TAAQing

TAAQ at Hard Rock Cafe Delhi, with extra vox! 26/11/09

That TAAQ (still an unsigned band) was not from Bollywood-besotted Mumbai or Hindi-mein-gao-yaar Delhi or still-smoking-the-Sixties Kolkata was really what went against them when they started. Or the fact that their music was a leap year ahead of the public imagination — I mean, how many Benadryl-swillers orgasming in the moshpit had actually heard of (let alone heard) Steely Dan and Pat Metheny, or even imagined that they could influence an Indian band’s sound? The few critics of this counterculture — jealous jilted lovers of it mostly — judged the music by a myopic yardstick: the done-to-death genres of metal and dinosaur rock.

TAAQ feat. Amit Heri, Amyt Dutta, Tony Das and others – Blue Frog, Mumbai, 9 PM, Nov 11. Wednesday, 11/11/09 – 9 PM: Thermal And A Quarter joins guitar players Amit Heri, Amyt Dutta, Tony Das and others at Blue Frog, Mumbai on the occasion of Eleven Guitar Day. In the afternoon, Guitar Doctor Bruce Lee Mani will test-drive the new Digidesign Eleven Rack. Free workshop on guitar technique and technology from 3 PM – 5 PM at Blue Frog, Mumbai.

That Day This Morning, the quiz series on all things TAAQ that runs in our periodicity-challenged newsletter ThermalAndAQuarterly, has scored one for itself.

Last month we asked: Who performs Indian classical vocals on the title track of Jupiter Café?
The answer: Rajesh Mehar.

That question drew the maximum number of responses, a number of them all-correct ones. As a listener-supported, user-generated content-driven band, we felt that we were reserving the dirty pleasure of asking the tough questions. So, in a sweeping gesture of democracy, we decreed that this month on, past winners shall ask the questions.

Snehal Pinto asks: In Brigade Street (Thermal And A Quarter, Jupiter Café, 2002), where and what does ‘Six floors up, one street down’ refer to?

Never has a Hard Rock Cafe gig sounded so delicious (loud, yes, but good) and not in a long time has TAAQ played its four-chambered heart out like it did on Thursday night at Bangalore. And I say this as a very disgruntled photographer who found the lighting, the cross-beams and the fat railings thwarting the remotest photographic possibility. The one thing that made my night was the way these guys played, and the way the gig sounded.

Guitar Doctor Bruce Lee Mani reviews the Digidesign Eleven Rack.

“At a street price of $899 in the US, the Eleven Rack isn’t cheap, but it does offer some outstanding amp models, and a dedication to high-quality guitar tone that isn’t seen on many of the inexpensive modelers out there, for obvious reasons. Clearly, the high levels of detail on the amp, cab, mic and FX models will be heard best only by more experienced ears, but that’s more a result of just how quickly technology has been able to digitally re-create all the myriad variables that go into making a great guitar sound.”

For Anil, and a few others who asked, here are the lyrics to an old TAAQ song – Drunk . All you happy pirates, this is a song from the album Jupiter Cafe.
I’m drunk
Sated, filled up, right up to here
And oh, all right, it feels so good…
Some more
Lap it up, I have no fear
Do you [...]

Pictures from Kingfisher Rocktoberfest, New Delhi, November 1