Rock and roll in India isn't dead, it hasn't even been born

Metric, a band from Toronto, sings with characteristic postmodern angst, that Rock n’ Roll is dead because everything has been done already. Just as the Canadian band inveighs against moribund music, Inder Sidhu, also rails against stagnated Indian rock and it’s over glorification by the media in a Tehelka article. But with the rock scene in India there is a slight difference -- it is not that everything has been done but rather nothing has. The Indian rock scene has not exhausted itself creatively; it has not even taken its first steps. 

“The disproportionate attention heaped on Indian rock is premature and a disservice to a sub-culture still trying to find its feet -- adding to the uncomfortable sense of faddishness," he writes. 

Gutless journos and self-conscious musicians

Samar Grewal, former assistant editor of our domestic Rolling Stone magazine corroborates Sidhu’s views about the shoddy media coverage of shoddy music.

“Music journalism lacks balls in our country. You only have 10 bands that are popular when you launch a mag -- and if you were really honest about them, you’d be trashing eight of them. There’d be nothing left to talk about. You have to work in euphemisms.”

We spoke to Rohan Mehta, an employee at Mirakle Couriers and an avid lover of alternative music who also expresses disappointment with the indie music scene in India.

“Indian rock music sticks to the normal form -- something that people did back in the 80s and 90s. There is very little genre crossing and blending of the lines between rock and other kinds of music. Creating chaos that works. Where are the guys sitting in basements using old equipment to make new music instruments? Music here is too self-conscious. Maybe it’s just that people here want to be rock stars more than real musicians, fixed on the American ideal of the 1970s.

"The venues for live music are also a bit half-hearted, being part restaurant or part club. I want a place that I can go to any day of the week to see either big names or really local guys just being passionate and playing music; unafraid to try to stray out of the mainstream; unafraid of not being loved.”

Pampered rock stars

At the root of these assessments is the question -- what is Indian rock anyway? Historically the roots of rock can be traced back to rhythm and blues, soul and gospel in America born from the voices of the marginalized. 

“Rock -- crime, sex, intoxication and all -- was built from the politics of the outsider fed up with the status quo and packaged in an insecure, but sexually aggressive, machismo. This strain still runs strong through Western rock…The rock idiom in India, by contrast, lacks any such character. In a complete reversal of the genre’s origins, our homegrown rock is almost exclusively upper middle-class territory -- and its practitioners don’t seem to have much on their minds. Often bankrolled by indulgent parents, and decked out in the requisite accoutrements and peripherals -- a tattoo or two helps -- these young rebels wage quiet war on creativity and imagination. The absurdity of these creatures of comfort and means, strapping on guitars and declaring themselves a ‘rock band’ would be laughable if it wasn’t so terrifying. The politics of the outsider and the marginalized, meanwhile, have become the politics of the leisure class and badminton togs.”

Inder Sidhu gives credit to bands like Indigo Children who have found new and creative sounds but the greater picture remains bleak and often real talent goes unsigned without the support of a record label.

Revenge of the bands

Bangalore-based band Thermal and A Quarter counters Sidhu’s assessment of the Indian rock scene with a tirade of questions like “What is uniquely 'Indian' about the Indian rock scene?”

They ask why journalists don’t do “some legwork to find out what’s really happening in India’s underground music scene? For instance, how do Indian bands approach songwriting, where do they learn to play their instruments, where do they rehearse? How do they finance gear, studio time and production efforts? What level of initiative does it take for a band to bag concert dates at Hard Rock Cafe or Blue Frog, or plan a five-city tour? Or to cut an album and market it independently?”

So we have heard from the critic and we have from the band, but buried under the contention and the ambiguities are music lovers like Rohan who are just waiting optimistically for a revolution.