New Act in Town
A band named "New Delhi"
(reproduced with modification from The IDEA #1)


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Here's a studio-based band of young guys breaking right in at the cutting edge of tech-empowered music in Delhi today. With quite a few commercial assignments already under their collective belt, they're continuously also working on independent new tracks to eventually emerge as a band on the public stage (computers et. al), with a unique sound and identity of their own. In the course of our ground-work on developing this first gazette of The IDEA, we've found that the young lads of "New Delhi" are representative of a staggering wave of fantastic new music that's just waiting in the wings to rock us into the new millenium ~ with album-release negotiations already afoot in this case. Here's what they've got to say for themselves:

In this era of digitally sequenced, programmed and recorded music, we are trying to improvise melodies influenced by contemporary Indian folk, Indian classical, and also western influences, such as blues, jazz and rock. Melodies influenced by acoustic compositions have been improvised with digitally sequenced and programmed music. We hope you will enjoy the three short examples we have included here.

The Music:

(Click title below to hear track. note: the last song below should already be playing in the background with this page if your browser is correctly configured. Remember to "Stop" it before another track will play)

The Band:

Although hailing from different cultures, from different influences of traditional and contemporary music, music in itself has brought us together:

  • Pankaj ~ ideas, lyrics, vocals, guitars & programming
  • Papon ~ vocals, ideas, lyrics, keyboards, programming & percussion
  • Amit ~ many of the ideas and lyrics

We all play acoustic guitar!!

Music & Ideas:

Some of our ideas stem from the strumming of a guitar, from emotions and sounds of everyday life,.. but with improvisations of digital music. Digital recording is taking over analog recording mainly because of its immense advantages in editing and user-friendliness. All kinds of music can be recorded digitally, although some people say the "warmth" of analog recording may be missing.

With the advent of electronic music, which has its influences starting from the sounds to the processing of the music, a new genre of music, broadly termed "Underground Music" has evolved in the West ~ experimenting with sounds and abstract ideas.

Our own music, which is Indian in flavour, has all kinds of influences, and is a little different from contemporary Indian Pop. We have tried to create music blending melodies with guitars, tabla and improvisations with electronic music, the influence of which has entirely changed contemporary music.

In our case, we were constantly trying to experiment with new kinds of music, with the blending of different instruments and sounds. Musical sounds have changed over the centuries and the new century will bring in new genres of music influenced by new and still-unheard electronic sounds. As sound itself has evolved into new and distinct, but different, sounds, it will definitely play a part in modern music and music of the future.

As many music lovers say that they cannot relate to electronic music and electronic sounds per se, we feel and create music with a blend of acoustic instruments and electronic sounds, because we feel the presence of electronic sounds in our daily life ~ like the tone of a telephone, or the beep of a modem connecting to the Net. And music, having no boundaries, can take many forms of expression.

Technology & Equipment:

We use a captive music set-up to compose our music, including regular commercial work for ad-jingles, TV commercials and the like. The basic studio profile is as follows:

  • Cakewalk Pro Audio Version 8 ~ one of the finest MIDI recording & sequencing softwares, upgraded recently to include Audio
  • Rebirth ~ a remix software
  • Sonic Foundry ~ a recording, editing and high-quality effects-processing software tool
  • PC ~ basically similar to your average desktop till one looks inside,.. to find a high-end "T-440BX" motherboard, the "Laila" digital interface (SoundCard) from Event Electronics, and Seagate's super-fast "Medallist Pro" SCSI hard-disk.
  • External peripherals include a multi-track analog mixer for signal-routing, and the classic "Roland XP-80" keyboard cum sequencer for MIDI-input.

So, sit back, enjoy music with us, and send in your comments to:

Papon
63-F, Pocket-IV
Mayur Vihar Phase - I
New Delhi - 271 2575, India
E-mail: big_music@hotmail.com ~or~ Papon

,.. goodwill from "Friends of Music" &