Two foreign returnees come back to the motherland for their tours - Karsh Kale and Anoushka Shankar. Karsh Kale will start his tour by headlining the York winery’s festival in Nashik, York Live on January 21, to perform his 2011 album, Cinema. Kale will be playing alongside fellow multi-instrumentalist Shri and Mumbai jam band, Something Relevant at the festival. He will play at Kitty Su, New Delhi on January 27 as well. Don’t worry, more dates will be announced soon.

Anoushka Shankar is playing seven dates in the country - Mumbai (Jan 13), New Delhi (Jan 15), Jaipur (Jan 19), Chennai (Jan 20), Bangalore (Jan 22), Guwahati (Feb 02), and Kolkata (Feb 04). She is touring to promote her new flamenco-influenced album Traveller. Tickets for her gigs range from Rs 500 to Rs 10,000 a pop.

Next week, we see Chennai glowing with pride as they host the Chennai Global Music Festival. A venerable feast of international and local musicians will take the stage including Susheela Raman, Junkyard Groove, Adam & The Fish Eyed Poets, and a reunion of Chennai trio Null Friction. The stage is also set for collaborations between musicians from all across the globe with the cream of Chennai talent. For example, percussionist Selvaganesh is featured throughout the festival collaborating with the likes of composer and clarinet player Shankar Tucker and six other virtuoso’s on day one; Swedish guitarist Mattias Eklundh, vocalist Uma Shankar, and singer Mahesh Vinayakram (who performed with Dub FX in Blue Frog, Mumbai last month) on day two; with drumming pro Ranjit Barot, and bassist/vocalist TM Stevens on day three. The festival is happening at Express Avenue grounds, Chennai on January 13, 14, and 15.

Acclaimed Chennai violinist, conductor, and composer Dr L Subramaniam brings Lakshminarayana Global Music Festival for the twentieth year running with performances by musicians spanning five continents. The lineup includes his wife and singer Kavita Krishanmurti Subramaniam, his son and violinist Ambi Subramaniam along with Senegalese kora master Solo Cissokho, Japanese-American koto player Miya Masaoka, and Tunisian singer and oud player Dhafer Youssef. The tour started in Bangalore today (Jan 7), and will move on to Chennai (Jan 9), Ahmedabad (Jan 11), Mumbai (Jan 13), Pune (Jan 14), Trivandrum (Jan 15), and Kollam (Jan 16).

Post-punk indie rock act from Chennai, Adam & The Fish Eyed Poets will play their debut gig at Blue Frog, Mumbai on January 10 along with Sid and Arman, as well as Blackstratblues. The band is the solo project of Kishore Krishna who’s debut album Snakeism was one of Indiecision’s top five Indian indie albums in 2010. We welcome him with open arms and wait eagerly to hear him perform his 2011 album, Dead Loops (get a better idea of what we’re talking about here).

Angaraag Mahanta aka Papon is out with his debut Hindi album internationally on January 10. He is plotting an album launch tour in India starting with Blue Frog in Delhi (Jan 11), Blue Frog in Mumbai (Jan 12), Bongaigaon in Assam (Jan 19), and moving on to Sulafest in Nashik (Feb 4), and Jorhat in Assam (Feb 18). Just last month Papon collaborated with percussionist Bickram Ghosh, and Scottish singer-songwriter Rachel Sermanni under the moniker Troikala to put out an album later this year.

Bookmark this post for more hot gigs as they get announced. For a full listing of gigs around the country, check out our gigs page!

The event will take place on the grounds of the biggest mall in the city, Express Avenue, across three days, and will have performances from 24 international and local artists. The range of genres at the festival range from rock, electro-pop, grunge and hip hop to fusion, folk, jazz, blues, and country. The lineup features local Chennai acts like ‘Folk You’ rockers Junkyard Groove (check out our review of their gig at Mood Indigo here), fledgling rock/blues band Grey Shack, indie-rockers Adam & The Fish Eyed Poets, jazz/funk band Groove #3, and grunge band Null Friction (interesting titbit about this Chennai trio – their gig at 1pm on January 15 is a reunion gig, their first performance together since 2010. They plan to put out an EP in March).

Chennai will also welcome an array of  artists from across the globe including France, Sweden, Reunion Islands, USA, and Malaysia along with collaborations with seasoned musicians from Chennai, Bengal, and Rajasthan.

The festival is the brainchild and the efforts of festival director, Eddie Prithiviraj of event and artist management company Exodus, along with Sujit D’Souza, founder of Lemontree media. Prithiviraj tells us about what he hopes for the Chennai event

At the festival the lineup is good, there are huge names that are coming over. The whole point is creating a future, the future of what the festival is going to carry, that is 2013, which I am already planning for.

Chennai has great potential for musicians, and though the city is a little conservative and they may not venture out much, unless something is happening in Bangalore and then they venture out (laughs)… What I’m trying to do is bring in a real festival with the maximum we have got for Chennai.

Lineup

January 13
Grey Shack
TH Subash Chandran, Ganesh Kumar, S Harikrishnan, Shankar Tucker, Colin Hinton, Michael Gam, and HN Bhaskar.
Vinayakram
George Brooks, Dr Lalitha and Band
Chinnapoonu, Karthik, Raju Baul with Paul Jacob
Jonas Hellborg and Selvaganesh
Junkyard Groove

January 14
Adam & The Fish Eyed Poets
Ziskakan
Piano Chat
Mattias, Selvaganesh, Uma Shankar, and Mahesh Vinayakram
Paul Jacob and Blaaze
Vikku Vinayakram
Moongai
Susheela Raman

January 15
Groove #3 featuring Benny Dayal
Shruti
Null Friction
Mesparrow
Uma Shankar, Gino Bank and troupe
Bud McMuffin
TM Stevens, Ranjit Barot, and Selvaganesh
Indus Creed
El Manos
Mukhtiyar Ali, Chinnapoonu and Paul Jacob

Ticket prices are available at Rs 200 to Rs 750, at the venue.

One of the highlights will be the big fusion collaboration on January 13, featuring clarinet player, Shankar Tucker. Check out his ‘O Re Piya/Rolling in the Deep’ mash up he did as part of his YouTube video series, The Shruti Box, below.

The Three Livewire Finalists
There’s a part of me that really wants to do a set-by-set review of what these bands played. And it’s the same part that would endeavor to run a Metal Archives-esque Orkutcore repository. I’m aware that these bands are both young and impressionable, but all I can say is sorry. Is it just me, or have competition winners Versus been playing the same set for three years? And why do I think they’d rather be called DR Jr.? Why does TurnKEY, the self-described “all out metal” act from Kolkata sound so uninspired? Mumbai prog-rock band The Hoodwink Circle show definite promise. But can a band as unpolished really be trusted to open for the almighty Karnivool?

Indiecision: C-

Junkyard Groove
Following the pointless punishment, the Chennai alt-rockers played an engaging yet gimmicky set.

The good: They were efficient, they got the crowd to love them, they played an incredible cover of Pearl Jam‘s ‘Animal’.

The bad: The band picked and played genuinely irksome music between songs. This includes two bars of ‘Why This Kolaveri Di’ and the ‘Docomo’ theme. Someone in the crowd rightly called Thomas a terrorist.

As Karnivool required a chunk of time before taking the stage, the band was forced back on for a two-song encore. With the crowd’s impatience escalating, they showered the band with insults, yearning the organizers to “send Ameeth home”. However, the band kept their composure and managed to finish their job regardless.

Indiecision: C+

Karnivool
Karnivool took the stage after a long, hard wait, firing off with the teeth-rattling ‘Goliath’. About a fourth of the crowd were familiar with the music, but the enthusiasm was shared by the rest. Given the fact that they only had two albums worth of material to work with, the band put together an amazing setlist that carried a definite sense of progression. They hardly interacted with the crowd, but Karnivool had tremendous stage presence. Frontman Ian Kelly stood out in particular, moving to the music in a perfectly synchronous manner. Kelly took time between songs for some customary banter, but none of it was as memorable as the performance itself.

The crowd was tireless in its wake, jumping fervently and in true Mood-I fashion, shouting requests out, hoping they were loud enough to be heard by the band. Halfway through the set, Kenny asked the audience to sing along to the most recognizable of their singles, ‘All I Know’. As expected, a good quarter complied.

Musically, the band was suffocatingly coiled. They played in a tightly wound manner, making it increasingly difficult to pick out mistakes. Perhaps the most memorable moment was when, during the outro of ‘New Day’, several firecrackers lit up a confetti speckled sky as Kelly yelled “Are we waiting/For a saviour?” repeatedly, spawning out of thin air a minute for the ages. The band closed their set immediately after with the 10-minute epic ‘Change’, bringing things to a satisfying end as the feedback died out.

Indiecision: A-

Nope, we’re not talking Peter Pan villainy, or even discussing what’s best to use at the end of your fishing line. And no again, they are not a Junkyard Groove cover band (this is debatable).

Instead, we’re talking about guitarist Siddharth Srinivasan, drummer Hudstin Fernandez, and bassist Craig Maxworth and the formation of their new alt-rock band – The Captains of Hook. After their departure from previous alt-rock band Junkyard Groove they’ve decided to “give it one last shot” and “see where it goes”.

Under the moniker The Captains of Hook, the band have dubbed themselves ‘captains’ of  the melodic and catchy riff known as a ‘hook’. Having only begun their travails approximately a month ago, they have recently headlined Bangalore’s annual battle-of-the-bands competition, Strawberry Fields.

Check out 46 seconds of lead singer Sidd singing at the National Law School venue (during their Strawberry Fields gig) in the video below.

According to their Facebook updates, they currently seem to be working on a series of demos. “We The Captains Of Hook have decided to make a series of demos for all of you to hear… PS. Excuse the recording quality, its only a Jamroom Demo.” They have now released two demos via their Soundcloud page. Take a listen and tell us that Siddarth doesn’t sound like Ameeth Thomas? Or does he?

Fairytale Jamroom Demo by The Captains of Hook

The Captains of Hook- Galaxies in Coffee Mugs (Studio Demo) by The Captains of Hook

Performances start at 6pm everyday. Dates and lineup below.

December 2
Indigo Children (New Delhi)
Bohemian (Bangladesh)
Metal Zone Oasis Band (Myanmar)
Petri Dish Project (Mumbai)
Zeb & Haniya (Pakistan) (pictured)

December 3
The Maldivian (Maldives)
Boomarang (Mizoram)
Advaita (New Delhi)
Kingdom Hum (Bhutan)
Motherjane (Cochin)

December 4
Fanoos (Afghanistan)
Thriloka (Sri Lanka)
Robin and the New Revolution (Nepal)
Junkyard Groove (Chennai)
Salim Sulaiman (India)

The festival takes place about two weeks after the Bacardi NH7 Weekender, in Pune. Check out our coverage of the festival here. December also sees the Sunburn festival in Goa. Check out the entire lineup (for Day 1 and 2) here.

Photos by Shiv Ahuja