EULOGY OF THE WORLD’S FIRST INDIAN ROCKSTAR

Come November 22, fifteen years has gone by since the world’s first Indian rockstar or rather world’s first Indian-Parsi rockstar to be precise, passed away. Want to take a guess? Oh come on I am sure there is not even a single soul out there who has not sung or atleast heard “We will rock you!”. Yes it is the front man of the band Queen, Freddie Mercury.

Born to Parsi-Zoroastrian parents who were originally Indians, Fredrick Bulsaro did his schooling in St Peters near Mumbai even if his parent moved to Zanzibar and later England. Little did this boy Fredrick seated in front of his piano learning so that he could play for his first band The Hectic, know that he was to become a legend an exceptional, excellent and eccentric rockstar. As Brian May the guitarist of queen puts it, “Freddie was eccentric but its alright geniuses are allowed to be eccentric.”

With his trademark tights and protruding teeth he took over the rock n’ roll world of the eighties. The energy and the adoration that he had for his fans was so immense that it fueled him through his good and bad times. He openly confessed his sexual preference, “I am as gay as a daffodil, darling.” It did not seem to change the way his fans worshipped him. He was unfortunately diagnosed with AIDS and he died of bronchial pneumonia. A sea of people cried an ocean of tears and bid adieu to him convinced that it was death of so much talent and the death of the quality and love of music that he took along.

It has been over a decade since Queen fell apart still the music lives and reverberates through any rock n’ rollers blood. Freddie Mercury is the face on the Millenium stamp of the Royal Mail and his statue in Montreux celebrates the performer he was. The vocalist of Guns n’ Roses, Axl Rose claims that it was Freddie mercury’s lyrics that opened his mind and thought him the realities of life. Kurt Cobain in his alleged suicide note has written that he felt “guilty beyond words” for lacking Freddie Mercury’s enthusiasm for music and performing for the screaming crowd.

This outlandish vocalist was truly one of a kind when it came to writing music or emoting it into a piano verse and the tone of his voice. The operatic songs like “Bohemian Rhapsody” and “We are the Champions” are still popular. Catchy songs like “crazy little thing called love” and “under pressure” are evergreen. Like any responsible musician he sang songs about the changes, about war, about peace but above all about humanity and the compassion. The apprehension of the radio lovers with the advent of televisions in “Radio ga ga”, the song that set higher standards of freedom of expression “I want to break free” and songs like “one” that showed the compassion he had. In the end after being diagnosed positive to the deadly virus he sang, “Who wants to live for ever” and “show must go on” listening to these would leave anyone weeping. May be it was because he sang only for what he felt or what he really believed in that made him immortal. For human emotions are such that they never change with the time, deep down inside we are all the same and still can relate to each other and similarly to his music.

“Show must go on…Show must go on..Oh inside my heart is breaking, my make up may be flaking but my smile still stays on. I will face it with a grin I am never giving in on with the show.”

Creative exhaustion??

Just the other day Me a friend of mine were discussing about "writers block" and she was telling me how her creative mind seemed to have stopped working. When i told her to stop getting so over worked and pressurising herself to write like before just as how i went through the same phase when i could no longer write poetry. Presuming that giving her the example of Kurt Cobain who wrote that his decision of giving up on his life was brought about by depression caused due to alleged creative exhaustion would stop her from being negative, I told her but in vain. I was instead startled when she immediately stated that it was a good reason to kill oneself. She refused to see life otherwise, life without creativity, without which life was a void was her strong opinion.

Since then I have been doing serious thinking about it because till now I've really never thought of having creative mind was a criteria for survival.What makes it so vital for our existence? Agreed that in this "competitive world" (I'm personally tired of that world...sorry word) its important to always have fresh ideas and concepts to put forth and grow in our materialistic pursuits.

From the time I've started attending my Journalism and Literature Lectures I feel my creativity pressurised.I do appreciate that I've stopped being forced to see human beings as masses of flesh and bones which are made of small particles cells which in turn are made of smaller particles and it goes on and on and on.Although psychology isn't as bad as other scientific subjects, it makes me feel like a piece of brain that stores and manages our lives and our choices, along with some chemicals called hormones which control our emotions just by their chemical reactions. So science is orderly placement of logical facts and arts is the disorder of natural human mind that no one can escape from. So if all of us start thinking or rather shall i use the word calculating like scientists then its all "order" then why do we need these "artists" who bring in disorder with creativity. And on top pf it dump them when they are creatively exhausted.

Yes the simple truth is we all need creativity.We all crave for change and wait for variety in life and in the world we wake up to and interact with till we sleep. We are all creative but only our world suppresses it from the childhood calling it "silly" or "irrelevant". Of course life is worth more twisting facts and coining new perspectives!! Or are we just scared that we are incapable.

Creativity is something larger than life and it is definitely not exhaustible.We don't "have to" be creative we are all different on our own and that my friends is individualism which in turn i believe is nothing but creativity. It is a rare coincidence to find two individuals with same perception and interpretation of anything that itself proves how we are all unique. A person can be rightly defined as nothing but mere collection of thoughts, experiences, emotions, ideas, views and opinions. And the interaction of all of the above is what makes us individualistic and takes it to the next level-creativity. Creativity is as simple as being ourselves. And the grandeur of creativity shines when we vent out our true expressions piercing the suppression of individualism by the world around us. It only becomes gaudy when faked, when we are forced to think creatively.

So the whole point is why are people getting so worked up about being creative, about thinking out-of-the-box when all we need to do us just be ourselves and express our true minds.In this immense, immeasurable bowl called mind the more you take out the more it produces and suppression just kills its quality of reiteriation. There is no such thing as creative exhaustion and so lets stop giving it as an excuse and lets start working on chaos that comes through human mind!

Music review-Iron maiden:A matter of life and death

First things first Maiden is made of something much greater than what we hear on this album. Adrian Smith taking a break from a band for awhile and Bruce Dickinson dedicating himself to his two solo albums are a few aspects that could have taken a toll on the music of this album.

Nevertheless they still have the nack of writing music with the right proportions of what is needed. For die hard maiden fans this album may seem worth buying. It has got the Anthems like "Different world" and "These colors don't run" , the lyrics are serious and of course speaks volumes more than just those words and some of the riffs will definitely leave you head banging. Whatever you do just don't listen to the album with too much of expectations because they will spoil the first hearing and make you belive that it wasn't good enough for "Iron maiden". But the consequent hearing will definitely leave you nodding and smiling thinking how wrong you were earlier about them loosing the previous charm. The music is pretty dense and so it takes time for the melodies and the lyrics to sink in.

In the First hearing the album sounds strinkingly similar to the album "Dance of Death". There is the same aura of mystery and seriousness with the same tones of plucking and strumming of the lead in the beginning of the tracks. And the epic like song "Reincarnation of Benjamin Breeg" starts of just as "Dance of Death" with the lyric "Let me tell you ..". On and on the songs sound like anthology of all other Maiden tracks only put together with different lyrics. Bruce's heavenly tones sometimes seems to sink down to earthy blandness which makes the music sound gaudy.

Compared to albums like "Number of the beast", "Brave new world", "Seventh son", "Dance of Death" and so on which were excellent this one is an "above average". I'd still say its definitely lacks "Iron Maiden' s raw musical magic".

Everyday we open our sleepy eyes with a steaming cup of bed coffee on one hand and a colorful newspaper that speaks of "India shining" and "Refresh Bangalore". We go through it with a contempt for crime, cynical left of eyebrows for the politics and a nod for the sports section. Then we move on to the even more colorful supplements where the world is portrayed in the way that we have all the time in the universe to plan what we would we wearing for the party on the Saturday night.

Then we are out on the roads with the traffic heating our brains up at the start of the day. Thousands of vehicles the rash driving cabs, the youngsters with the bassy music, the two wheelers cutting into all the lanes like it was a skill to show off, the always-in-a-hurry auto rickshaws who have least respect for any form of life and then the buses over crowded still with so many people on their personal transports!!!

Oh all the rat race and all the frustrations, right? But have we ever got the time or patience to shift the gaze off the traffic signal and look for a few seconds at the footpath(if there is any). There so many families still tossing and turning in their uneasy beds of poverty. Well everyone will just say "What can we do about it?" or just casually state "Yah its the government to blame". Ok agreed that its the government is inefficient, corrupt and......So many more adjectives right. But wait aren't we also responsible atleast a tad bit to the way the government is, to the way poverty still haunts our nation and most of all to the ignorance we proudly wear on our faces. What is this that has made us so irresponsible and cold to the realities. Have we become so used to these scenes that we dont want to react any more? Isnt that a pity?

When will we learn that patriotism isnt about the fight for the land it is about the people. Love for this great democratic country India does mean to strive for the welfare of the people by the people and for the people. We debate about reservations about human rights all the time but where is it being implimented? All the debates end within the wall of the big big concrete walls when we are out noone cares. We need to do something about this..writing articles doesnt help...publishing pictures doesnt help...then im asking What helps???Is there a way out???

Well lets not forget and lets appreciate the few organisations like World Vision and so on which are genuinely providing some support. They also provide a perfect establishment for us civilians to make our due contributions to the needy. But wait still we aren't ready to. Why are we so reluctant in doing some charity when we know its gonna reach the destination and it is going to make a huge difference in a few people's life. This is for real people, this is the reality lets get out of our imaginery world where the world is becoming more and more "developed" everything is "progressing". Lets open our eyes to the neighbourhood and for once wake up in the morning and tell to ourselves "I have the power to make a difference" and lets do something...anything...a small deed of goodness...tell the world that India isnt poor any more when we are rich with compassion.

"Without each others help there aint no hope for us"-Ozzy