J.D. Rock Awards - Hard Rock Cafe

Rolling Stone Magazine in association with Jack Daniel’s put up three spectacular tribute concerts that commenced towards the end of 2008. The first was the Beatles Tribute in Mumbai (which I, myself raved about), the capital saw a packed audience at Elevate rocking out to The Doors, and the Pink Floyd Tribute concert was rather well-received in Kolkata. These were all part of the build-up and promotions for the Jack Daniel’s Rock Awards 2009- one of the biggest and most awaited award ceremonies (and perhaps the only) in the independent music scene. The grand finale boasted of a ’ Tribute to Guitar Gods ’ and I expected it to be nothing short of awesome. But obviously, the lack of consistency as far as event organisation in India is concerned, is nothing new. The J.D Rock Awards were well, the exact opposite of what they claimed to be or the idea we had, built up in our minds.

The headlining band, Hipnotribe were all right with their trippy/tribal/beat driven music. But I just fail to comprehend, how a band like Hipnotribe could’ve possibly agreed to play at Hardrock. It’s not got the ambience required to play such music and certainly not the audience. Well, apart from those peeps that understood music in general and received invites to the concert. Playing originals like ‘Hunter’, ‘Robot’, ‘Dark and Delicious’ amongst others, if you eliminate all of the above mentioned, I think Hipnotribe can be quite magical, given the right space. Since this was a Tribute to Guitar Gods, obviously the country’s best axe-men were present- It just wasn’t Randolph’s night when he played ‘No Sleep Till Brooklyn’. I personally maintain, that Randolph is probably the most innovative and experimental guitarist in India at the moment but something that night didn’t click.  Rex Vijayan played a Van Halen tune, which I couldn’t care, less about. Then there was Dhruv who played ’ Roxanne ’ and ’ I don’t need no doctor’. His set along with Amyt Dutta’s were probably the only two worth watching. Amyt Dutta has got IMMENSE stage presence- very Satch-like. What more? He even looks it! I won’t fail to mention, that Floyd Frenandes’ set was fun too! Paresh and Naresh are a talented duo, there’s no two ways about it — - and they proved it with ‘Walk this way’ and ‘Black night’. Rudy Wallang played to an enthusiastic audience towards the end- but it wasn’t even half as good as when he plays with Soulmate!

Honestly, I expected a LOT more. These guys ARE amongst the best we have today and to watch them perform this way is an insult to them and the legends that are being payed tribute to. However, this fiasco needed an extremely minor change- a better backing band! Everything else would’ve fallen in place. Oh, and the ‘mallus’ ruled that night with Avial bagging almost every major award, Band of the Year, Album of the Year and Song of The Year! Monica Dogra of the Electro-pop/Soul ensemble, Shaa’ir n Func received best vocalist (female) and Suraj Mani from Motherjane was declared best vocalist (male). Presenting awards at short intervals after a performance was pretty cool. Helped break away from the monotony of the event- and this is from a third person’s point of view considering most Hardrock Cafe goers aren’t much into the music! Luke Kenny, who was the host that night was his energetic self, cheering and keeping up the tempo of the event…And of course, it’s almost like tradition for him to sing at gigs, and so he did! I’ll refrain from commenting on what I thought if his rendition of ‘Whole Lotta Love’. But I’ll give him credit for one thing- he CAN hold a crowd! Not intending to question the credibility of those running Rolling Stone India, I’d really like to know what were they thinking when they chose Hipnotribe as a backing band? And they say they know everything about music? Even though ordinary listeners like myself don’t know the technicalities involved while playing an instrument and performing live, I think we certainly can tell a bad sound from a good one! Everything about that night was disappointing. Nothing memorable. And I like gigs that are memorable! I’m sure a lot of ground work, funds etc etc are required to put up an event like this one, but they very well could’ve gotten a tighter ROCK band to play. Lastly, what the hell was Hard-Kaur doing???