The earliest rock bands in Calcutta originated around the same time when rock music was taking a concrete shape worldwide as contemporary popular music. Live bands in 60s, playing across uptown clubs like Mad House (Park Hotel), Trincas, Moulin Rouge, Macambos and Ferrazinis, started incorporating elements of contemporary music in their performances and rock music was slowly beginning to penetrate the music listening habits of uptown youth of the city.
In 1967, The Flintstones were among the most admired band to play on Park Street. It had Steven Booth, Clayton Saunders, …

Ghazal is originally the Persian form of poetry and was originated in Iran in 10th century A.D. It grew from the Persian Qasida (meaning songs of praise), which was a panegyric written in praise of the emperor or his noblemen to later deal with the whole spectrum of human experience; though its central concern is love.  Ghazal is an Arabic word, which literally means ‘talking to a woman’. Since woman is most poets’ muse and the topic of conversation is love, love with its complexity of emotions, notwithstanding the plaintive …

In 2003, BBC World Service conducted an international poll to choose ten most famous songs of all time to mark the 70th anniversary of the BBC World Service. According to BBC, people from 155 countries/islands voted, around 7000 songs were selected and almost 150,000 votes were cast. The song “Dil Dil Pakistan” was third in top 10 songs. The second song on this list was India’s National song – “Vande Matram”. As a result, for some “Dil Dil Pakistan” was equivalent to the National song of Pakistan.
Recorded as a single …

By 1996, Junoon had released four albums and had a leading cult following from across the country. Yet the best was still to come. In retrospect, it’s easy to see why Junoon clicked with a mass audience — they weren’t as pop oriented as Vital Signs or earlier bands and of all the Pakistani’s bands in early 90s, their sound owed the greatest debt to hard rock. With their riff based sound, sufi- urdu poetry laden lyrics and expansive masterful vocals, Junoon became the forerunner of south Asia’s rock loving …

Kandisa by Indian Ocean deserves to be right on top. On the eve of release of “Leaving Home”, the article digs into the first impression that the band had on its most ardent fan and supporter.

Sufism is an age-old lyrical path, which is now captivating the attention of ‘New Age Gurus’, ‘Seekers’ and the young generation alike. Nazia Mallick writes on what Sufi Music and poetry means to her.

This was a piece written for Tehelka in 2001 to provide an overview of the popular music scene in India. Rabbi Shergill nothwithstanding, how much has really changed?

2009 was a great year for film music. Though there were no earth shattering hits that may be called as milestones, yet the list suggests that finally a much needed maturity has arrived that washes away much of crudeness and mediocrity off the industry.

India can boast of a vibrant, if not profitable and widely publicized, underground music landscape. The prospects have always been bright yet a lack of well acknowledged push from audience as well as market practitioners has mostly kept it to the background.