riyaz

So I’m back in Chi-town from Cali now. Man, last week was such a great trip. Every day I got up at like 8:30-9a. Practiced for a few hours. Then at like 12:30p I’d head over to Khansahib’s house, and he’d have bhelpuri ready for a snack for us. So we’d sit and chill for a little bit, then sit down for a lesson for an hour or two, then I’d be off to do whatever I wanted for the rest of the day. Most of the time, that was going back and practicing so my lesson the next day wasn’t going to be a total waste. But I did make some time to get out. Early in the week I made it out to a park and the ocean to practice a bit out there. The ocean was GORGEOUS out there. The weather was GORGEOUS out there, landscape that you drive through was GORGEOUS out there. Can you tell I’m jealous? :P I was talking to Khansahib about that one day after our lesson, about how I thought the weather was so nice out there. and he was saying that sometimes ‘it's too much. You know, you’ll have like a whole month when you don’t even have a cloud in the sky, it can get to be just too much.’ I was like ‘Khansahib, last year in Chicago, it snowed in May. That really doesn’t sound that bad!!’ Lol. Wednesday and Thursday he had concerts with his group Ghazal, so those nights I just stuck around at his place after our lesson, hung out with him and some of his other students that were going to the show, checked out the show, then went back to his house for a dinner FEAST that his friends had prepared. All in all, it was such a great trip.

The hotel I was staying in was shady as hell though. It was called the Heritage Motel on Ventura Blvd. My first night there, I was sitting in my room listening to my tapes from the lesson i had earlier that day, and at about 9p, I heard and felt this big BOOOOOOOOOM outside. The floors shook, the walls shook. It was like a small bomb went off right outside my room. Crazy. At first I tried not to give it much thought, but then i heard all this craziness going on outside. So I went out to check it out—I was on the second floor overlooking the parking lot—and some lady was running around getting fire extinguishers, screaming ‘somebody call the fire department! What’s wrong with you people!’ Apparently, the hotel has some rooms with kitchens in them. And in one particular room there was a family there who had been LIVING in the hotel for SIX YEARS, with their kids, a dog and all. Hello... So in their room, there was a big GAS EXPLOSION. We (being me and the dude staying in the room next door who also came out to figure out what the hell was going on) tried asking the fire department people what the cause was, but never really got a solid answer. The next morning, the old guy at the front desk that I made friends with said something about it being a ‘grease explosion.’ I tried to hear him out, but come on, grease doesn’t explode, it just burns. That night was an EXPLOSION. My guess is there was a gas leak, or maybe they left the stove running gas unlit or something, and someone tried to light a cigarette or something, and BOOM. But all in all, it made for a fun little first night out in Cali. I also found a used crackpipe under my bed a few nights later. Yay.

So since that first night, I never really slept that well out there, go figure. But it was moreso because I didn’t have an alarm clock, and I was paranoid as hell of oversleeping. So I’d constantly wake up startled thinking I overslept, only to look at my watch and see it was only a few hours later than it was the last time I jumped up. So that made for some pretty interesting dreams. One night I had a dream that I was chilling with some friends at this small get-together thing, and this kid I haven’t talked to since elementary school comes walking in, Akaash Rami. He looked exactly like he did in elementary school, only bigger. Like, older-bigger. He still had a mullet, still had the same looking face, and still wore those technicolor plaid shirts. Lol. He walked into the room, and just started introducing himself to people, networking-style. When he got to me, he had a look on his face like he recognized me from somewhere, but didn’t know from where, but didn’t say anything. Just introduced himself and moved on. That was that.

Another night, I had a dream that I was walking down some yuppy street in Chicago on a rainy night with my bass guitar and my acoustic guitar, in their respective cases. I’m not sure where I was going, or where I was coming from, but I was trying to get SOMEWHERE. So I stopped on a sharp corner of a six corner intersection, and I left my equipment down for a sec and walked away somewhere, and when I came back, some dude picked up my stuff and was RUNNING OFF with it. Hello. I went chasing after him, he got to his car and while he was fumbling around with his keys, I caught up with him. He dropped his keys as I approached, and just froze, cause he wasn’t really sure what to do, and wasn’t sure what I was going to do. He just asked me, in an ‘oh crap’ sorta way ‘what are you gonna do?’ I grabbed my guitar and bass from him, gave him a few words and went back to that corner that my stuff initially got stolen from. I just stood there for a second collecting myself again, and then I see my DAD crossing the opposite street. It was like 3a, in the city, and my dad was crossing the street. So of course I was thinking ‘what the hell??’ So after taking a split second to decide to leave me stuff on the corner again, I went chasing after him. He was walking into a parking lot, so while I was catching up with him, I tried to keep an eye on my stuff from the cracks in between the parked cars that gave me an obstructed view of my stuff. After I finally caught up with him, he said he was just making a quick stop while he was driving to New Jersey. For some reason, at the time, that sounded to totally reasonable, so I said ‘cool, have a good trip,’ and headed back to the corner to get my stuff and get on my merry way, and low and behold, once again my stuff was gone. This time, a saw and ENTIRE BAND RUNNING down the street with all sorts of equipment - guitars, amps, speakers. So I had to decide if I was going to assume they took it—cause why else would they be RUNNING with what I know is some HEAVY-ASS equipment—or assume they wouldn’t have cause take my stuff cause they already have way more equipment than my measly little axes. After taking a quick glance around and not seeing any other obvious directions my stuff could have gone, I went chasing after them. They lead me into some warehouse FILLED with music equipment. I felt more like it probably wasn’t them who took my stuff, cause why would they? But at this point, going back wouldn’t lead in any other good direction. It was either here, or gone for good. I obnoxiously started rummaging through their stuff trying to find mine, and lying on the floor around a corner I saw the case of my bass guitar. Then I woke up, somehow content. Crazy, huh? The dreams were so detailed, and so random.

I brought my sitar home this weekend. I played it for the first time in probably three weeks yesterday. Ahhh, did that feel great. Now I can get back into the practice-everyday-thing again which I’ve been missing lately cause of the move and everything. Feels good. All my CDs are at my place now, too. I’ve been listening to shit I haven’t listened to in over a year. It's great.

Stories of the tsunami still continue to drop my heart to my stomach. I heard this report on the world that was an eyewitness telling the story of what he saw and how it all unfolded, and how he’s been dealing with simply being a survivor who saw what he saw. Tragic, depressing shit, man. I couldn’t imagine what this guy and the countless number of people just like him must be going through. Just the sheer numbers alone baffles my every time the body count rises. I remember as a kid, I always had this fascination with tidal waves. I had this image of what it might look like to see one approaching. But even as a kid, I knew what my imagination could conjure up could only be a fraction of what it might actually be like to see a giant wall of water approaching. ‘Giant wall of water.’ Got-damn, what on this world could come close to a phenomenon like that? There’s definitely something to be said about the power that created those waves. It's a reminder of how small we really are in this world, that a four minute natural event could wash away so many lives.

I’ve been checking out a lot of music lately. Friday night I ended up checking out Amp Fiddler at the Hot House, and man, what a great show. I’ve never really been into like, seeing r&b or soul or whatever you would call it live, but man, shit was HOT. The music was great, the crowd was cool, good vibes. Amp was singing and playin keys—on these two sweet sounding Nords—he had two backup singers, a drummer, a bassist, and another keyboardist. It was tight. I even bought a CD. And seriously, that’s saying a lot for me. Usually if I buy a CD at a show, it's because I’m already into the artist before I check them out, and I have every intention of buying a CD before I even walk into the place. But for me to check out a random show of some dude I’ve never heard of before, AND buy a CD that same night? That’s a very telling of how much I was diggin the chunes. Saturday I checked out Archer Prewitt at Shubas. He was really good, he was playing guitar and doing some really cool, intricate guitar work and singing, and he had a bassist, a drummer, and a keyboardist that pulled out a trumpet every now and then. I was having a hard time thinking about how I would describe him, and my buddy described him as ‘Indy rock.’ I’ve never really been into ‘Indy rock,’ so if you know what that means, please let me know. Last night, we saw Ming + FS at the Empty Bottle. That was a good show too, they were spinnin, then pickin up a guitar and bass and jammin out old rock songs over hip hop beats. That was sweeeeeeet. So yea, lots of musaaac.

Do I only talk about music that i like, as opposed to raggin on shit that sucks? I think so. I was talking to some buddies about this Saturday, cause before we went to see Archer Prewitt, we went to the Fireside for that Asians in Rock thing, and this band Please Please Wait was playing there. And man, my one buddy best described them when he said they should have named themselves ‘Please Please STOP.’ They were HORRIBLE. It was a dude singing and playing guitar, and another dude on keys, and they were playing over some beats. The beats weren’t all too exciting, the singer wasn’t anything to writing home about, and the music overall was just so... blah. It was bland and boring, the same old beats on every Kiss FM song, he must have been playing presets on his keyboard. And dude, the keyboardists didn’t even need to be there. He wasn’t doing anything. They already had enough of they sound prerecorded on the tracks they were playing over, they could have thrown the keyboardist on the track and the guitarst totally could’ve done it solo. They probably consciously left certain keyboard parts out of the track so the keyboardist had something to do on stage, and that’s even lamer. Your work will get recognized whether you’re on stage or not. That’s the beauty of technology and music. I wasn’t sure why I was still standing there watching them. So I stopped. But the issue came up with me when I was talking to my buddies about ragging on other bands. Cause when I see a band live, I’m not too keen on announcing the fact that they suck to the rest of the audience. Cause at least they’re out there doing their thing, and SOMEONE’s gotta like them. So more power to them. If I think it sucks, I’ll just shut my mouth and move on. But there’s nothing wrong with thinking a band sucks, and letting everyone you know they suck. That’s part of the game, no harm, no foul. So yea, DO NOT GO SEE Please Please Wait. They suck.

I miss the walk to the Hanuman mandir in the mornings.
I miss being overcharged for a lymca at the ymca.
I miss the poorly constructed cement tile sidewalks.
I miss watching schools of monkeys trot along the fences.
I miss shop merchants greeting me with ‘hello friend’ as they push leather wallets and belts at me.
I miss Rumpi’s ghetto hat.
I miss the kid at the marg who always just wanted to hug me.
I miss the puri, potato shak, and tea for breakfast at the y.
I miss our cab driver.
I miss seeing shrines on dashboards.
I miss Chandu.
I miss walking across the hall and knocking on Lindsay’s and Daphne’s door to hang out.
I miss the floor guy at the y saluting me with ‘good morning, sir’ as I walked out of my room in the morning.
I miss the hot water heater that took 30 minutes to warm up for a hot shower.
I miss the Sony music store at Khan Market.
I miss referencing my Lonely Planet guide.
I miss crammin on the bus.
I miss bargaining with riksha drivers.
I miss wanting to reach out of the rikshas to touch the car next to me, cause i was that close.
I miss the kuttas at the marg.
I miss 3 dollar 40 ounces.
I miss the alley the Rikhi Ram store was in.
I miss being paranoid about getting lice.
I miss the lane markings on the roads that no one ever followed.
I miss the dude on the sidewalk outside the y cooking dried indian snacks.
I miss lunches with Dev and Veena.
I miss trucks that said ‘please use dipper at night.’

I miss India, dudes. I gotta go back.

So this weekend was good, and bad. I went to a show at the Hot House on Friday night. It was this Brazilian woman Cibelle that this kid in my breakdancing class was opening up for. It was a TIIIIGHT show. She had two microphones she was singing into all night, one normal mic, and one with crazy delay on. And she’d go back and forth, back and forth between the two, she was doing some really cool stuff with that. And her whole presence was cool, the whole stage was like a really big toy for her. She was really into what she was doing, and that was cool to see. Then they had a bassist, and really good guitarist, a laptop/keyboard dude, and a white drummer with a fro. She did a cover of Nancy Sinatra’s tune Bang Bang recently made famous from the Kill Bill movies, and she did a cover of Nirvana’s About a Girl with just her and an acoustic guitar doin some really cool fingerpicking type stuff. It was TIIIIIIGHT.

Friday night I went a ‘going away party’ of sorts for my friend Rupal who’s going to India for a year to set up an art and design school out there. Which is cool as hell, all of her friends are really proud and supportive of her, myself included. But I’m a selfish bastard when matters of my friends go, and I’d rather see her stick around than leave for a year. I know, I’m a bastard. But I like my friends, and I’d rather keep them around, what can I say. She’s gonna have a great trip, and she’s going for a really cool cause, so I GUESS I can suck it up...

Of course, I’ve been practicing my sitar a lot. The tips of my first finger and middle finger of my left hand are so callused I can’t feel anything any more. That’s AWESOME. Lol. When I’m tapping beats out on my desk now, my right hand can serve as the kick drum, and my left hand can serve as the hihats and snare drum quite effectively. After I heard Bang Bang on friday night, I’ve been obsessed with the song, I figured out how to play it on my sitar and decorate it with some cool sounding meends. If I can get the intonation right on the bends, it sounds SWEET. I also figured out how to play it my buddy’s guitar at work (yes, I have a buddy at work who keeps an acoustic in his office). I’m obsessed. Other than that, just been practicing the same few songs, and trying to get tighter with my meends. I’m getting there.

Anyway, back to the stress of work, and the added stress of trying to figure out when I can move into my place. Worthless...

So I’m chillin at the Office of the Journal of Law and Medicine at Michigan State University. Oh man, am I hardcore? Hardly... I’m just taggin along with my buddy Dhru while he gets some work done... We drove up here last night, with my sitar in my lap the way in, cause he was moving a bunch of stuff up here in the back seat. That was an uncomfortable ride. But it's all good, my friends. Cause tonight i’m heading up to Troy, MI to check out a classical sarod concert, then hopefully finding somewhere to crash out there so I can hook up with my guruji tomorrow morning for a sitar lesson. It's on.

I’ve been the lab hardcore with my sitar lately, I’ve been practicing the hell out of this latest composition he gave me. It's a slower composition in the same raag I’ve been working on, yaman kalyan. But there are a ton of meends (bending the string to hit another note) hardcore that I’m still getting my hands and my ears used to doing. That’s been one of the hardest parts with learning the sitar as compared to what I already know on guitar and bass. On guitar, for any note you’ll need to hit, there’s a fret wedged in the fretboard that never moves. Just slam your finger behind the fret, and as long as the strings are in tune, you’ve hit the right note. So whereas on guitar, the only things you really need to tune are your string, on sitar there are three places you need to tune:

* tune the strings
* tune the movable frets to make sure they’re in the right position
* tune the bending of the string while you’re playing (meend) to make sure you hit the right note.

That third one is the one that’s gonna take me some time to get totally right. On guitar, you can bend a string a half step up, MAYBE a whole step. On sitar, for each fret you play, you need to know where to hit a half step, whole step, 1 1/2 step... all the way up to three whole steps in some cases. CRAZY, my hands and my ears have never had to do that in all the years I’ve been making music. Ever. That alone’s gonna take some time and work in the lab. But dude, as I start getting it, it sounds sooooo sweeeeeeet. Just over the past month I can see myself getting closer to hitting the spot on a bend before I even pluck the string. That’s sweeeeeeet.

Anyway, otherwise just chillin. I might hook up with a friend of Dhru’s, Jazz, that I made when I was helping D out with the stage setup for the bhangra competition he took a team up to in January. I’m gonna try to hook up with that kid Ajit, too. Every time I come up to Michigan to get a sitar lesson, we’ve been trying to hook up but he’s always out of town the weekend I end up coming up. He’s helping organize the concert tonight, so he’s defenitely in town! Hopefully we’ll have a chance to catch up, too. And of course chillin with Dhru’s always good. He’s always motivating in that he reminds me what my ultimate goals are with all the music stuff I’m doing. Its easy to just stay in the mode of workin on shit, and losing track of the ultimate goals sometimes. A good reminder/kick in the ass is always a good thing.

Word.

So I’ve started to get back into the swing of things with my sitar practicing. I never got a chance to hook up with Rahul, we’re still trying to coordinate schedules and whatnot. But I started struggling through the notation guruji gave me and I started sort of remembering how the song went. So I’ve been practicing the hell out of the first few lines. My fingers are starting to callus up again. But I’m still getting used to playing more than an hour at a time, but that’s all mental, I can get my body to do anything as long as I don’t let myself get tired of it. I also made a few beats on my sampler to play along with. I want to start making a series of beats that I can eventualy turn into songs, too. That would be ‘tizzzzzzzight.’

I had my graduation ceremony for school sunday. After 8 loooooong years of working full-time and going to school part-time, I finally finished back in December, and had my ceremony Sunday morning. I didn’t even want to go, cause I’ve already given DePaul enough of my time and money, I didn’t need to waste a Sunday morning where i could have been sleeping in for a 8a ceremony to give them one last chance to convince me my money was worth it. (Am i bitter? A little…) But I went cause I’m the first kid to graduate in my family, and my moms pulled that card on me. It was fine. I went out to eat with my parent that evening and had a beer with my dad, that was better than the ceremony.

Get up, and get your grandma out of here. (c) Kiss