Rat King’s Larva

If you are looking for music that will make you pump your fist and head bang, Rat King is not your thing.
If music is a lot more than just ear-candy to you , read on.

Chennai’s Rat King is a dark-ambient, Avant-Garde project by Deepak Raghu and Murari Vasudev that pleases and disturbs at the same time. Rat King is supported by Chennai’s indie record label Roadcrew Records

Their second album, Larva is an offering that attempts to take you on a wondrous and somewhat twisted journey and succeeds.

Larva begins its twisted tale with with tense tribal percussion against an eerie atmosphere. A couple of minutes in, it descends into a morbid cave filled with uneasy melodic passages, unsettled by short, violent blasts. The mood is consistently oppressive, yet the listener is rewarded with epic (sometimes eastern), almost symphonic sections that occasionally ease the tension. Rat King uses layer upon layer of subtle instrumentation and samples set against well-crafted rhythms and tempo as tools to narrate the story of ‘Larva’.

While, Rat King certainly had a concept (http://www.gimmesound.com/RatKing ) in mind while crafting Larva, the music is sure to stir each listener in a unique way.

A considerable improvement over their debut, the minimalistic, ‘Plague of Hamelin’, ‘Larva’, is a victory for the band and independent Indian music. It is both bold and experimental in the right amounts, with enough variety thrown in to make it a thoroughly engaging listen!

Blind Image’s More Than Human

I’ve known about the existence of Chennai-based metal band Blind Image for sometime, but it was only last week that I actually listened to them, when the guys at Rock and Raga asked me to listen to a track from their yet to be released album, More Than Human. Not being into the local metal scene, I was pleasantly surprised by what hit me as soon as I touched ‘play’.

The track ‘Deciphered‘ showcases the songwriting and skills of a mature band. If I have to go by this song, Blind Image plays a new-age form of thrash metal which fuses the groove of Pantera with the energy of a Devin Townsend project (I can’t really say why but I hear a similarity). The hard-edge shouted/grunted vocals (David) are antagonizing in a good way, and the melodic clear-voiced chorus relieves the built-up tension. The guitars(Shri and Prashant) are chunky in the right places with catchy lines to hold the interest of the listener, the bass(Muneeb) adds well to the groove factor and the machine-like drumming(Krishna) adds to the modern thrash sound.

To sum it all up, if ‘Deciphered’ is a representative of the album ‘More than Human’, I think I need to get it ASAP.

Blind Image is launching the album at High On Caffeine, Chennai on November 7th. Be there to grab your copy!

Salute to Deep Purple by The Perfect Strangers

[flagallery gid=10 name="Perfect Strangers"]

On the 25th of October, Chennai turned a deeper shade of purple, when 10 Downing Street hosted a tribute to the legends of Hard Rock (incase you didn’t already know, I’m talking about Deep Purple).

Perfect Strangers is a cool name for a band doing a Deep Purple tribute but also a misnomer as the musicians playing knew each other very well and are also very popular in the music fraternity in Chennai. Fronting Perfect Strangers was none other than veteran vocalist, Timothy Madhukar (Burn, Moksha, Seven days) who was expertly supported by Joshua Raj (No Idea, Afterburn, Moksha, Garage Monsters Inc) and Viji Cheyyur exchanging lead and rhythm guitar duties, Jimmy Satya on the keys, Mario Nambiar (No Idea, Moksha, Garage Monsters Inc) on bass and a lively Shyam on drums.

Perfect Strangers smoked the spirited audience at 10 Downing as they played out their Purple setlist (listed below) to perfection. The event organisers, Rolling Stone Magazine, had a few surprises in store for the audience when Delhi-based vocalist Aditi Singh Sharma (Crimson/Groove Adda) took over from Timothy for the show stopper and crowd favourite Highway Star. And then a little later, Luke Kenny, the host for the evening, seemed quite comfortable donning the jacket of a rockstar, when he performed vocals on Soldier of fortune and Hush.

The performance quite rightly wound up with what is arguably the biggest rock song ever, Smoke on the Water.  In the end it was a show well organised by Rolling Stones Magazine and sponsors (Z3 and EMI) who took every opportunity to hand out freebies (Deep Purple CDs and shirts) to a rock-hungry audience.

As for me, I was happy to walk out with a sore neck (from all the head banging) and my own copy of a Deep Purple poster and the latest Issue of Rolling Stone Magazine!

Setlist:

Anya
Storm Bringer
Highball Shooter
Perfects Strangers
Sometimes I feel
Lazy
Space Truckin
Burn
Knocking at your Back Door
Never Before
Wasted Sunsets
Black Night
Highway Star
Soldier of Fortune
Hush
Smoke on the Water