Derek Julien Archives - Thermal and a Quarter (TAAQ)

TAAQ brings the Shut Up and Vote tour to the capital

The capital. Power center with no power cuts. Karims. Gulatis. Great gigs. TAAQ quite infested this joint between 2006 – 2007, playing some super shows in the colleges, pubs, etc. Delhi’s always been good to us!

Bruce at the Shut Up and Vote tour, Delhi

Staying at the Tata Tea guest house, while crew (who, btw, are beginning to look more like the rockstars than us) stay at a place called (see? see?) ‘Rockland’. Manage to catch up with old pal Hebbani Raghu Rao Venkatesh (of CNN IBN Anchor fame) and his lovely wife Anu at their home in Noida. Thanks for that great dinner!

Rzhude in full flow at the Shut Up and Vote tour, Delhi

Pragati Maidan is such an amazing place; last we played here must’ve been for GIR, way back in the late 90s, at the Hamsadhwani theater. Lal Chowk is also a striking location – the pics will speak for themselves. Sachin’s sound and lights were spot on, and everything came together just right. Changed the set list a bit; threw out the medley and put in Jupiter Cafe and Sanity instead. The jams were cooking! And there was a bunch of folks in front who seemed to know all the licks and lyrics… nice!

Rajeev skins 'em at the Shut Up and Vote tour, Delhi

Post gig Colonel’s (overpriced) Kebabs and Swagath Pomfrets later, we’re ready to move on.

Must be quite a trip to do this kind of thing 200 days a year.

Tonight, be there in Mumbai. We have a huge stage, full power sound and the works in terms of lighting and multimedia. And it won’t cost you anything except the train fare.

If you miss this one, you’ll rue it. We know Nerul isn’t exactly Near-ul, but it ain’t Far Out either. Please note the correct address of the venue:

Ramrao Adik Institute of Technology (RAIT) grounds (D Y Patil Academy campus), Nerul, Navi Mumbai.

Location details and map

See you there tonight!

Happy Ugadi to all of you in Bangalore. We’re coming at ya live on Saturday evening at St Joseph’s College of Commerce Grounds. 7 pm onwards. Entry free.

The Shut Up and Vote Tour

You have already previewed ‘Shut Up and Vote’ on YouTube. Now, coming soon to your city, or a city near you, is the ‘Shut Up and Vote’ tour, part of the Jaago Re One Billion Votes campaign. This is an initiative of Janaagraha and Tata Tea.

We will play in five cities to get the youth together to stand up, shut up and… vote!

It’s interesting how some good folks in the blogosphere are already dishing out their cynicism and quasi-intellectual gibber about the campaign and its effectiveness. They yap about India and China, about the economy and their parsimony, about the Olympics and the Commonwealth Games, about Padma Shrees and Padma Laxmi. But hey, just for a minute, get off that high horse and do something, people.

And well, about our song.

Some of the comments on the music video made a big deal about language: some viewers thought the song ought to have been sung in Hindi. Heh, we’ve heard that one even before most of you started to Rock On! Our piece of advice: Try that in Chennai, my friend, and you’ll spend the rest of your years picking splinters out of your rear.

But seriously, language is a non-issue. If you have English newspapers and magazines, English TV news channels, and English theatre, if you can fill your bank application form in English, and sign your name in English, why Bollywood-ise our world?

Go to the neglected Northeast (we have) – English works there better than the officialese of Hindi. And then, we have always maintained that English – thought, written and spoken our way – is an Indian language, and that stays.

For those who haven’t heard us before, we urge you to listen to our songs a little more carefully. Potatoe Junkie, Humpty Dumpty, Cynical World, Galactiqua, Sevenish, The Steal, Chameleon… scratch the surface of these songs and you’ll get to the heart of the messages we have been spreading for the last 13 years. To that list, Shut Up and Vote is one more addition.

So, come and watch the concert. It’s the first step you can take before you use your index finger to make a difference.

And while you’re at it, we’ll practice what we preach.

Here’s the schedule:

MARCH 20: Open Air Theatre, IIT Madras, Chennai

MARCH 23: Presidency College, Kolkata

MARCH 25: Pragati Maidan, Lal Chowk, Delhi

MARCH 27: D.Y. Patil College, Mumbai

MARCH 28: St. Joseph’s College of Commerce, Bangalore

Be there!

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The Shut Up And Vote Tour Diary – 3

The Shut Up and Vote Tour