October 2006 - Thermal and a Quarter (TAAQ)Monthly Archive

  • The Spirit of the Roadie-O – Part 2

    Uncategorized | | Permalink | Comments Off

    We continue with the list of our heroes who make the band look so great…

    • Leo James David aka Leo

    True to his name, he is our leonine, fierce bearded Head of Security. One look at his super muscular body would discourage even the thought of making trouble. Leo makes us all feel totally pathetic when roadieing – as 5 of us struggle to lift a power amp, Leo coolly hoists an entire top on his back and walks away. Lifting 36 kg bags for 8 hours a day makes a Leo out of ordinary men. For all his musculature, Leo is a surprisingly nimble dancer. You should catch him do the “caterpillar” to How Can I get your Groove. He is also a learned philosopher and inspired the song “The Steal”

    • Tanmay aka Tank

    Tank is obviously big and not necessarily muscular. Tank’s crawling CPU speeds inspired Bala and Arun to coin the “plugpoint” concept. When Tank doesn’t get the joke even after a few years, you electrocute yourself in frustration at the nearest socket and scream – Plugpoint. Other Tank-inspired variations include “Transformer” and “Substation”

    • Vaibhav aka Vav

    Vaibhav is a short, suave and portly gentleman who has served honorably on the Thermal rolls. He is always mentioned in the context of the inseparable Tank-Vav duo. Vaibhav (sometimes Bow-Bow) is known for making really funny jokes in totally unexpected situations. Bark on brother.

    • Sanket aka “Speedy” Gonzalez

    Sanket is a super sweet super mental kid who earned the sobriquet “Speedy” because of his super quick guitar soloing. It is another matter that we could never hear most of the notes. For most part Speedy is timid, amiable and thoroughly likeable. But let him see any Thermal DNA under threat, and he becomes a snarling killer rat. You can meet him in cyber space sporting the smart sounding tag “Jonathan”, because “Bruce, who will want to speak to anyone named Sanket, Bruce”. Brother Speedy, hope you’ve hit that elusive million notes per second.

    • BMC aka Butterfly

    BMC is the roadie that no band, especially TAAQ, can do without. She is a diminutive super woman – she is designer, CD seller, marketing head, accountant, ticket collector, water bringer, powder putter and much more. Taking a break from all these activities, in her spare time she manages to dispense advice, hugs and sanity to the Thermal family. No wonder Midas couldn’t hold a candle to the Butterfly. Madam, we are proud to know you.

    • Auntech

    In the shadowy world of the Thermal roadie network sometimes appears a mysterious figure simply known as Auntech. Auntech is usually mistaken for an innocent adoring fan at the end of the gig, but make no mistake, Auntech is the super roadie. There are no words in any language to describe this individual, but let it suffice to say – the drummer can’t do without A. Along with Butterfly and the rest, Auntech’s persona is woven into the very spirit of the entity called Thermal And A Quarter.

    • Elsa aka It’s a boy… it’s a girl… it’s a…Thing?

    Elsa made it to the roadie ranks in the following manner. One evening, Rajeev and friend drop off another friend at the airport. The usual airport wait becomes another opportunity to operate under the influence. Rajeev vaguely remembers goodbyes and the drive back to Barton Centre, our then HQ, along with a third silent companion. Next morning we arrive for practice, and lo, there she is, Elsa – a passenger trolley from the airport. Since then Elsa has been the only uncomplaining roadie in the band, carrying all the heavy stuff with ease. Towards the end of her career she developed a limp and so she took VRS. Elsa is now retired and has a place of high honor (on the first floor) in our jam room.

    • Suchin aka Slick Thief

    Suchin is the shiny, latest, off-the-shelf acolyte in the roadie network. To describe him as a roadie, he is cool, calm, collected, level headed and never panics in any situation (and boy do we have situations). He has no minus points to his credit and nobody ever found his service wanting. Which can all mean only one thing. Only One Thing. He HASN’T BEEN AROUND LONG ENOUGH !!!

    • Umesh aka Obi-wan-Pataani

    The chronicler of this tale and many more to come. If you look at Thermal And A Quarter in the multicolor, larger-than-life big picture, you’ll see him as a pixel or two.

    There are many more unknown heroes in the rolls of the roadie network. This post salutes them for their unselfish, unnoticed deeds.

    You are invited to share more Thermal tales with this writer at St John’s on the tenth birthday of Thermal And A Quarter.

  • Razz-le Dazzle

    Drum Patient | | Permalink | Comments Off

    Mumbai was hot and sticky. Got in over two hours late – Spice Jet blamed the weather.

    The Juhu Hotel is this slightly run-down looking place, and it’s the home of the Razzberry Rhino, one of Mumbai’s Meccas for live music. The funny thing: the Razz, as it’s called, is this typical pub/lounge thing, inside the hotel, and just outside it is the outdoor restaurant/lawns where they have weddings and the occasional party sharty; it isn’t unusual that occasional Zhari-enveloped aunties and suited-booted uncles sort of wander in to have a look at the tamasha. Surrounded by black tees, goa-tees, and other variants of the hard-rocking variety, they squeak out rather quickly, muttering under their breaths about misspent youth, or ‘too much noise’.

    Rithvik, our event manager for the day, effusive and friendly, bought some beers and we chilled on the ‘lawns’ while the hotel staff set up for the evening’s wedding do. The aforesaid staff are also clearly distant cousins of a certain slow-moving south American primate, as it took us nearly 40 minutes to get a chicken sandwich. We also ended up eating a fish starter for dessert.

    Sound check was a bit of a joke. The ‘sound engineer’, an underage knob-twiddling maroon, had neither knowledge nor experience, and, I suspect, couldn’t hear very well either. He was the stand-in anyway, the real dude being all washed up in traffic (there was some Bihari puja going on and the streets were clogged; even Bangalore seemed momentarily better for an instant, not including *&#% Gowdagiri).

    Medusa, a sort of electronica-rock band on the lines of Prodigy, opened for us. Nice act, some very tight playing by the drummer. The vocalist had attitude but didn’t sing very well. They deserved to get a little more from the crowd. Given Tony’s new fixation, there was no way the guitarist could be playing anything other than a Tele… hee hee.

    Rudy’s cronies, old TAAQ-friends Tall Ravi (the wonderful guy who brought down my PODxt) and Chotu found their way to the gig, and they brought a sound-engineer pal along. Huzzah. We opened with Look At Me, and within the first couple of songs, he managed to get a lot of things working. Thanks man.

    Good crowd, saw a lot of folks singing along. Always great to see! Played almost two hours. Jupiter Cafe was a nice jam, Intermission featured a small train wreck, Chameleon rocked happily along with Galacktiqua and Hoedown finished up before the Motorbyckle encore. They wanted more, but some sound guy had already pulled the plugs.

    Good gig, overall. Hope we do more in Mumbai.

  • The Spirit of the Roadie-O – Part 1

    pictures | | Permalink | Comments Off

    Every fan can tell you about the personnel who make up a great band – we all know our gods who make the great music, but I’ll be the first to profile the Crew of this band, nay this (mental) institution called Thermal And A Quarter. I don’t recall everyone who was in therapy with us, but I’ll profile the most familiar faces (!)

    We start with…

    • Guru aka What ra

    Guru is the pillar that the Thermal Roadie network stands on. It would impossible to write more about anything in the band without first defining it around Guru. There is a theory that Guru is actually 3 or 4 people, at least there is that much energy in the guy. This energy is expended in his usual activities and roles – dueler, duel maker, verbal slanger, dosa maker, inebriated-fan belter, photographer, press reporter, event organizer, roadie, light man, sound man, camera man, handy man and every other kind of role you could possibly imagine. Our man never rests, and when he does, he is famous for his “2 minute breathers”. On the rare occasions that you catch him asleep, you’ll find him in sweet repose on his thumb or nose (really). He is the only guy in the universe who doesn’t make “garrulous sagacity” an oxymoron.

    • KD aka …

    KD’s biological name would expand to Korangu Dass, but for the first time it is revealed in these chronicles that he actually has a human name – Vinay. Taratara! KD is the other pillar of the roadie network since he was actually the first guy to be offered the job, never mind that he didn’t turn up and that honor went to this writer instead. KD has his heart in the right place, but almost everything else is misplaced in his huge freezer-like frame. His tales alone would fill a book, but suffice it to say KD ensured nobody ever got bored. The mind goes back to a moment when KD climbed this long metal ladder with great acrobatic finesse and skill – only to discover that he couldn’t get down. So he had to be coaxed down ala a scaredy cat on a very tall tree. KD now heads an apparel store very successfully with his business maxim being – Buy or I pound you to pulp.

    • Bala and Arun

    Bala and Arun for the band have always been spoken in the same breath. Bala is the ultimate footloose and fancy guy – he is in a party all the time. For a time he was the talented pretend keyboard player (he pretended very well) for the band Road Crew (more on this entity later). Now he is a temporary Britizen of the Empire and raising a toast to the Queen’s health at some party somewhere

    Arun is the super brainy, super intelligent but-by-no-means-geek dude. Rumour has it that he has 2 IITians for breakfast and 3 MBAs for lime juice. Arun is now traveling all over the world and making millions for HP.

    • Rajesh aka Phat Muttony

    Phat Muttony is the super talented musician who got the ultimate roadie promotion – he made it to the band. His musicianship aside, the band believes that Muttons is actually what Newton was looking for – the perfect inertial frame. His frame had so much inertia, Archimedes would say – give me a crane, and I can try to move him. Muttons is also known for his incredible capacity to decimate food. The staff of Empire and Impy’s are in awe of him when he digs in. He is the reason why there is a drastic drop in the sheep population of Australia and Shivajinagar. Long live Muttons, and sorry we can’t say the same for the sheep.

    • Rakesh aka Oosht Battery

    Rakesh’s suspect mental processes led Bala and Arun to suppose that his “Battery” had gone “Oosht”. Battery or Batts was the band’s very own recycle bin when it came to food. There were never any leftovers. Batts has an even bigger appetite than his aforementioned brother Muttons, and for him all food is potential battery acid. The Muttony bros have the capacity to wreak havoc and cause serious ecological disasters when they decide to cut loose. Batts has expressed a desire to win the Pulitzer and is on his way there, dishing out very nice fare for a respectable South Indian newspaper. The band, with their affection for the rags, fondly remember him as “Paper Pulitzer”

    Up next – The Spirit of the Roadie-o – part 2

  • At Heber Hall – MCC

    jakarta java jazz 09 | | Permalink | Comments Off

    We get up at the usual unearthly hour of 3 and a quarter am, and shove ourselves into a tempo traveler. As soon as we cross the Hosur checkpost, the sun burns us right on cue – Welcome to Tamil Nadu border, Thermal And A Quarter. 12.30ish sees us at Chennai locked in this traffic jam. Somehow we bump along to MCC and Bishop Heber hall. Our liaisons, (forget their names, good guys) arrive and we see one metal band finishing up the competition. Turns out they finish the competition as well as they place first, with Bruce doing a chief guest and giving away the prizes. And Tony and I see a lot of women walking away with prizes for best singing and best acoustic guitar. We are very impressed.

    Meanwhile we have to go to our hotel to unpack, have lunch and come back on for sound check. We are taken to hotel Lion International, a newly opened joint apparently. Turns out when we step in that it is certainly not a Lion’s den, but a hole – rat hole or hell hole, take your pick. As we arrive several guys are just finishing up plastering the rooms and applying coats of paint, that’s how new it is. I think they just opened as we were stepping in.

    Lunch over and we go back to the venue. Mr. Prithvi, the sound man has arrived. There is very little time to sound check, because the show needs to be over by 6.30 pm, as the girls have to go back to their hostels by then (awww… please don’t go). The stage is really cramped to fit in the entire band. But TAAQ thrives on the simply adjust maadi edict and we simply adjust maadi. Sound check quickly over and band meeting in the green room, where we pray to all the right gods and a few wrong ones. Some Red Bull to energize and we’re ON.

    As the band takes the stage a lot of guys gawk at Nate and sax in tow. Nate says sax players are a dime a dozen in Americana, but here you got to throw a stone pretty far to hit a sax player. The show begins with a lot of the familiar – Brigade Street an all, with crowd singing every song. As I am the mixer, I hear this guy keep raving about “how good they are! Look at these guys” and I am very happy. Somewhere along the way Wonderwall and Nate pop up and this guy’s going nuts. I hear ya bro, I am going nuts too. Nate is sizzling on all his songs – Wonderwall, Paper Puli, Holy Jose et al. Then comes one of my favs among all the favs – the super gritty tale of the urban chameleon. The sound is cooking but also growing louder by the minute. A dazed, ecstatic hour and a half later, we meet Galacktiqua – where Rajeev is out of this world. It’s great to see everybody grooooving. 6.30 is here, and cries of Encore ring out. And the best is yet to be. The band does like the ultimate rendition of Hoedown and everybody goes bonkers. The girls leave (awww…please don’t go) but no one is ready to put their hoe down. After like a million autographs by the gang, we head off to the Lion’s bar to celebrate and contemplate. A great gig by any standards, never mind these grumbling musicians…

  • From the saxophonist's cornucopia

    Uncategorized | | Permalink | Comments Off

    In our ten years, we’ve jammed with a whole variety of instruments – Carnatic percussion, Hindustani slide guitar, Coromandel vocals, et cetera. But in the recent past, we’ve been initiated into a new sax-uality.

    In TAAQ’s book, 23-year-old Nate Linkon from the Windy City is nothing short of a prodigy. He is our latest thrilling discovery (though knowing him, he’ll argue the converse is true). But what does an American four years out of his teens but who’s played his brass for 13 years feel about jamming with, of all things, that incongruous entity known (only recently, and begrudgingly) as The Indian Rock Band?

    Here’s the spaghetti in Nate’s words:

    Greetings, TAAQers!

    Allow me to introduce myself. My name is Nate, I’m 23 and hail from the United States. I’ve been living in Bangalore for the last 16 months or so, marketing for an IT company by day, rocking out on my sax with TAAQ by night. After playing in a rock/funk band in Chicago for several years, I had no idea what to expect from the music scene in India. To be honest, I brought my axe along not really sure if I’d play with anyone but my iPod for the 2 years I’d be here. Clearly, I was mistaken.

  • Shambho Jam – circa 2002

    Gear review | | Permalink | Comments Off

    It was just after Bruce’s wedding. We went back to ol’ 606, Barton Centre, and having seasoned ourselves suitably, settled into a jam.

    JJ, TAAQ’s spiritual ‘wind beneath the wings’ of the Jupiter Cafe era (you must have seen him credited on the CD literature) was there with a friend. There was Umesh on tambourine and Guru knocking away at Ram’s two mridangams. With Rajeev leading on hi-hats and snare, and Rzhude on bass, what followed was Shambho Jam.

    Reelin’ in the years all right. Watch this…

  • Eye Eye Tea

    Drum Patient | | Permalink | Comments Off

    Some mad last-minute air-ticket convolutions notwithstanding, TAAQ made it to IIT Delhi on the night of Friday, the 22nd of September, 2006. The piped voice on the Jet flight gargled that the ‘temperature outside was 35 degrees’, but the gargler was wrong – a sudden shower had decided to cool Dilli down for us.

    Gluttons for punishment, Tony and I had signed on to judge the rock competition, slated to stretch through the night. Strangely enough, Nate (our new sax player – yes, our new sax player!) enthusiastically decided to join us. We piled into our special Tata Indica (after finding the dude with the sign that said “Mr. Thermal And Quarter from Chennai”), captained by a Mr. Manish. The rest of the band folk would follow in two other gaadis. Now, this particular Indica was clearly one of those ‘less car per car’ versions, the company somehow having forgotten to include minor details like First Gear, seat belts and so on. Some laborious chugging, many irate honks, and a couple of wrong turns later, we tootle into the IIT campus, where we were contacted, taken to our room in the guest house for a quick howza, and promptly whisked off to the auditorium for the big judging. Many hours later, rapidly approaching catatonia, we shambled out after proclaiming our verdict. What happened inside is another story…

    While some parts of the TAAQ family buzzed off to Agra to take in the usual tourist bits, Tony, Chandy, and I chose some shut-eye. Everyone came together again for the most amazing dinner ever, at this place called Karim’s. The best sheek I have ever eaten. Ever.

    Soundcheck, some of the usual issues. Drum kit not quite happening, but we soldier on. Tony, Rzu and me are wireless! New AKG system, didn’t mess with the sound as much as I remember the old Shure UHF doing. Nifty little gadget – no beltpack, just a little blob with a tiny aerial, attached to the jack.
    And after the competition finals, judged by Chandy and Nate (quite the cutlet, isn’t he?) we get on and start with Look At Me. Goes down well, Nate takes a smoking solo, and we’re off… Shine On You.. was good as well. Galacktiqua, Bend, Paper – quite the punchy set list. Words and Pictures was the one moody song, but that got quite a good response too. Our mangled version of Wonderwall had Nate taking another super little solo. Wrapped up with Motorbyckle this time, no Hoedown. Good gig. The sections of the audience that wanted the heavier stuff left, but everyone that stayed seemed to be having a blast.

    First gig with our new sound. And I think it’s working. It’s like a sound I’ve always heard in my head..

Back to top
Loading

Your current browser does not support this website. Please upgrade to a more modern browser.

Suggested options are chrome iconGoogle Chrome or firefox iconMozilla Firefox

You can also upgrade to the lastest version of Internet Explorer