Archive for July, 2009

Birmingham happened out of no where and we have to credit Clare Edwards for the most amazing time we had! It was a pleasure and we loved every minute of our stay there!

We landed up in Birmingham right after WOMAD and after an early morning adventure getting to the railway station, we managed to board the train at the most beautiful Kemble Railway Station near Swindon and headed to Birmingham.

It wasn’t long after that we landed at the Birmingham New Street Station where Clare’s husband Richard was there to pick us up and not knowing the extent of our agility, was shocked when all 6 of us with our bags and instruments fit into his VW SUV! It was the first time something like that was even attemped in that car :)

We headed straight to Handsworth Park where we were supposed to play at the first ever ‘Handsworth Park Family Day’ that Clare was organizing.

Now Handsworth park is the MOST beautiful park I have ever seen! and I know I haven’t probably seen many parks, but this place took our breath away! there is just so much there, the beautiful lawns, the trees, the lake, it was a perfect location for a family day event and it felt like we were there on a picnic ;)

We opened the festival and there were people just trickling in when we started but it was nice to play in the park and then head out on the lawns, stretch our mats and catch a snooze! The weather was just brilliant, it was bright and sunny and naturally, we took all the credit for it :p

Clare had arranged for us to stay at her lovely house and we had the best time there with her and her family. She even prepared Pav Bhaji for us so we won’t miss home too much and it was quite excellent! she officially has the endorsement of the Raghu Dixit Project for her Pav Bhaji!

The next day started with a lazy morning and while Raghu went out to catch up with old friends from Mysore, the rest of us went out to see the Birmingham City Centre with all its canals and malls and weirdly interesting buildings! It was fun to sit by the canals and have traditional English puddings and desserts and some Orignial Ale!

The show in the evening was at the Hockley Bar and Kitchen which is a nice little venue in Birmingham and it was for the local Birmingham residents and a few people that we had specifically invited to watch us. We had friends of ours drive down from Coventry etc to catch the show and by the looks of it, they loved it! which is always a good sign :)

This was the most Indians we had played to on the entire tour and it was quite a fitting finale to a very memorable and hopefully successful tour! Raghu even had to succumb to pressure and play ‘Mahadeshwara’!

A huge thank you from the band to Clare for putting this leg of the tour together and for the lovely time we had in Birmingham! If you ever come down to India, look us up :)

Photos uploaded here - http://www.facebook.com/album.php?aid=286389&id=522175007&l=2bbfea5a37

So how do you prepare yourself before playing at the music festival of your dreams? Certainly not by sitting packed in a van in heavy traffic on the Motorway!

But thats how the gig of our dreams started! After much confusion about the travel and having to drop one member from the travelling party at the last minute because there wasn’t enough place in the van, we set off from London in a rented van and to our horror found that the traffic on the Motorway was unbelievably crazy! But Sareata was on top of things and managed to squeeze her way in and out of lanes and get some ‘Indian Style’ driving done to speed things up!

But it was a HUGE sigh of relief we breathed as we pulled into the artist registration area at the festival and collected our artist kits and then made our way to the Saddlespan stage just 40 minutes before we were supposed to go on stage!

It was then that we found out that the engineers had gone off for a dinner break since we hadn’t arrived yet and were planning to land up only half an hour before our show, so we had just 15 minutes to quickly check if all was in place and then headed back to the green room to get changed! Looking back and things, I am quite pleased things went this way coz we were all full of energy and there was no chance or time for nervousness or any such thing! it was all plug and play!

The people who come to WOMAD are really special and they come there for a fun happy experience, the place itself is out of a fairy tale and the music is the most diverse you will ever find at festivals! So it was a great vibe from the first moment we got on stage! people were already fully kicked about our band and ready to have a great time!

We also spotted in the crowd, a familiar face, Mr. Derek Sivers himself and quite a few attendees from TED Global that had just finished in Oxford earlier that day! It was a first for me, playing in front of my “boss”!! But he seemed to like it so its all good I think ;)

The set was quite fantastic, the band was tight, the sound was brilliant, the crowd was beautiful, the setting was perfect, there was nothing more we could ask for! But … and you know how in our case, there is always a big BUT ;)

Rajeev, who was our Road Manager cum Photographer cum Roadie cum Guitar Tech cum Merchandise Sales Manager cum guide cum everything else assumed that the band’s slot was from 8PM to 9PM and so when there were 10 mins to go, he told us to wrap up the set and so at 9 PM on the dot, we ended our performance with a bang!

The organizers however came running and told us that we had half an hour more to go! so it was time for our triple encore!! :D

The crowd loved the fact that we had more time and it was all good and the best part of it being that we had enough time to set up a small stall on the left side of the stage where we could sell our CDs. And boy did we sell CDs! we ran out of every single CD we managed to get from India and still ended up not having enough!

By this time, it was getting really cold (atleast for us!) and then it was time to check some of the rest of the festival, go out and eat from the wide variety of cuisines on display and head to The Hilton in Swindon where we were to stay for the night!

And that is how it all went down, there are so many more stories to tell, but this is the basic draft I had to get out ASAP! More shall follow!

Pictures from the gig available at - http://www.facebook.com/album.php?aid=285799&id=522175007&l=64b11f6ff6

This was a high pressure gig! we had invited about 75 people from the music industry in the UK to come watch us and it was like a final exam situation :) Thankfully we had prepared :p

And we had a whirlwind show! it started when we had to walk to the show without our guitars coz we had to pick any Gibson guitar of our choice to use for the show. Now, in most cases, it is a dream come true for a musician and we were wondering if we could have such an arrangement for all our shows!

But there was a slight problem in that we took some time to get used to those lovely guitars! and the bigger issue, we were too used to our own guitars!

But then it was only a slight deterrent and we go on with the rest of the show. The showcase was in the Gibson Guitar Studio which is a fantastic place for performance! the acoustics are brilliant and the equipment was fantastic as well! so it had all the ingredients of a nice show.

We had about 70 confirmations for the show and it was nice to see most of them turn up for it! the drinks were set up and ready and the band was sounding nice! As with all our shows here, we had to start with cajoling the audience and making them clap and move on to some singing, dancing and jumping around! but they did it and it was beautiful :)

We played a tight 45 minute set and it was pleasing to hear after we finished that the audience wanted some more ;) its always a good sign when the crowd wants more :p - it was time for us to then say Hi! to everyone in the audience and interact with them and see what they thought of the band!

We got a nice and positive response which was worth all effort before we headed out to the Varun suggested, “Benito’s Kitchen” for some of best Mexican food ever!

Muchos thanks to Paul Knowles, his lovely wife and Kaz Sahota from Jenral who set up the whole showcase for us and were our lovely hosts for the evening. It would never have happened without you guys!

And thanks to all of you who came and watched us! Now we wait to see what comes from this :)

As always - photos available here - http://www.facebook.com/album.php?aid=285017&id=522175007&l=d694355582

Our first club gig in London was at the Von Underbelly and we were the headlining band! and what fun it turned out to be :)

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Unless you’ve been living under a rock for the past 50 years or have nothing to do with the world music scene at all, you know that WOMAD is just the *Biggest* world music festival ever!

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We *LOVED* the Lovebox and by the looks of it - Lovebox loved us too :) We could not have asked for a better start to the tour!

The famed British weather woke us up in the morning and it was just freezing cold with a drizzle and the general moroseness that is associated with the British weather was in its element! Add to this, the fear that, coming from India, there won’t be anyone who will venture out for a gig in that kind of weather, din’t make things any easier for us!

We finally reached the venue well in advance and after collecting all the passes we needed, we headed backstage to get ready for the gig!

Like many other things in the UK, the gig started at 12.30 PM on the DOT and no one exceeded time! it was just crazy!

We got on stage a couple of minutes in advance since the band before us moved out a little early and did a quick line check before we plunged into the set!

Just as our first song, ‘Hey Bhagwan’ was getting over, Horror of Horrors, the 5th string on Raghu’s guitar snapped! Rajeev went backstage like a pro and sorted it out with the guitar from the previous band! while he fixed the string that was broke and tuned it right there amidst all that chaos!

The rest of the set was one big party with the crowd increasing in size and volume :) We got them to jump and sing and dance and even learn some Hindi! Not just that, I thought we were on the spot with our humor as well :p - and the crowd seemed to LOVE that!

This was of course, Varun’s first gig with us and after exactly *ONE* practice and he nailed it! The next task is to make him wear a lungi and jump with us on stage! But we have 5 more shows and I’m confident it will happen. It would be lovely if you guys could leave a comment here telling him how much it would mean to you that he does that - It might just change his mind :)

In all, it was a mindblowing experience, we got to see the scale of things at a festival of this size and stature and we should hopefully be back soon!

It was with great apprehension that we arrived in the UK without our guitarist Vijay Joseph and the man who was supposed to replace him was Varun Krishnan ..

So after the heart breaking news that Vijay could not make it, we were in a complete fix about how we would pull off the trip to the UK and one part of the answer was Varun Krishnan. He was the guitarist for Zero after Warren had to move to New Zealand and he came heavily recommended ;) - So we had nothing to fear!

We landed up at his house early in the morning yesterday and I must say it helps when you stay down the road from Abbey Road Studios! You know what you *HAVE* to do when you are in the vicinity of the Abbey Road Studios right? We did just that!

Sang Beatles songs and crossed the road and had someone click that famous photo! except small problems - the song that Jithin started singing when we asked him to sing a Beatles song was - “Hotel California” !! - though we can just blame his Mallu descent for it :p - and we most certainly don’t look like the Fab Four a couple of decades back, but then, it was a brilliant experience walking through music history!

Varun did not disappoint - he had his parts nailed, gave us cereal bars and cake and some excellent coffee and the morning session was a breeze! We ran through the structure on most songs we were playing and stepped out of his house to watch the long queue of people waiting to get into the Lords Cricket Ground! We have promised ourselves that we we will make it to the Final day of the Ashes test on Monday - I hope the Aussies stick around till then!

We then headed out to meet Sareata, our lovely host who has been quite an angel, helping us out with settling in and sorting out all issues we’ll face here about our travel and accomodation - its been brilliant! thank you so much :)

The evening practice session was at ‘The Joint’ which is a studio that is used by bands like Noah and the Whale and Coldplay for practice! and when we reached there, we learnt that we have been upgraded to use one of their bigger and newer studios - the Red Plus!

A LONG practice session and some Mc Donalds burgers (Thanks Sammy and Rajeev for that!!) and it was time to drag our tired selves to the flat and get some sleep! But its all good coz in a couple of hours - its us on the Gaymers Stage at the Lovebox festival!

Check out some of the pictures we’ve put up! - http://www.facebook.com/album.php?aid=281666&id=522175007&l=fecccf746e

After all the confusion regarding our tour, we are finally off and have sorted most of it out, but then what fun is a tour without a little uncertainty ;)

We boarded the Sri Lankan airlines flight last night and had a long stopover at Colombo and are currently in the Colombo airport ready to board the next flight to the UK. In between, losing boarding passes and breaking escalators, we’re certainly making our presence felt ;)

But here we go hoping for the best and knowing that we will play our hearts out and like the lovely Anuva Seth said, hopefully break a few hearts on our way back (with only our music that is!)

Wish us luck and if you are in London next week or know someone that is, please tell them to come watch us - the list of gigs we play is here - http://raghudixit.com/uk

Yes! we are finally on our way to London to play at Lovebox Festival on this Sunday - July 19, 2009 at 2 pm -

but sadly without our guitar-god, Vijay Joseph. His Visa was rejected for reasons only the British High Commission knows. Despite having every document in place, Vijay has been unlucky twice in a row (he was rejected last year too for the SAMA festival at New Castle).

Just when I decided that the rest of the band should not travel to London, Vishal Dadlani called in to convince me not to cancel our tour and that we should try out Varun Krishnan (ex-Zero) as the replacement guitarist who now is based in London! And when Vishal says something, it’s worth listening to!

So that’s the story – Varun will learn up all our songs in the next two days and have a long practice with the band on Saturday as soon as we land and be our replacement guitarist for all our shows including the big gig at Lovebox festival J. I spoke to Varun a few hours back and he sounded pretty confident that he will be able to cover up for Vijay (even mentioned how he learnt 20 songs in two days before a Zero gig when Warren was unavailable) But Varun, I bet u have never worn a lungi and played a gig, but then, that’s the challenge you see J!!

We have few more gigs lined up – for details visit www.raghudixit.com/uk

So here we go … We will be in London, waiting for a miracle on Sunday!