Picture by Rashbehari Das

My first attempt to get into their music a few years back was a failure. I couldn’t relate to the ‘poetry’ or the mainstream rock masquerading as alternative rock. Marko’s (Saaresto) deep voice was great except that he lost me when he turned his vibrato on.

But that’s just me. So when I heard they were playing five minutes from my house I read up a bit on them and heard their hits. I realised quickly that they would put up a killer gig, whether I dig their music or not. And that, I’m always up for.

The morning of the show I get a call from the tech support guy, Rohon Ghosh, saying that their lead guitarist wants to borrow my Taylor acoustic guitar. Being a helpful Calcutta boy, I was at the venue promptly with my main baby.

The tickets were sold out and a couple of friends who wanted to go would have to miss it. The guitar techs and the sound engineers were hard at work to make the dinosaur, Nazrul Mancha, sing. The worst acoustics for rock music, ever.

At 6pm, when I landed up for the gig I met a bunch of disgruntled musicians saying their opening acts were cancelled. “The POTF management wanted 2,000 Euros from each of us for them to share stage with them,” said the drummer of one of these bands.

After waiting for an hour and listening to the non-stop banter of the MC who was trying to keep the crowd engaged, the POTF van arrived. The roar of the crowd made it clear that they would have waited for a day.

The MC made the crowd sing a few lines of Carnival of Rust to welcome them on to stage. Enthused by our crowd, they came on like a bolt of lightning and went on to play their hits Diamonds for Tears and the title track for their new album Temple of Thought. Everyone had worked-out bodies in the band and was dressed in black. Marko the singer looked like he must have been an athlete in college. I realised that this is what Glam Rock has become in today’s context. The band knew how to transfer energy from stage to the crowd just like the crowd knew how to transfer the energy back.

On the fourth song, Olli picked up my Taylor guitar and slid into Cradled in Love and the crowd sang along word for word. Our Calcutta crowd has been starved of international acts, but as an audience they’ve always been ready. I saw at least 200 phone cameras filming and wondered what the point of it was. There was also the syndrome of young boys and girls with serious cameras with very long lenses. “Mine is bigger than yours”. Marko saved the situation for a bit when he asked the crowd to light up their cell phones and wave them in the air on the sixth song, War, and at least the cameras had to be switched off for a bit. The lighters have been stripped of their rock glory moment. Also, it was a no-smoking venue.

After playing their Max Payne 2 hit Late Goodbye, they staged a mock end to the concert. Ten songs had been played. The crowd took three minutes to co-ordinate the encore shout and promptly the band was back to perform the acoustic set with high bar stools in place. The acoustic set was very informal and the vibe of the music changed completely and it was good to see them improvising. The audience loved it. The band was having a great time too and Marko even said, “My skin prickles and my hair stands on end” (the body hair he had shaved off I couldn’t help noticing)! A few sexual innuendos were dropped. “Let the band do what they do best with their clothes on” (maybe they were experts at getting a sauna).

The acoustic set bled into the section where the rest of the band could emerge a bit from under the gigantic shadow of Marko — guitar solos and drum solos, etc. Suddenly it was back to business with their hit Dreaming Wide Awake. They ended the show with the two most-wanted songs, Carnival of Rust and Lift.

Everyone was happy. Despite the horrible acoustics (the sound providers did their best), Nazrul Mancha is only kind to the Dover Lane Music Conference, sonically speaking. Calcutta had pulled it off, and with style.

As I walked back I kept thinking that tonight the winners for me were the crowd. They sang along to at least 10 of the songs played by a band from Finland, nobody got killed or hurt, no fights broke out, none of the girls threw their undergarments on stage (much to the disappointment of the Poets) and everyone had a smile on their face. We have a killer audience here.

IS ANYBODY LISTENING???

[Neel is singer, songwriter and composer of Neel & The Light Bulbs and Gandu Circus]

Do you agree with Neel that Calcutta has a killer audience for rock acts? Tellt2@abp.in