Greetings from bollywood

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“The song actually came about around four or five weeks ago, during the Egypt protests. Of course, in India we don’t have a dictator to fight, but we have apathy to fight, we have stupidity to fight and we have dishonesty to fight. And I’d like to believe that there’s a lot of us who would like to see and make that change. That’s what Tomorrow’s Decided is about,” says Pentagram vocalist Vishal Dadlani about his favourite track off the band’s fourth album Bloodywood, that is all set to be launched today.
The name of the album comes from what the band perceives as the thriving, vibrant, sharp, intelligent and necessary sub-culture in India today — the alternative to the gigantic mainstream. “This particular sub-culture has been growing rapidly and independently and is representing India overseas in a never-seen-before way. The concept of Bloodywood extends through music, art, culture and all fields of expression that have something to say and aren’t purely commercial,” says the frontman.
Set to hit stores a whole four years after the release of It’s OK, It’s All Good, one wonders why there’s such a long gap between albums. “We’ve always wanted to actually do one album per year. But the thing is that the last album was very popular, whether in terms of how many people heard the album, the number of shows we’ve played off the back of that record or the fact that for the song Voice, I’ve never had to sing the chorus. The crowd sings it. So we’ve just spent all this time playing that album and now, we’re ready to move to the next one,” he explains.
The band’s latest offering, according to Vishal has been “the most effortless album” Pentagram has ever put together. “Normally what happens is that we put forth one idea, someone else says, ‘This isn’t working’, so we go back to the drawing board and start over. This time, we just went with the flow like we used to in the early years. It was a lot more instinctive and there was literally no discussion, only expression. If you felt it, that was it. I also feel its a big step forward sonically from the last album.”
The story behind Tomorrow’s Decided is that it’s based on a street rhythm that is quintessentially Mumbai. Drummer Shiraz Bhattacharya used to play that rhythm for fun during soundchecks and one day, guitarist Randolph Correia threw a guitar riff on top of it. Taking a cue, bassist Papal Mane played a bassline over it and that was it.
Randolph, who in addition to his guitar work, also produced the album, chips in, “There was a magical flow throughout the process of writing this album where we weren’t trying to do something specific or contriving to make it something specific. Originally, we thought we’d write around 20 or 25 songs and end up choosing 14, but as it turned out, we only wrote 14 and they all ended up on Bloodywood.” Additionally, as a musician and producer, Randolph also took a new approach to the music on the album.
Eschewing fancy soundproof recording rooms and intricate equipment, the entire process was simplified this time around. “This was a very rock’n’roll production, in the sense that we broke a lot of conventions and went against the ‘done’ thing on many instances. We recorded in my room without any sound proofing or auto-tuners. I recorded most of my guitar parts directly into my soundcard, without any amps or special microphones or anything of the sort,” he says and adds with just a hint of vitriol, “We kept everything simple and didn’t want to use the sort of fancy equipment that people like to use, just so they can talk about the fact that they used it.”
But what about the actual album? From having seen some of the tracks live and listened to a few cuts of some of the song, the album seems to be a lot more upbeat and fun when compared to the previous albums. But one glance at the song lyrics serves to put paid to that idea. “Fun, upbeat songs that make people want to jump around has always been the Pentagram way,” says Vishal and adds, “But lyrically, this album is a lot more introspective, thought out and real.” Brave words. Care to substantiate?
“Mental Zero for example, is a fun song. You can jump around to it. But it is specifically about the dumbing down of society — from the news to the politicians and how we continue to be tolerant of it. We’re too dumb or lazy to do anything about it,” offers Vishal and adds with his tongue buried deep in his cheek, “There was this news story I saw about these aliens who visit a particular part of Himachal Pradesh to light a bonfire and dance around it. That is why they come to Earth apparently.” Silence.
Back to the album and while there were a few other names being thrown around before Vishal, Randolph, Shiraz and Papal settled on “Bloodywood”, none of them were memorable enough for Vishal to remember. But one name that most certainly wasn’t in the mix was “Political Dance Party”. “That was just a flippant throwaway. It was never a real name. It was a joke blown out of proportion,” the vocalist sighs.
But the true beauty of Pentagram has always been in its live shows. Having showcased chunks (six songs to be precise, including Mental Zero, In My Head and Lovedrug Climbdown) of the new album at live performances over the last year, the response appears to have been positive. So far at least, Lovedrug Climbdown according to Vishal, has been receiving the best response. “In Guwahati, hundreds of kids came to the hotel we were staying at and sat in the lobby singing the chorus. In Delhi, it was the first time we ever played that song there and people were singing the chorus loudly by the third refrain,” he smiles.
The Jim Beam
Bloodywood launch tour starts off today at Mumbai’s HardRock Café.