bruce Springsteen and Dire Straits - the former captured fans (not just girls) thanks to his lyrics and passionate voice. Courteney Cox got her big break when Springsteen pulled her over from the crowd during a live rendition of Dancing in the dark and made her sway on stage for a few seconds. And the latter, well. I know guys who're trying to trying to smoke just so they could deepen their voice to sing and play the guitar like Knopfler does. I mean, you could even call it arrogance...he plays the guitar without flinching a muscle, like it's the most trivial thing mankind ever invented. No sweat, job done, while girls continue to drool. And hey, being a Tamilian, I've never appreciated Ilayaraja more...he's like Beethoven of the East. I could quote a dozen songs I'd do anything to perfect.

Final year, well. That's now. Before I came back to campus I got myself a guitar, and have been trying to perfect Stairway to Heaven without much success. I must have listened to it a thousand times over the vacation, driving my folks mad. And Joe Satriani and Eric Clapton are my latest Idols (you might have figured that from my earlier posts) after The Extremist and Love Thing and Cocaine and Wonderful Tonight and Layla, among others. And oh yeah, there's this song called Stop! Stop! Stop! by this Russian/Ukrainian band called Nu Virgos (I suggest you check them out on Wiki ;) ) which has become a popular number on campus.

That covers most of my favourite bands. I think I left out Vertical Horizon, The Calling, Vanessa Amorosi and a few others. Ronan Keating, Five for fighting, Hoobastank, Richard Marx, Maroon 5, INXS and the likes will keep coming out with love songs while Iron Maiden will continue to give meaning to rock music. But there can be no end to this I guess. So then, So long, farewell, until the next post!

SLOTH 4.1

SLOTH:

1. Apathy and inactivity in the practice of virtue (personified as one of the deadly sins).
2. Any of several slow-moving arboreal mammals of South and Central America; they hang from branches back downward and feed on leaves and fruits.
3. A disinclination to work or exert yourself.

I am living up to two-and-a-half of the aforementioned points these days. Why climb branches when you have a snug bed, a wall to lean back onto, a packet of biscuits to pounce on in case of untimely stomach calls, the comp right next to you with the keyboard on your lap, multiple googletalk windows open and active and most importantly, you guitar to turn to to echo the river of tunes flowing in your head, thanks to all the Clapton and Floyd and Joe Sat you've listened to during your state of acedia. It's this part of your life in campus - a vice we shall christen 'Psenti-sem', and I dare say it's got to be appended to the se7en; they should call it ei8ht I guess ;).

One of my friends here who started blogging recently was talking (I am not sure I could call it cribbing) about how it was his Psenti-sem and still he had no psenti. Well, is there anyway you could actually get a psenti just for your last sem? I see the psenti eliminating the latest vice we coined, but we hit a snag here. A four-and-a-half month trial version of a psenti isn't really a psenti. It's something like freeware (if you substitute the treats with (w/t)alks) you download and experiment with. If you really like the trial version, you'll pay a semester later, not with money but with a heavy heart, trying to make yourself believe that long-distance is going to work in your case. It just doesn't. You simply have to resign yourself to Sloth 4.1. You've just downloaded the full version, and it's free!

So how is Sloth like? Let me try and explain. There may be alternate versions, and they may be just as vague. It's like finding a coach for the Indian cricket team. There's no single solution. There are so many that you're totally zapped and have to contend with the one you believe is the best, and go all-out with him. (Still from time to time you're not sure he's your coach, and rant publicly against him in all tabloids, but that remains another issue).

When you're in Sloth mode 4.1 (or 4.2 or 5.1 or 5.2 in other cases), there's this particular inkling to listen just as keenly as the first time to a number that has gone into its 176th repeat. If it's a song-video, well, you simply give up trying to bring yourself play another song. You begin to note down significant instances in the video, like the time Clapton starts off fiddling with chords for the first minute and 3 seconds, and then the bass guitar joins in playing a mysterious chord I still haven't been able to figure out, to be accompanied by a gentle tap of the drums a couple of seconds later and at 1:17 Clapton ends the unknown chord sequence with a smile towards the drummer who goes rat-tat-a-tat-tat and then the confluence of the guitars and drums happens, the crowd suddenly goes wild realizing that the number is Cocaine - a masterpiece by Clapton. Fine, the suspense no longer remains suspense when you listen to it over and over again, but the kick you get out of it is undiminished throughout.

Well, and then there is this inner persuasion that drives you away from your room come night time. You just walk. Somewhere. You don't really have an idea about the time, it's probably 1 in the morning for all you care. You look up to the stars. You try and identify the few constellations you know. You wish the moon would just disappear so you could get a better look at the astral bodies. Hum the song you’ve listened to that day. Find a possible interpretation to the psychotic lyrics. You wonder why. Then you wonder why you wondered why when you know you can never zero in on the real reason for the song to come into existence. Most songwriters are either loonies or geniuses, and are almost always gifted with the art of pulling the right strings on live shows. It just comes out brilliantly, and most people are left marvelling at the numbers of years these guys practise relentlessly. When you can’t think more than you already have and are totally saturated with inner voices, you stop, sigh, walk back to your room and crash.

That’s the Sloth 4.1. I love it, and execute its routine everyday.

Credits:

1) Eric Clapton's Cocaine which I keep experimenting with (only on the guitar ;) )
2) Wordweb (er, you now know where I flicked the definition of Sloth from).

No strings attached...

It was brand new, straight from the most gorgeous showcase of the shop. The desire of owning one had long kindled his musical instincts, only to be bogged down by his inability to pick up guts and ask his father for the money. The family situation wasn't ideal - his mum's cancer treatment chiselled away $220 every month from the $950 pension his father drew as a retired bank officer. His sister, separated from her husband, undertook odd cleaning jobs at Brooklyn households adding a measly $40 a week to the family earnings.

And there he was, a dropout, still only 21. He'd defied education and taken up playing the instrument when he turned 19, learning chords on and off and currently was no more a professional than a two-month old novice at the National Academy on 74th Street.

He was looking at an Ibanez. This one boasted of a JS neck, a signature of the master himself, Joe Satriani. He'd seen him play at sonic speeds, his fingers moving over the rosewood board with stunning ease negating the complicacy of the notes. Picturing himself playing Lynyrd Skynyrd's most famous number yet, he marvelled at the thought of all the girls swooning over the breathtaking five minute solo towards the end. Freebird. He'd probably give up playing if he could pull this one off somewhere in the best part of the next twenty years. It's a long shot, he told himself.

Catching sight of another wannabe on a Gibson in the acoustics room, he pointed at the Ibanez, paid $5 for the trial and waited outside for his ten minute slot, scanning his brain for possible tunes to experiment with. The solos from Dance of Death and Blood Brothers, Love Story, the Godfather theme, the first few notes of Nothing Else Matters and Wish you were here, Wherever you will go by The Calling, Superman by Five for fighting....

Shutting the door behind him he proceeded to plug the instrument and sat down. Resting the curve of the Ibanez on his thigh, he brought his right arm around the basswood body, took up the plectrum and strummed. Delight. Yes, this was a JS100 and not a Gibson Les Paul or a Fender Stratocaster, but that wasn't going to make him think two ways about playing the first ever tune he'd learned...

E E E E E E E E

B B B B B B B B

C^# C^# C^# C^# C^# C^# C^# C^#

A A A A A A A A…

So simple, just eight notes on one string, and eight notes on the other and yet so delightful. And so significant that you couldn’t imagine The Edge playing With Or Without You with any other base note…

And he continued to play it over and over again till the end of his allotted time.