Thick Headed Captain

He told me his head was once bitten by a camel. Not bitten off, but bitten into. He even showed me the spot, which was actually a scar hiding under a film of gruffly hair. He said he and his siter had been taken captives by the Pakistani army, at the Rajasthan border, and imprisoned for about two months. The first few weeks, there was no food. And it would get nauseatingly hot. So hot, that the tar would melt from the road and ooze on to the sides.
He had scraped some of the tar and eaten it. Which made his stomach swell. It was so bad, he said he'd rather watch his sister die than give her some of that road pulp.
They asked him several questions, but he had no clue how they ended up in this place. He mumbled something about being sedated by a cattle trader. Then they started using the terror tactics.
His sister was brought in front of the camel, to be trampled underfoot, in front of his very own eyes. It was while trying to save her that the camel bit him.

I asked him what happened to the sister. He looked unperturbed, much like someone who's gone off the rocker and doesn't realise what he's lost, or what he's been through. He only knows events that brought him to the edge of sanity. Not a moment's worth of recollection more. And the camel bite was probably when he'd lost his sanity. From then on, he'd started regressing. His voice became that of a crackled teenager's. Or, according to some rumour, he'd had his bollocks removed out of spite just because his father didn't let him marry the girl he loved.
But even though he was regressing back to childhood, his features were increasingly getting older. He wore the expression of a 40-year-old man, even though he was only 29 at the time. With callouses on his palms, saltnpepper beard and scaly, bunion infested feet, he reminded me of a caricature uncle. Someone who amused kids to bits, and was naive enough to earn the trust of the ever suspicious parents.

He'd announce his arrival from hundreds of yards away. There was a peculiar way he held the side of his palm to his mouth and let out this carnivalesque horn. No one could produce that sound. It was louder than a truck siren, and longer than a train horn. It began from a low note, a rumble that'd climb till you could hear the vocal chords vibrating furiously with the soft flesh of the hand. That siren was another reason he was popular with the kids.
I can think of one more reason. He could eat any amount of chilli. And I’m not talking about heavily spiced food. He could eat, bite into and chew the hottest chilli in the world like it was a beanstring. And boasting about it almost always worked as an ice-breaker with the kids. He’d recount triumphant tales of when such and such person challenged him into eating a teaspoonful of red chilli powder. And he’d taken one teaspoon, polished it clean and then scooped another heap into his mouth, like it was milk powder.
And when you prodded him enough, he’d say there was no secret or trick to it. “I was born in a chilli”, he’d laugh maniacally. He’d then proceed to explain the obsession had caught on much early. From childhood, he’d started eating green chillis with a dash of salt. And soon it was just chillis. It never caused any awful reaction in his system. Ever.

He worked at a solar observatory. It was the only one in the country, he'd boast. And it was situated in the middle of a lake. So kids would go absolutely nuts about the journey to his office, which had to be undertaken in a boat. The observatory was a cylindrical building with a rotating dome at the top. The first time I entered it, the dome rotated a couple of degrees, at which point the pigeons nestling there took flight. That gave me a sudden jolt. And he laughed, wickedly. In fact, he found it so amusing that he came back and recounted the tale with sadistic pleasure to my mum.
"He was calm throughout the boat ride, you know, but you should have seen the look on his face when the telescope moved!!" he'd cry with a rasp, hoarse, maniacal laugh.

But there were certain things even his affected mind knew would be anathema to talk about. Like how I had almost died the day I went with him to his office in the lake. The disaster that had been averted just in time. Apparently, while getting off the boat, I'd calmly stepped into the water, thinking it was the dock. The water was some 30 feet deep there, and I fell with an unceremonious splash. He jumped in to save me. He was always saving people and getting into trouble. But thankfully though this time, the moor and the rope were right next to us. And he'd had the good sense to grab it right before jumping in. We never mentioned the incident to anyone.
I spent the afternoon sitting in the lawns of the observatory, warming my body and drying my clothes. I hated it. I'd been pretty desperate to check out the observatory, peer through the gigantic telescope and see the spots on the sun. Now I had to content myself with only soaking it up.

After taking a mighty swig from the jug full of chai, he asked me whether I could join him for buying some poultry. A chicken farm, he promised me would be exciting.
We cycled off to the farm. And he showed me how the hens were kept inside the coop, and their feed sprinkled through a mechanical device. I watched the hens roosting peacefully, totally oblivious to their suitors. We were looking for the one with the right amount of flesh. Not too swollen, “because it’d taste like a potato”, he’d say. And not too skinny either. There are 5 people eating it, remember?

A moderately sized chicken was chosen, but we had to go the main entrance to get the butcher guy who’d make her ready. Before that we went exploring the farm. There some dogs lying about in the sun, watching us but not quite. He looked at me with a wild grin and said he was going to give the dog a cup of coffee. I burst out laughing. The imagery was so funny: a guy offering a cup of coffee to a dog. I was still laughing when he picked up the stone and hit me in the head. It was so sudden, and so blinding, there was hardly any pain. I could see the events unfolding, and knew it was going to hurt. But like in a dream, I just couldn't move; I didn't even want to move, and I didn't feel the pain. I really didn't. It was fun, except that I don't remember what happened next.

Masculinary Delights with Homo Chauvinistic

They say a man likes to do things alone. Being alone, they say, can make you lonely. I was alone, but not lonely. At least not quite yet. I had my choicest poison for company, and enough dope to last many weeks. 

That stuff can drive you crazy though, especially when you're alone. It can also give you epileptic cravings for anything sweet. So there I was, wanting to have a nice sweet dessert but feeling cantankerous, because that's how a scruffy man would ideally feel. Or so I thought. I skimmed through my options. I didn't want to bake a cake. Baking is for the weak. I'd rather go for frozen dessert. Frozen stiff, and a barrel of alcohol to wash it down with. 

When you're a man, you don't go shopping for ingredients. The correct word to use is hunt. For obvious reasons. But hunting for dessert ingredients? Oh no, too emasculating. I altered my plans a little. I needed to make some OTHER thing that would be a great excuse to go foraging for dessert ingredients. Pretty cool right? I was putting on the mask in masculinity :B

So I went hunting for some meat, a rather adventurous thing at this hour, considering I had very little moolah and only a cubbyhole butcher shop to buy it from. But I like hunting for meat this way. And for today's efforts, it gives a rough edge to the whole deal.

Butcher shops are ideal places to make you feel manly. Although I'm pretty sure I'd faint if I ever saw a pig being slaughtered. But for our current performance, let's go with the thought. In the deepest drawl I could muster, I asked for an under-cut piece of pork. If you're in Delhi, you'll soon realise this is a highly coveted piece. Most of the stock gets over because crony floozies from restaurants across town will flock here to handpick the best cuts early in the morning, even before the swine has bled its last drop. Luckily for me today, though, they had a piece left.

Normally I like conversing with the butcher. Man to man you know. As if. About how fresh the meat is and what different kind of cuts there are. Yada yada. Today though, he seemed amnesiac; a puzzled face that pretended to not know what he was doing. I heard him tell his assistant to not wear that shirt to work. This annoyed the life out of me. This butcher, with the enormous shoulders and beefy arms wielding a gigantic meat cleaver, was beginning to seem very soft. Not at all going with the script. I like my butchers hard-faced and stone-hearted; how else would they do justice to their jobs? Tenderness in a butcher is anathema to his profession.

I grunted at him to quickly carve me some pieces of chops. I think he got the hint. In a ruthless-but-deft stroke, he hacked the chops out, much to my heart's content. I handed him the money, in exchange for the meat. I walked out. There was a fish market up ahead. I like fish, but only the ones I've caught. Only true men catch blue fin tuna. So I gave the market a pass. Next to the fish market were these vegetable shacks. They sell fruits out there as well. I bought some peppers to go with the steak. Also some mushrooms, beans, leeks, courgettes, cherry tomatoes and chillies. Also an  avocado for a side salad. 

Finally, I was en route to buying the ingredients for the dessert, when it hit me. The smell, the aroma, odour? It was so real that I lost my bearings for a second. I'll tell you why. For in this very INA market, is a place, somewhere six feet in the air, where the smells of the fruit, vegetable, meat, and fish markets mingle, and combine to form a most potent, and rather-too-familiar scent. It was so strong it stopped me in my tracks, that musty fragrance drove me mad as I kept hovering at the stop, valiantly trying to draw in deep breaths. Passers-by must think I'd found nirvana, or a new zen breathing technique. If only they knew this was something more base and carnal. For that deep whiff was redolent of nothing but a sweet, invigorating...pussy. Exactly that. And I'm not talking about the ones playing near the fish market. 

As I stood there, nostrils aflare, for what felt like an eternity, I could discern the congerie of melodies within this master symphony: the delicate fruity citrus notes jostling with balmy fish drafts, fresh vegetable aromas wafting behind, and acrid notes of rancid meat, all of them somehow combining to create the most heady and intoxicating miasma known to man. If you've read or watched Perfume, you'll know that the most potent and alluring scents are those in which one has infused the good with the bad. Like life itself. How would you know joy without suffering, pleasure without pain, grace without guilt? 

I made a mental note of the spot, planning to bring B over and make her smell the same thing.

Back home, I marinated the pork cuts in soya sauce for half an hour. Before adding a dash of rosemary, I rubbed crushed garlic on the meat. Then proceeded to pan-sear the meat first and then the vegetables. They say when garlic and butter come together, a chef is born somewhere. I'd say when you add rosemary to the mix, all the sins a chef has committed in his lifetime are forgiven. Once the meat is seared and sizzled golden on both sides, take it out and add chopped vegetables. That's it. Stir fry and it's done. 

 
It was awesome, to say the least. Now the excuse for a male chauvinistic dessert over, I proceeded to make the real thing. Crushed some hobnob cookies to a crumble, and after adding a lavish portion of melted butter, set it in the dessert tray. Put it in the fridge, to make the base firm, and now focused on the condensed milk to make toffee out of. My Yoda diction, please pardon. Boiled it for hours, and after layering the cookie crust (now out of the fridge) with split bananas, ran the toffee solution over it. Added whipped cream and shaved chocolate flakes on top and we're ready.

Now if you wish, you can pour the vodka on top of it. It'll taste like shit, but you can have dessert like a man.

Noble Beast+Bird+Effigy

Andrew Bird's Effigy
from the album, Noble Beast

-------------------------------------

If you come to find me affable
and build a replica for me
Would the idea to you be laughable
of a pale facsimile

so will you come and burn an effigy
It should keep the flies away
And when you long to burn this effigy
It should be of the hours that slip away

Slip away

It could be you
It could be me
working the door
drinking for free

carrying on with your conspiracies
filling the room with a sense of unease
fake conversations on a nonexistent telephone
like the words of a man who spends a little too much time alone
when one has spent a little too much time alone

So will you come and burn my effigy
it should keep the flies away
if u long to burn an effigy
it should be of a man who's lost his way
slips away

it could be you
it could be me
working the door
drinking for free

carrying on with your conspiracies
filling the room with a sense of unease
fake conversations on a non-existent telephone
like the words of a man who spends a little too much time alone
when one has spent a little too much time alone

For the longest time, I wasn't even aware that I had died. I was surfing the internet on the laptop when suddenly the connection went plonk. Or so I thought.

I did everything I could to fix the problem. But it just felt like the dream when you're trying to escape or call someone for help but no part of your body moves?

I wanted to unplug the cable from the modem, but couldn't move from my chair. Bizarre, isn't it? There was only one thing to do in such an emergency situation.

Wake my roomie up. She was lying dead in her bed. Not literally, but I knew waking her up would need the resourcefulnes of a stand-up comedian or a sexual pervert.
But imagine my surprise when I found myself unable to even lift a finger to rouse her from sleep.

Was I dreaming? I couldn't fix the internet line, couldn't move from my chair. Shit, I even tried opening my mouth to say something and absolutely nothing came out. Not even a sigh.

I tried listening for some vital clues to make sense of what was going on. And then I could hear it. The deafening silence. Like outer space.

I was terrified and paranoid. Imagine a plight when you can't turn to anyone for help, no matter how hard you try, and to top it all, your senses abandon you like a gold-digger wife. This could only mean I was paralysed or some crazy shit like that.

And as I found out later, that would have been still better. I would have at least kept believing that and sat there till the roomie woke up the next afternoon and took me to the emergency. Had it not been for the sudden assault on my senses.

Out of the blue, I started seeing things in the weirdest of ways. Or to put it more clearly, I started seeing things FROM the weirdest places. I looked up, and there was an enormous growth right above my eyes. It stretched on for god knows what, a mile? And below me? An eternal abyss. If I fell from the angle I was looking down, the only way of escaping would be clinging to the cluster of thick bushy hair right under my eyes. And that was really confusing. Eyebrows under my eyes?

Anyway, I somehow managed to look up beyond the stump that was right above my eyes. Something even bigger was towering above the stump, but way above. Then I recognized it. It was my face. I couldn't have mistook the scraggly beard and the unkempt hair for anything in the world. The face I'd adored every single morning in front of the mirror. And outside while shopping in the mall, or in the office window pane. I knew what I was looking at.

But there was something horribly wrong with it. Instead of eyes, it had two very ugly orbs sticking out of the sockets. Round, but so not like my eyes.

Suddenly I knew what had happened. Someone was playing jigsaw puzzle with my anatomy. And that could mean only one thing.

I was dead.

HIVy League

It all happened on a day I was feeling particularly thirsty. Dehydrated to my core. How I wish I could say it was the side-effect of popping a certain alphabetical pill. But in my case, it was the cured shark I'd eaten after a brief culinary misadventure. It was bought from a native shack from a popular market, as a spur of the moment indulgence. I'd also asked the shopkeeper for cooking instructions before bringing it home.

Now I'm not usually a bad cook, and mostly, just the way the food looks and the aroma it gives will tell you how good it is. 

After cooking, the shark actually looked fine, with the right amount of glaze and did I even detect a sharp undercurrent of the sea? Well, the latter intuition wasn't quite off the mark because when I put the thing in the mouth it tasted like a fillet...........of salt.

I was supposed to soak it in water for about 8 hours, the part of the instructions I'd completely forgotten. But seeing there was nothing else to call dinner, I chose to face it rather than go hungry .

And that's how I got dehydrated. Even two days after that fateful meal, I was gulping down water like a camel in the Gobi. When it continued till the third day I rushed to the doc, carrying a bottle of mineral water in one hand.

The little clinic I went to was a poor man's clinic. The doctor wasn't even there. But when my turn came, I found myself sitting uncomfortably with my mouth wide open to this man who looked nothing like a doctor. He didn't even talk like a doctor; in fact he wasn't even a doctor, as I found out when the apprentice addressed him as compounder saab.

I then suddenly remembered the real reason I'd chosen this clinic, of all the others in my neighbourhod. That hot nurse who looked at the patient with a look of contempt while taking the blood pressureP? But it probably was her off that very day.

I'd just let out a wistful and regretful sigh, and the next thing I remember is a flashlight probing the depths of my throat. The compounder hadn´t even bothered to ask me what was wrong.
"I've been feeling very thirsty." I managed to gargle-warble.

After much inspection and nodding and shaking of head, the man started asking me stuff, with an intonation that suggested he was clearing his throat to spit. He asked me a whole bunch of questions, but still couldn't figure why my thirst persisted. He noticed that I was constantly taking sips from my bottle even while talking to him.
So, his ingenius mind had a plan.


Him: "Is your merij done?" (sic).

There were around 13 other patients in the room, who could hear everything and everyone in the clinic - from the rising and heaving chests to the old woman's crackling bones. So he probably meant marriage, and his question, although very innocent at first, was actually quite loaded.
You'll very soon know why.


Me: "Well, no I'm not married. "
Him: "Hmmm. Have you done anything phhun?"
Me: "Fun?...mmmm, well...a lot of things actually. Drinking, playing the guitar, listening to music, watching sitcoms, going out. Yea, quite a few things."
Him: "Hmmmmm...yes....ok...hhmmm.........yes.....Dhiruuuu....give patient HIV test."
Me: "Huh? What? I mean, excuse me....???!!

But before I could protest, I was whisked to the waiting room, where an attendant stood gleaming with a giant syringe in one hand, ready to draw the blood that was quickly draining from my face.

It cost me some 300 bucks. To see two tablespoons of my blood being whirled around in a little tiffin box, so as to separate the plasma. I liked the sound of it initially. Plasma in my blood and I didn't even know it??

So the plasma then goes into this little pregnancy kit, which has HIV written in big block letters. And that's how I figured it wasn't a pregnancy kit.

A line means I'm ok. Two lines and I'd be joining the big league of celebrities like Michael Jordan, Freddie Mercury, Derek Jarman, and what have you. Sometimes, an extra line is all you can pray for not to appear. There there, I was also beginning to sound like Chuck Palahniuk.

Anyway, Dhiru and I were sitting and waiting for the results to show when I began to wonder what was worse - a positive pregnancy for a 20-year-old responsible adult or HIV+ for an equally responsible adult.

When, very hesitantly, Dhiru asked me whether I'd been up to some fun stuff lately. I didn't know what to say. As if the compounder's incompetence to suggest an HIV check for something as simple as dehydration wasn't enough to make me livid.

Dhiru: Don't worry. If you know you haven't done anything, what's the problem?" (sic)

The idiot couldn't see that the furrowed rows on my face were caused not by worrying, but by disgust, and possibly anger.
Me: "Yea, but I think there's been a mistake. I came here to find a treatment for dehydration. Why the fuck am I getting an HIV test done?"

Dhiru: Good news. Negative. You are not HIV+."(sic)
Me: "Ok man, but will anyone please check my real problem? I'm so fucking thirsty!!"

Dhiru: "You know, your plasma is yellow colour. How many cigarrettes you smoke?" (sic)
Me: "What...? Well, I've cut down to three a day."

Dhiru: "Ahaa..so that is the problem. Just stop smoking three cigarettes a day. You will not feel thirsty again." (sic)

Me: WTFFFF...are you fucking insane? Between HIV and cigarettes, you idiots have no brains? 

Of course that's what I screamed in my mind, but anyone who observed my facial expressions for even a brief second would have no doubt heard the mad and loud clanging inside my head.  

Dhiru: "Please pay 100 rupees at the counter for only checkup. Compunder saaaaaab, patient is not HIV+." (sic)

The Magical Mystery Tool

The picture has nothing to do with the story below. So why is it here, you ask. Well, it's one of the cooler pictures that I've taken, that's why.



Till fairly recently, I was under the impression that just because a biographer has taken the pains to write down someone's life-story, it must all be true. Maybe having picked it up from the non-fiction section of the bookstore had a role in forming that seemingly innocuous but cunningly deceptive opinion. Moreover, if the object of a biographer's affections is not a popular personality, chances are you may have only one source to get all the lowdown on him or her.
But of course, not that having half a dozen bio epics written about someone is of any help either. Every author will claim that the meal he's cooked is closest to the truth. It's author A's word against author B's.
For the longest time, after having read Albert Goldman's "The Lives of John Lennon", I thought I knew enough about the Beatle-founder.
The picture Goldman paints of the Beatle chief is that of a neurotic caricature in a musician's clothing. He takes away the terribly sensitive humane side of John and replaces it with a pathos of vengeful hostility. Goldman says - look here's a man marinated in his own pride. He's this weak-willed, fearful, unnecessarily controversial, perpetually paranoid domestic despot who despises everyone in his house, including his own son, and prowls about in his ivory tower nude as a newborn.
Further, with such cogent insights that would baffle even the most dense lyric interpreter, Goldman says "Imagine" is actually a parody of the impossibility of the song's 'apparent' wishful thinking. He devotes a major chunk of his energies into proving that Lennon was a bit of a madcap posing as an avante-garde artist.
Oh and by the way, the malicious intentions of the author didn't occur to me at all while reading the book.
Only after reading Philip Norman's "Shout" did I find out that Lennon was quite normal. A genius nonetheless, but without those quasi-evil traits that Goldman was talking about.
In fact, Lennon had quit smoking, gone back into making music after a 2-year hiatus and was all set to start life afresh at 41. In his own words, "40 is the new 21".
The funny thing is, both Norman and Goldman don't get too far from each other while describing the events that happened on Lennon's last day on earth. Goldman's account shows a musician who had become so useless in his last days that his only concern was tucking his son in bed. Norman paints a man who for the sake of his wife's music career dons the hat of a househusband as well as an album producer.
Later I found out how Goldman had pulled a fast one on Yoko, making use of the widow's trust and hope for a sincere biography. In "Shout", when Norman confronts Yoko on why she hadn't denied those accusations thrown at her by Goldman, she says there were too many questions and that she couldn't have answered it all by herself. However, the evidence that Goldman had distorted the accounts of some close acquaintances of Lennon helped Yoko's case, and by extension, lent cerdibility to Norman's.

I was more inclined to believe in Norman's version.

Till Norman recently came out with a new book that claims Lennon was gay.

Curious incident of the twitters in the morning

In my house, there are three critters. The tiniest one screeches for my attention the moment I'm awake, begging for some serious head-pat and ear-rub. The three-sizes-larger critter nudges me with his paws the moment I've put my feet on the ground, thinking it's going to fetch him some beluga caviar for breakfast.
The third (and the largest) critter keeps me awake all night with constant advice on how and why I should sort my life out.
One day, the tiniest screecher went missing. I didn't find out that so soon because the day she went away, something strange happened. It may or may not have anything to do with her disappearance.
I was actually enjoying the moment of morning bliss, when the sound of a deep guttural screech just cut through my head and woke up the irritable beast in me. I was awake, but my eyes refused to open, as if too scared to see what the brouhaha was about. After all, the screech I was expecting was a pretty faint one, after having heard it everyday for the last one year.
I squinted just in time to see three-sizes-too-large sitting and making jarring sounds in the corner, just like his little counterpart. But the little furry companion was nowhere to be seen. Truth be told, I was more intrigued about this sudden inexplicable behaviour, than angry at being woken up in such a frightful manner (the screech was loud enough to scare the nightmare I was having away). There was no sign of the little one, and three-sizes was still uttering those maniacal sounds. Hmmm, still thinking.
I looked at the (largest) twitter lying next to me. She was sleeping serenely, hair forming a bedhead that would have made even Marge Simpson envious. Anyway, bedhead or not, this was serious and so I had to wake her up. I shook her a couple of times. The response was, to be honest, quite freaky. Usually, she'd cuddle up and ask for 5 more minutes or a cup of tea to be brought to the bedside. And I would happily oblige in either case. Today, she just lifted her hand... and even as I was dreading this bizarre freak of nature, started pawing me as if expecting breakfast.

(Note: The above instance took place (and was immediately written about) in the early hours of the morning, when reason and sanity take flight to leave behind a figure of mass confusion)

"It was the most disgusting night ever."
"Not that I could help it; I just didn't expect things to go this far."
"Yea, well there is nothing that can be done about it now."
"He called me. I had known it coming for some time now, so I didn't quite bother to think it could involve something else too."
"I picked up the stuff and went straight to the place we'd agreed to meet. I got suspicious when a friend of his called on the way. She said her place was very close to the one we'd originally planned on meeting at, and that he and I were free to come over for coffee and cookies."
"Seemed harmless, so I agreed. Her place was quite nice, but something seemed to suggest that it was all a facade."
"There were two others too, who I hadn't expected at all. I thought it was going to be just him, me and her."
"But that was not to be. One of them, as it turned out, was her flatmate. Dark auburn hair, with contrasting light eyes. And a body that was as fit as it was delicate. Innocence that could turn you on. The other one was very old. In fact, too old to be hanging out with us. I noticed the smirk when she shook hands with me. And I didn't bother to respond to her phoney pleasantries.
I took my coffee and dunked the cookie in it, hoping it would start a conversation with the auburn-haired beauty.
When it didn't, I picked up one of the pieces of paper lying on the table. It had the word SCISSOR written on it, in big bold letters. And a crude drawing of something that looked like it. I asked her what it was for. I saw a wry smile dart across the old hag's face. Even before I realised that the woman I was talking to wasn't listening, she jumped and sat on my lap. It wasn't that I didn't protest. What came out of my mouth didn't sound like one. She told me they'd been playing an extended form of Scissor, Paper and Rock. Except that along with these three articles, there were also Man, Woman and Devil. The rules were quite interesting, even though a little too comprehensive. Man writes on paper, hurls rock and exorcises devil. Woman tempts the man, writes on paper and uses scissors. Devil tempts the woman and is immune to rock and scissors. Simple rules, simple game. Would you care to join us for a game? I saw this as the only way to get her off my lap. I said yes.

Abstract jolt from the blue

The other day I was listening to Andrew Bird’s Fake Palindromes. It struck me that it was quite a simple song. Just 4 chords, on a 6/8 beat with some intricate finger picking. On the guitar I mean, although he does something even more complex on the fiddle.

I liked this song at the first listen itself. It has all the ingredients of a powerful, punchy track, but the beauty of it is that it doesn’t come across as one. Well, maybe the surreptious wail of the violin mellows it here and there, but musically, its soul is not too different from that subterranean gem "Rebellion (Lies)" from one of the best exports from Canada -Arcade Fire. Don't get me wrong; both songs pay tribute to two entirely different aspects -the former actually sounds like a palindrome in parts, although I'd allow that only in a figurative sort of way. The latter sounds like a clarion call against any kind of propaganda. But I think there is some common territory when you compare them musically. I know there is some cloud around what exactly that is, but it could have something to do with the music both artists have been influenced by.

Come to think of it, Bird seems to be America’s answer to the Canadian baroque outfit. Both use elaborate techniques for a multiple-layering of sounds in their albums. Bird does it through of clever manipulation of gadgetry; Arcade Fire do it live with as many musicians as the track recorder can afford. The result is the same- a dense wall of sound that slowly builds up with incessant clangs and turbulent melodies.

That said, it'd be really interesting to see both the artistes perform together. Come on, is it that difficult?

Disgrace
One of the disadvantages of being in India is that you can enjoy the independent music scene only vicariously. Not for us the luxury of watching an Andrew Bird concert. Instead, we’re left with no choice but to listen to the umpteen electronica acts that take up most of the dates in gig calendar. Not that I have a problem with that; electronica is thriving in India, but sometimes you can’t help wish The Raconteurs were playing their next gig here. Or that Radiohead would at least express a wish to tour India, and be touched by the fan following they certainly seem to be unaware of. Or how about The Flaming Lips? I’d give an arm and a leg to be in a Lips concert. I’d even kiss Wayne Coyne’s feet Timberlake-style, or even the entire cast of Arcade Fire, (Win Butler included, although he smashed up a guitar in a bout of angst-induced juvenile outburst after performing Intervention live), even though none of them are worth $125 million.
But instead, I have to undergo the humiliation of having to plead with the manager of a popular nightclub to let me in to watch a multi-sensory act, the prospect becoming increasingly distant because I certainly don’t have “above 25” written on my face, or even an ID to prove it.
So I’m left to do what has now become the only incentive to go to work. Downloads. Yes, thank god that India is not internet isolated. But coming to think of it, I don’t think any country is. So that doesn’t put us in any advantageous position. Other countries are way ahead of us economically, technologically and musically. Ah who the hell cares! I just console myself with the fact that even if any act comes here, they’ll do what every other international act does; give a merciless ear to our live-concert-deprived ones and go to South India.