For six years, Manoj Nair’s life has revolved around his writing and his music. With a view of the sea stretching beyond the wall of his rented house, in Saudi, Fort Kochi, Manoj has been working on Between the Rock and a Hard Place (to be published by Harper Collins in March 2020), a book on the history of alternative music in India that he says has been with him for a long time. He takes time off to cook for himself and to play his sax every night.
Manoj, who hails from Thrissur and is very interested in visual arts, worked as a journalist covering music and art. Having been associated with the Kochi Muziris Biennnale since its inception, he moved to Kochi in 2010.
Between the Rock and the Hard Place is divided into six sections and deals with music of the North East, EDM, women in music, why bands do not survive in India, and the politics of Indian English music. “My publishers want to change the title to India Rocks, but my whole premise is that India does not rock,” he says.
Manoj explains how the music scene developed in different parts of the country. In Delhi, the first notes of alternative music began in the late 1960s at The Cellar, a disco in Connaught Place. Delhi was a stopover for the flower power generation who travelled in their sturdy motor vans from Europe through Afghanistan, Pakistan and to the hills of North India.
These travellers brought records and students, who discovered the music, began to form independent bands. Many such bands began playing in hotels and The Beatles’ visit to Rishikesh also gave this some momentum.
In Mumbai, however, the scene was different, says Manoj, and was “was founded by visiting bands from Europe, but it was mainly jazz.” In the northeast, where Manoj lived for eight months, “the music was influenced by Scandinavian bands and their heavy metal.” Also there was the problem of drugs and an anti-establishment feeling. Besides, with “the region being predominantly Catholic, the church reacted by founding their own metal bands playing gospel music.”
Despite the development of a vibrant music scene, there was no original song writing and so the songs being sung did not resonate with the people, he says. “They sang about Vietnam, but did not protest against the Emergency,” adds Manoj, pointing out how out of sync the music scene was. The other reason that bands did not last, he infers, was that most band members were from the upper classes. “The bands were formed by English-speaking, Western-educated Indians who could identify with those themes and lyrics. Ironically, in the West, the bands are founded by the working class.”
He claims that it was only in the 90s, with Avial, a band from Kerala that original song writing came to be. “They wrote in Malayalam . It was Progressive Rock. Though in 70s a Bengali band Moinur Gholaguli began a wave called Aadhunik music and encouraged writing in Bengali but it did not last.’
Going back to his book, Manoj says he finished it thanks to the discipline he learnt from the fisherfolk amid whom he resides. “They leave every day before daybreak. Tennessee Williams says, discipline is important for a creative person. I wrote 1000 words a day, every day.” And every night he played the sax.
