Lounge Piranha, the Bangalore-based rock band, was in town recently to perform at the Live 101 concert at Unwind Center. NXg caught up with its band member Abhijeet Tambe for a quick tete-a-tete…
This was your second gig in Chennai in the last two months. Is there a strategy behind this?
We used to wait for gigs to happen, but now we try to circumvent the forces that make an event happen and make ourselves available for gigs. We are all new to the business of music and so experimenting with new formats. Basically three parties need to be satisfied after a concert — the fans need to be comfortable with the price and the venue, secondly the Band needs to be compensated in whatever way possible and lastly the venue or the organisers needs to make their ends meet. The scene with clubs and pubs is that they have a lot of overheads and the gate collection is vital — that format works with us sometimes. Now we would like to work with venues like Unwind who are not so hard pressed about the money part and they have this cause of promoting music which is wonderful support for a band.
Why did you choose Chennai?
We believe that we have a fairly good critical masse, so to speak, of fans in Chennai. I've got a good feeling that the more we play, it will open up more avenues to perform in different segments of Chennai.
What was the highlight of the gig last Friday (Nov 27)?
The crowd was huge! I understand that there were more than 170 people there and it is apparently one of the biggest shows Unwind has seen since JRO! After our last song the power went off, George brought out his djembe, Kamal and I squatted on the floor with acoustics and we had another unplugged session for 20 minutes! The only lights being from mobile phones!
It is an experience we will never, never forget!! We could not see the small crowd around the stage, but we could hear their voices. They made us play ‘Hand-hole' again for which they sang all the words and even mimicked the guitar parts!
It was the most intimate experience that our fans have given us — we will not be able to forget the experience ever!! I think the people who had already left missed out on a superb experience – the feeling was electrifying.
Do you have any idea why the song ‘Hand Hole' is such a hit?
Well, since it was developed we have played that song every time we play. We love that song and emotionally we connect to it. Kamal wrote the song and he had some ideas in his head with the lyrics and for us we have our own individual interpretations to it. So every time we play it, it's great to re-visit those feelings & memories.
We don't play that song if we are upset with the organisers, as a sign of protest — kind of like your venue is not worth ‘Hand Hole'! A lot of people love that song!
