Farhan Akhtar at Hyatt Regency on Sunday. Picture: Pabitra Das

He had a bad throat when t2 met him in his suite at Hyatt Regency on Sunday afternoon. “It’s hurting a bit, but it should be fine by the evening,” smiled Farhan Akhtar, dressed cool and casual in grey cargos and grey tee. Three hours later, the man brought the house down at the Farhan Live Rock On Concert, jiving and jamming the way only he can. A t2 chat with the man who can do almost anything!

You’ve come to Calcutta to promote your films, receive awards and talk about your social cause MARD (Men Against Rape and Discrimination). This is your first time here as a live performer. Are you nervous or excited or a bit of both?

It’s definitely exciting coming here as a live performer. Just to come and share the music we have made in our films over the last 10 or 12 years with the fans here is very, very exciting. The common feeling everywhere when people come for a concert is that they want to have a good time. The audience everywhere likes to be included in the performance. I like taking my energy from my audience and throwing it out to them wherever I perform. I like audiences that are loud and noisy and come in wanting to have a good time.

There’s been a lot of interest around the concert ever since it was announced…

Oh really? Oh my god, I better start gargling! (Laughs out loud)

In your interview to t2 a few days back, you had said that you didn’t really have a playlist to share. Are you always so spontaneous on stage?

I like improvising a lot during my songs. There’s a certain set, of course, that we have to prepare or otherwise the band wouldn’t know what to play after what (smiles). But we really try and keep the length of the songs flexible. There are times when you want the song to carry on for a bit longer… or you want to include the crowd. If the mood builds up such that the crowd wants a particular song, we move away from the sequence on the playlist and do it first.

Do you suffer from stage fright?

Every single time! I equate it to jumping out of a plane. I have done 100-plus jumps by now, but every time I go to the door, there’s always that one little element of ‘what if?’ at the back of my head. But once you jump off, it’s just incredible. Even during my concerts, I get that same feeling when I walk up the stairs to the stage. I take a deep breath, but it’s always good after that (smiles).

Do you have a ritual before you go up on stage like many rockers do?

No, not really. Should I? Maybe it will help if I have my own little totem pole (laughs out loud). Now that you ask me this, I remember Keith Richards (of The Rolling Stones) was asked, ‘What do you do before a concert?’ And his answer was: ‘I wake up!’ (Laughs)

Do you remember the first time you took to the microphone in public?

Oh, vividly! I remember it was in a mall in Mumbai where we had gone to launch the music of Rock On!!. Shankar (Mahadevan) called me to sing the title track and I told him: ‘Impossible! I can’t do it.’ I felt my legs had turned to jelly. At that time, being on stage was such a scare for me, but now I am relatively okay (smiles). But, I have read up certain polls where people have rated public speaking as worse than death! They would rather risk dying than go up and speak or sing publicly (laughs).

Going back five years, how did you react when Shankar-Ehsaan-Loy told you that they wanted you to lend your voice to almost all the songs in Rock On!!?

Weirdly enough, it was I who told them and it was up to them to react! (Laughs) There’s a mutual trust between us… we’ve worked together in almost all the films I have done. When I recorded for Rock On!!, I knew that Shankar would tell me where I was going wrong. He’s not the kind to bullshit me just to make me happy. What was good about the Rock On!! album was that most of the songs were recorded ‘live’ like, with the band playing along while I recorded the songs.

So, why haven’t you sung in your subsequent films?

It really depends on the kind of film, actually. I felt really comfortable singing for Rock On!! Even in Zindagi…, it made perfect sense for me to sing that bit in Senorita. But in a film like Milkha, the culture of the singing was so different from what I normally sing, that it didn’t feel right to me to be singing my songs in that film. It felt just right to be lip-syncing to Sukhwinder Singh (in Slow motion angreza) or to Divya Kumar in the other song (Maston ka jhund). But I’ll gladly do it again when I feel the song is right for me.

Where have you enjoyed performing the most?

To be honest, I have enjoyed the audience in all the places I have played in. They all connect with the music, they sing along because they know all the songs, whether it is Rock On!! or Zindagi Na Milegi Dobara or Bhaag Milkha Bhaag.

How do you plan to take MARD forward through your music?

The only thing is to keep visiting college campuses and making young people aware of the initiative. In the social space, we are doing a lot. Mahesh Babu has just recited the MARD poem in Telugu. We are now rolling out the poem in different languages. It’s a commitment that I have taken up for the rest of my life. There has to be an organic growth of MARD through our music… I don’t want it to be sensationalist. I want people who come on board to believe in the philosophy, rather than just be shocked into saying ‘yes’.

Any plans to cut an album sometime?

Currently, there are no such plans. It will happen sometime, hopefully. An album requires a lot of time and planning and right now, I am just concentrating on films.

How do your daughters Shakya and Akira react to their dad the rocker?

They are always very excited! I think, they like the music of Rock On!! the most because they connect with my voice in the songs. They also like the music of Karthik Calling Karthik like Uff teri ada and Hey ya. Shakya, the older one, likes the Dil Chahta Hai album because she was very young when she first heard it. They also like listening to the songs of Zindagi Na Milegi Dobara because it’s ‘happy’ music for them… the kind they can sing along to.

And do you serenade your wife Adhuna?

Well, I have serenaded her in the past (smiles). Now, every time she sees me picking up the guitar, she leaves the room! (Laughs) But once in a while, we do have our sessions at home where I play the guitar and sing. Mostly it’s just the two of us or we could have a few friends over. But she knows which songs of mine are for her (smiles).

Priyanka Roy
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