Vande Mataram - Tarana

Sung by the uber-melodious Kaushiki Chakrabarty, do give a listen. Enjoy.
P.S. : If the embedded player does not materialise for some geeky reason just use the link given below. Let the stupidity not stop you from listening to some good music.

http://www.raaga.com/play/?id=98088

http://mio.to/album/127-Hindi_Patriotic/19097-Vande_Mataram_Vol_2/#/album/127-Hindi_Patriotic/19097-Vande_Mataram_Vol_2/

Vigil....

26th November ...... remembrance of the horrors perpetrated....... hoping that it never happens again. 

Pushing the envelope....the heavy metal way!

A casual conversation in the life of a little known metal band called "Meshuggah"......introducing the characters....

Fredrik Thordendal - Lead guitars - plays an Ibanez custom 8-string guitar.

Tomas Haake - Drummer - Plays a Sonor kit with Sabian cymbals

Fredrik : Hey Tomas, long time no beer. Ready for some new metal music?

Tomas : Fuck yeah man!....you got something?

Fredrik : yeah, yeahh. Wrote this song called "Bleed" and composed it on the PC.

Tomas : Sounds brutal!

Fredrik : Here, come listen to this cool drum part i wrote for this song...

Tomas puts the headphones on......starts listening to the track.

Tomas : Fuck...:O!

For people who's eyebrows have shot up and have no clue of what is going on around here, check out the song posted below. And especially listen to the drum parts which were watered down from the ones originally written for this track. Tomas reportedly spent 6 months practising the drums for this one track....:D

Second coming.....

The great redwood uprooted fell,
On terra firma lies peacefully.
Anger hath it not,
nor malice, in its heart.
For in its wake,
it knows it sheltered;
the growth of a new seed.

The demise of Linkin Park

Friends and family, we have gathered here, to mourn the sad demise of Linkin Park, one of the best and most successful alternative rock bands of our time. From the band that gave us the seminal "Hybrid Theory" and the fantastic "Meteora", who would have thought it would end like this?





With the ultra-awful bollocks album called "Minutes to Midnight" and its stupid bastard child, "A Thousand Suns"? From the band where Chester's screams and Mike's rapping had everybody pumping fists and banging heads, it has come to being Justin Bieber and Justin Timberlake on steroids.


From personal experience, I will tell you that LP was the band that got me into heavy stuff. It was my first step. Reading the lyrics of "Papercut" and being scared of your own shadow was where the fun began. Rapping with Viren in the middle of the night on the verses of "Points of Authority", banging my head to "One Step Closer" and feeling awesome about "Crawling". And the screaming attitude of "Hit the Floor" and the melodic Shakuhachi flute piece of "Nobody's" Listening". Those are the moments this band gave me. And many more.



Then came apocalypse. "Minutes to Midnight" was the paralysis, since there was that one good song on that "What I've done" and "A Thousand Suns" was the full blown heart attack. Dead as a dodo. No signs of revitalisation. Lights out, curtain down.



So, good folks, who bothered to read this, listen to the first two albums and be sad that there are no more coming. And for fucks sake, do not listen to "A Thousand Suns". A bucketful of horse manure will give you more to cheer about than that album.


To the deceased,
Mike, Chester, Brad, Rob, Phoenix and Mr Hahn - Please wake the fuck up!


In Memoriam......the best of Linkin Park!

Faraway.....

Leaves green, fly away;
Melt into autumns charm.
Yellow laid they a carpet,
On the soil so calm.

Silent are the nooks from whence,
spoke beautifully the koel.
Sweeps on the deserted stems,
Diabolic the gushing gale.

Carried afar, all the colours,
You charmed the spring away.
Dress sparkling of slade emeralds,
Hands holding the lights of life.

You smile away from a picture far,
surrounded by what you hold most dear.
Your abode of proesperity and peace,
Kept safe from the shadow of a tear.

Promise to who in foreign land lives;
your return will be imminent.
In full splendor and glory resplendent;
For he counts every minute and moment,
for the welcome sound and scent.

Literati.....

Sonorous metal, blowing martial sounds;
At which the universal host upsent.

A shot that tore Hell's concave, and beyond,

Frighted that reign of Chaos and old Night
- Milton, Paradise Lost

Apart from listening to heavy metal, I seem to have picked up one more bad habit. No, not swearing, I picked that up in high school. No, its reading heavy metal literature. And heavy metal literature does not mean The Satanic Bible (which is a real document and can be found on the internet). Following is the crazy train of what I am reading now.....

1. "Black Sabbath and the rise of Heavy Metal Music" by Andrew Cope

Fantastic book to understand the basics of metal and the difference between hard rock and heavy metal. Very detailed technical musical explanations. Ability to read musical notations and and use Wikipedia effectively would come in handy. Also a very skinny book, so will not take months to be done with.

2. "Heavy Metal" by Deena Weinstein

I would call this book, "Heavy Metal 101". A beginners guide to this wonderful music with a very intense culturo - sociological angle. Lotsa pages in this one, but nothing technical in this, so you will skim through them faster.

3. "Damage Incorporated : Metallica and the production of musical identity" by Glen Pillsbury

A must read for Metallica fans. Again, a little technical, with the musical notations. But, indispensible.

4. "Extreme Metal - Music and culture on the edge" by Keith Kahn-Harris

Any death/black/math/speed metal fans out there? Even if not, this book is a good discussion on the birth and various aspects of extreme metal music.

I know that some people might find this fact that heavy metal can turn someone to literature a little over the top. But let me throw in one more fact. The lyrics in the albums, "A Farewell to Kings " and "Hemispheres" by the Canadian progressive rock/metal band "Rush" are heavily influenced by the writings of the novelist Ayn Rand. I rest my case.