A new festival series aims to give a leg-up to rock music, a genre that is prone to being neglected at venues
White Vinyl belts it out on stage during a live gig
Our prayers have been answered. We had lamented on these pages earlier this month about how live bands — and rock music in general — have been getting an expected raw deal from organisers even after venues finally opened their doors for gigs after the lockdown. Electronic music is the cash crop they have been harvesting to overcome the drought that the pandemic has caused to their business. But a new gig series, Rock Raid Fest, aims to alter that equation. It hopes to give the genre a shot in the arm in the manner of, well, vaccination for COVID-19.
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Nikhil Bhosale aka Dean
The members of city-based hard rock act Nightrain, who have started an events firm called Temple of Rock, are the ones organising it. Co-founder Nikhil Bhosale aka Dean tells us, “I grew up in an era in the 1990s and early 2000s when we had huge rock festivals including Independence Rock, Great Indian Rock and Mood Indigo, the annual fest at IIT-Bombay. Those were the days. But things started fading around 2010. Bands started dispersing. We thought that someone needs to do something about it. We need to unite bands on one platform and give them their due, since rock bands often get mistreated.”
Dean adds that the reasons behind rock’s declining fortunes include new genres such as EDM and hip-hop stealing the audience’s attention. “People don’t listen to rock bands patiently enough, and there is hardly any independent music left on television either. Yet, these bands have survived. And we hope that they coming together on one stage will give a lot of exposure to the rock scene. The people who attend the event will go back home and talk about it with their friends, and if we keep hosting such concerts, people will understand the magic of listening to a live band instead of a DJ pressing buttons,” he says.
Luke Kenny
With that in mind, the Temple of Rock team has brought five bands on board for volume one of Rock Raid Fest this weekend. They are White Vinyl, One Night Stand, Luke Kenny and the Bollyrockers, Claver and the F Band, and Nightrain. Dean tells us that they didn’t go by anyone else’s reference while choosing these acts. “Instead, we studied the bands and their lifestyles. What is their attitude like? Do they fit into the aura of Rock Raid Fest? The idea we had is to choose bands that are good enough to inspire smaller bands that are just starting out, to reach the same stage.”
He adds that the pandemic has tied his hands in terms of inviting outstation acts, which is why all five names for the upcoming gig at a Lower Parel venue are Mumbai-based. But they plan to host further editions of the event at Goa, Delhi, and in the Northeast this year, in order to reignite the flame of rock music across the country. “Later, we will have bands from different cities playing at one place, so that the crowd can hear acts from other places,” Dean says. But for now, the gig in Mumbai with local acts is the first step on their journey towards being the flag-bearers of a neglected genre. And we, for one, couldn’t be happier about it.
On: March 7, 5 pm
At: AntiSocial, Mathuradas Mill Compound, Lower Parel
Log on to: instamojo.com
Cost: '749
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