Music - "Sufi" soul - Music

I am a music freak. I was in 10^th when I first started listening to rock music and since then, I have never stopped listening to it. Although, I find many people who love rock since ages, fans of Black Sabbath, Nirvana, Metallica, etc etc, but for me, I know and love bands the time I have started listening to it. So, my favorite bands include, Papa Roach, Limp Bizkit, POD and that kind of stuff. Some 5-6 years back, International rock music was not easily available in music stores here in India. Neither they had stores likes Crossword all around the place. Times have changed and I am so thankful for the store owners who have made International rock music available for us. There were times when I used to wait for almost a week, for my music store owner to get me a cassette or CD of Limp Bizkit and Papa Roach. It all started listening to hip-hop + rock for me. Slowly and steadily I started listening to some good soft Pakistani rock music. And basically this is the reason that I am writing this post.

Pakistani artists and bands are one of my favorite and listening to them is like experiencing a high for me. Junoon and Strings are the evergreen favorites and now-a-days, there have been so many additions to this. TO mention some of them, we have Aakash, Call, Jal, Atif Aslam, Nishaan, Azal, Fuzon……

Pakistani Music includes diverse elements ranging from Folk, rock, Persian as well as Arabic. New artists are mostly influenced by American rock and combine that with the melodies and there we go, we have Sufi rock for us. Thus, we can Pakistani music as a “fusion” of multiple culture. I am not into classical and would not go into describing it, but I would definitely like to give you a touch of what classical Pakistani music is all about. Classical music has basically 7 nodes and unlike the 12-note scale in western music, the base frequency of the scale is not fixed. Similarly, the tempo also may vary. The performance if based on melodic patterns [raag]. Qawwali is also a form of music in Pakistan and is devotional music of the Christi Sufix. Qawwali is a very ancient form of music and stretches its root back to 1300 century. The major instruments in the performace will include Tabla, Dholak and Harmonium.

Pakistani music industry began to emerge in 2000 when artists and bands like Strings, Ustad Nusrat Fateh Ali Khan launched their new music albums. Duur by Strings is one of my favorite album. Although Strings had launched their first album in 1993 [Sar Kiye yeh pahar], I had no clue about this band, It was when they launched “Duur” that I came to know about their past-present-future. Since then, I have been showing lots of interest in their music.

I heavily connect to Pakistani music because of the fact that their music is melodious and I can relate myself to their music. After I graduated, I had lost touch with music and had been going through lots of ups and downs in my life. Recently, I went to this Pakistani music site and searched for the top 20 artists. And I was amazed to see that 80% of the names were new to me. So I decided to download all of them and listen to them one by one in a silent room. The first song that I downloaded to my hard-disk was “Zindagi [Unplugged]” by Aakash. On listening to it, I thanked myself that I went to that site and saw that song and downloaded it. The pure sound of guitar, violins and the superb vocals of the artist reminded me of the old time when I had first started listening to Pakistani music. In those days, I was a free bird, just out of my high-school, all set to see the world. I had good as well as bad experiences of meeting people, doing some odd things that I never had expected to do, etc. So, the mere feeling of going into the flashback for me was simply amazing. Based on that, I downloaded all the new songs from that site and started listening to all of them. I was so much influenced that I decided to get a decent mp3 player so that I can always listen to music. And I would recommend all of you [who have managed to read my blog till so far], to take my advice and listen to the following bands and Artists that I am going to mention : Jal, Nishaan, Fuzon, Azal, Aakash, Strings, Shaqfat Amanat Ali, Rahat Fateh Ali Khan, Ali Farrukh, Zameer, Mirage, Ehsaas. I am going to search for some new Pakistani Talent and as soon as I find some new ones, I will definitely post my experiences about the same.

Feeling Depressed? Have a heart-break.....

So, what does a heart break have to do with happiness..........?

Bad experiences make a person even stronger and the worst situations bring the real person out of you.

How many of you have heard this before? Most of you would probably have heard about how people turn out to be more mature and wiser when they go through bad situations. Personally, even I have experienced the same and I would never hesitate to say that it was good to have such a bad experience in my life. I have learned a lot and I always make sure that never to do any such mistake again. Regretting something that you have done, is not the way to go with it. Acceptance is what is needed. We need to accept the fact that we were wrong and we need to improve. Acceptance of such a fact, is what a real person should do. People tend to understand the facts if told in a language that is more familiar to them, so here is an example of what I want to convey:

How about the Shahid-Kareena break-up? Or how about Steve Jobs on the failure of leading Apple to become the best software industry? No doubt, we see that Shahid and Kareena are superstars now and no doubt that we consider Apple as one of the top companies in the I.T. industry. Had it not been the arrogance of Steve Jobs, some 20 years back, we would have seen Apple everywhere, instead of Microsoft. Apple was the first company to think of GUI Operating System. But Bill Gates was a visionary and not to mention a cruel businessman! For better understanding of the last few lines, I would request you to go through the autobiography of Steve Wozniak and Steve Jobs Thus, I want to say that, failures does not always mean that we have failed in everything that we did. Neither do we need to blame everything on time or situation. We need to understand the fact that we need to learn more and more things and separate the wrong from the right. Heart-breaks, though very painful can make us a more responsible and sensible person. I would not recommend you to break-up your relationship, just to experience it. But, as the statistics say, 90% people have had a heart-break in their life, no matter what! Now, considering that in my mind, I would assume that, whoever is reading this must have had a heart-break. Otherwise, you would not have read this topic.

So, go ahead...... ask yourself what you have learned and what you have missed. Be a better person by looking at your wrong side and analyze how it can be converted to good. So, are you feeling depressed? Have a heart-break buddy!!!!

Bikes for Status

So, we buy cars to for what? Status or is it a necessity. I feel, now-a-days, cars have become a necessity. Employees of various organizations now have the wealth and time to get a car. Well, I almost forgot, I was going to write about bikes. Bikes for me is an essential part of my life and also one of the most loved object in my life. A total bike freak, I would always prefer a sports-bike over cars. And recently, we are seeing lots of changes in Indian market about how bikes are branded and launched. Most bike manufacturers would like to sell their bike as one of the bikes which has "Good Looks and styling". The Bajaj PulsarMania commercial - a recent entry and definitely one of the commercials which set standards - was one of the best advertisements I have ever seen.

And now Ducati has launched itself in India. Italy-based Ducati Motor Holding, one of the world's leading producer of racing motorcycles, has ventured into the Indian market with a full range of its premium bikes priced between Rs 15 lakh and Rs 50 lakh. But with a price tag of > 15 lakhs, its only for the creamy layer of the society. So, now, we also have bikes to show off our status.

Thanks for the memories!

Last weekend, I had a small trip with my office friends to Kashid beach near Alibaug. Well, what can I say about that trip - one of the most wonderful trips I have ever had in my life. The trip was planned for Saturday and Sunday. I usually do night shifts, so after Friday's work, we decided that we would leave for the trip on Saturday morning. Even though this was an office trip, I was not that much familiar with most of the people. The only person I knew was Andrew, who was my friend before I joined the company. So, on his recommendation, I joined in. Anyways, who cares, and who give a ____. I was there to enjoy the trip.

People were excited, and so was I. We had planned to leave for Saturday morning, but suddenly, a whole lot of people were not present at the pickup spot. Well, everyone tried to get those people , but maybe they were busy with some other things.... Well, then a thought came to my mind, that they must be busy drinking some Beer and Whiskey. Andy was with me the whole time and we thought that we will go the nearest Bar and get them bout of it. But, I think, it did not go according to the plan. Well, myself and Andy joined the party and we too had some whiskey. I had this very unusual feeling that I normally do not get while drinking. I was feeling very nice and comfortable drinking with the new guys. Well, I thought this might be the beginning of a new friendship.

After out drinks [Maybe it took 2 hours for us to get drunk, haha], we approached the bus, which was waiting for us. People were furious as we had delayed the plan for almost 2 hours. That does not look good..... Anyways, we left the place thinking that on our way, everything would get alright. Songs, Beer and all that could possibly make the trip nice - gave us company. All those long hours seemed like minutes. We reached the beach and what a beauty it was.

It took us 3 and half hour to reach to the cool blue beach. The place was quite nice. Not too many people around and not too less. It was just the right quantity and quality that was needed. It was a tiring sessiona dn everyone needed some time to rest. After doing a night, shift, I should feel tired, but that was not the case this time. And that was for a reason - I had some of the cool and funkiest friends around me - Andy, Prash, Ayyo, Jiggie, James ...... Well, all are rockerz in their own way. They will talk to you, do all kind of non-sense which will make you feel "Why the hell I am here, with these guys!". But at the end, you will enjoy yourself like you have never enjoyed yourself. One such Incident happened Late that night. After having our dinner, we were ready to party and enjoy ourselves. All of us had their own preferences and me and my friends chose to have a nice peg of whisky along the beach. It was a wonderful scene. A Bonfire in the middle and all the friends sitting all across the bonfire, enjoying their drinks and talking to each other. All of us seemed like one family sitting together and enjoying themselves. These indeed were some great moments to remember my entire lifetime.