Sleepy September mornings aren’t ideal for rocking out hard, some might say. Yet, the 36 bands that gathered at Planet M, Elgin Road on September 5-6 for the prelims of Virgin Mobile Scholastic Beats 3, in association with t2, must have felt differently. Five bands out of the 36 made it to the finals at Kala Mandir on September 18 — Krishti, Noyze Akademi, Krematory, Safire and Sinful Oath. While Noyze Akademi, Safire and Krishti were chosen by the judges as finalists, five more fought it out over two more days for a place in the finals. In Human, Flipp, Krematory, Black Rose and Sinful Oath performed on September 9 and 10 to win SMS votes. With judges from some well-known city bands sitting in to give the greenhorns a patient listen in the finals, rock was the flavour of the day. t2 takes a look… |  |
| The judges for the finals of Virgin Mobile Scholastic Beats 3 included members of Hip Pocket, Lakkhichhara and Insomnia | |
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| Safire walked away with most of the prizes in the individual categories, including Best Bassist, Best Drummer, Best Guitarist and also the prize for the Best Original Composition for its song Train Of My Life. It shared the runners-up prize with Noyze Akademi.With its slightly retro-flavoured, clean alt-rock sound, Safire packed everything from a ballad to a hard rock track into its all-original set | |
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| New-age alternative metal band Noyze Akademi rocked with a cover of Rub It In by Pin Drop Violence and original compositions Red Alert and This Misery. Just five months old, this was the band’s fourth stage performance | Sinful Oath got the crowd wild with original compositions Headache and Deathwish. A black metal band, the heavy sounds of this bunch of youngsters raked up the maximum number of audience votes (a whopping 51% of all SMS votes) |
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| Krematory, the band from St Xavier’s College, rocked out the finals of Scholastic Beats 3 with its metal act. Frontman Pemaa Wangchuk Bhutiya was impressive with his energy. The band,which got the audience headbanging to its set — a combination of an original song and two covers, including the Megadeth classic Sweating Bullets— emerged as clear winners,walking away with the top honours and a cash prize of Rs 10,000 | With performances from bands with eclectic names like Dead Souls Fragrance, Kafka Dreams (who quoted Paulo Coelho and Edgar Allan Poe as an introduction to their original compositions), the crowd at the Planet M prelims was left clapping and crying for more |
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| The crowd rocked just as hard as the participants. This group of PYTs (picture left) cheered loud and clear for Black Rose,who dedicated a song to ‘someone special’ in the audience. The boys were as excited (picture right) — don’t miss all that headbanging! | |
Thursday, 08 May 2025
