Music Review: My Name Is Khan

While I’ve, predictably, hated most of Karan Johar movies, I more or less enjoyed their music. But then again, it was never spectacular either. Couple of good tracks, and in general formulaic. My Name is Khan soundtrack is no different, either.  It’s a decent soundtrack, but stops just there. Just a notch above mediocre, if at all. But, this one leaves you thinking more could have been done with some numbers. A letdown, coming from SEL.

Of the tracks, two are noteworthy:

Sajda — a sufiyana song/quawaali with a little modern instrumentation thrown in — is sung by Rahat Fateh Ali Khan, Richa Sharma, and Shankar Mahadevan. The rhythm reminds of the upbeat streams in Mitwa, and is indeed quite an upbeat number. However, RFAK seems to be severely underused here. And the sufiyana soul of the song is smothered by the pop like treatment. The thin catwalk between soul and rhythm that Mitwaa managed  has gone wrong here — heavily in favor of rhythm, to my personal dislike.

Allah Hi Raheem — as the name suggests  – is another predominantly sufiyana number  (Curiously, while Sajda is set on the same rhythm as Mitwaa, this one is set on the same rhythm as  Kabhi Alvidaa … although that one dragged, this one doesn’t) sung beautiful by Ustad Rashid Khan — who steps down, in a way, from his serious classical genre, but does the job absolutely competently. The song starts with a LOT of promise, but then kind of suddenly ends, without delivering on that promise — especially with Ustad at disposal!

The theme track is okay too. Maybe, in the context of film, it might reach better.

Noor e Khuda is neither here nor there. Reminds me a bit of this and that song. It is pleasant, and the kind of song I won’t switch radio stations to avoid while driving, but hardly the one I will sit down and listen to. ESL seem sliding down into their comfort zones, rehashing from the past.

Tere Naina has quite banal lyrics. I guess too much has been said about tere (and mere) naina already. Okayish number — just the kind that you would expect would be a big hit because of its banal lyrics, and stereotypical music. Shafaqut tries to put in some jaan into it, but too gheesa-peeta to do much with it.

Rang De is the rock-ish track that reminds strongly of Rock On. But that’s about it. Rock On’s USP was its newness. Not greatness. And Rang De can’t claim either.

All in all, this looks like a ‘job’ done well. Par for the course. Reminds too much of too many things from the past. Lacks freshness or soul or character. A pity really, for it could have had all three.

Tweeting with the Celebies

The Social Celebs Have It Hard

Not Honour, Your Honour

In past few days two Supreme Court statements got me thinking. First was when SC asked the center to “legalize prostitutions [as] they can’t curb it” (link). Right steps, wrong justification?

I mean, by that logic, we should legalize female foeticide, terrorism, dowry related killings/tourture, domestic violence — basically all major crime.

Don’t get me wrong. I do not subscribe to a view that prostitution is a crime. I would strongly welcome legalization of prostitution on more principled grounds: activities between consenting adults should be outside the control of state, when no one’s rights are violated. What needs to be tackled are the ‘coercive’ aspects of the trade: minors/adults forced into the trade, or held in it against their wishes, the unholy nexus between pimps and police, the harassment of the sex workers, denying them basic human rights, and so on.

Of course, the matter of weather the plight of commercial sex workers would change post legalization is another matter altogether. And, it’s for others to comment (those who know the ground realities better). But that’s a digression.

So back to the other (and more important) SC commentary while converting Death sentence of Dilip Tiwari, also upheld by the Bombay High Court, into a life sentence:

“[Outside caste marraige] is held as the family’s defeat. At times, [elder brother] has to suffer taunts and snide remarks even from persons who really have no business to poke their nose into the affairs of the family. Dilip, therefore, must have been a prey of the so-called insult which his younger sister had imposed upon his family and that must have been in his mind for seven long months” (link)

Again, I’m ambivalent on the issue of capital punshiment (or to be truthful — I’m against it). But, what I cannot understand, is the differntiation that is made here, on grounds that the person may have ’suffered taunts’.

Let’s put that in context. Let’s say a person is being taunted in society, because his wife did not bring in enough dowry, or that she hasn’t been able to deliver a male child (as happens routinely in our society). Now this person gets angry, and does what: beats/tortures his wife, or sends her back to her parents, or even kills her and her parents, and young siblings. Will anyone reduce the severity of punishment in such cases? Of course, not! And why? For the simple reason, that aggression is legally tolerated only against the one who’s tormenting, not those who are innocent.

If Dilip, in the moment of rage, had killed, even brutally, those who ‘had no business to poke their nose into the affairs of the family’, sure, he might be considered for ‘temporary insanity‘ plea, and get a reduced sentence. But a gruesome (as noted even by the Court), and pre-meditated murder (there were two people assisting him) of those, who’re basically innocent, apart from the crime of going against ‘genuine caste considerations‘ (sic!). They didn’t even spare a 13 year old kid, for God’s sake …

It gets worse, if that’s possible:

“It has come in evidence that the mother of Dilip tried to lure back Sushma and so did her other married sister Kalpana who actually went to meet Sushma in her college. Those efforts paid no dividend. Instead, Sushma kept attending the college, thereby openly mixing with the society. This must have added insult to the injury felt by the family members and more particularly, accused Dilip,” the bench said.

Instead Sushma kept openly mixing with the society! What was she supposed to do? Sit in a remote corner of house where no one sees or talks to her? Is this Supreme Court? Injury felt by … If I feel injured because the female I love doesn’t respond to me, and then I see her openly roaming with someone else, I go and kill her brutally, and him too, will I be spared the noose because of my ‘perceived injury’? This is seriously screwed, coming from the Apex court, no less!

It’s a verdict that belongs to middle ages, especially the justification. That it should apply to urban crime, in the twenty-first century, under the pretext of ‘caste considerations’ (read: bigorty, racism) hardly gives me hope. That it comes from the apex court — the last standing bastion of justice in this land — makes me despondant, and sad.

The message that’s gone out is this: honour killing are somehow less abhorrent that other dastardly acts of killing. That totally idiotic notions of caste superiority ingrained in our society are somehow a licence to kill, and that those who use that licence to kill will be spared the highest punishment, because they’re seen as victims of the social ideology. That those who do not have either the courage to confront aggressor or think beyond social norms, can go and kill those who’re the real victims (of those norms). That they’re are somehow to be seen as more human, than they are.

No, your honour — it’s just killing. There is no honour there.

PS: As an aside, those who harp on ‘uniform civil code‘ every once in a while, will they condemn this complete negation of criminal law for a twisted logic that triumphs the ‘community law’? Or will they let the ‘pinko-liberals’ beat the dead horse, and watch from sideline with a smug, indifferent expression, as always? When people’s right to life is being trivialized and ridiculed in the name of archiach community ‘conciousness’, the debate over ‘civil code’ turns meaningless.

Broad Brush Paintings – Episode 3

Story so far: Episode 2, Episode 1

[For my loyal reader Parikrama, and anyone else who doesn't want to read previous parts]

Chaitali is wakes up in the middle of the night, and ruminates over her married life, and her husband: the Kitsch writer V, who’s yet to publish anything. V and Rakesh (his school buddy, a popular crime thriller writer) have a talk about writing, sitting in a dilapidated Irani cafe.

---

His discussion with Rakesh had left V unsettled far more than Rakesh could have ever imagined.

Rakesh thought of V as someone who did not give a hoot about what others said about him. V’s high-brow attitude, even when he had hardly anything to show for it, puzzled Rakesh. It also made him uneasy. His other friends were much generous in their praise for his writings (although he wondered if they had really read any — whereas with V, he was at least sure). But all he ever got from V was an indifferent, and even that indifference seemed to be an after-thought at worst, and a concession given to an old friend at best.

Do I write that badly, Rakesh wondered, as he drove back in his old Esteem. He reminded himself, that he needed to change his car. There was no question of affording a newer and better car. It was his emotional attachment to the car that was holding him back. His father had bought that car for him when he joined college.

The thought of his father disturbed him tremendously. His father, who was a successful businessman, self made at that — he was penniless, and illiterate when he started — wanted his son to be more cultured. His father lamented how people always seemed to envy him his wealth and power. He assumed, wrongly thought Rakesh, that people’s aversion to his wealth was due to his lack of education, or prominent ancestry. He tried to hide his provincial background by engaging the services of the experts in every field — the architects, the interior decorators, art dealers — and trusting their judgment (a bit too much, Rakesh thought). He even had set up a wine cellar and a well stocked bar at home at great expenses, and entrusted it to a bartender he had flicked from a socialite joint that was mired in financial difficulties. And he had got personal tutors to improve his hindi accent (more urban), and to teach himself English. However, almost everything had backfired, and he was ridiculed in the circles he so wished to belong to as a vulgar, tasteless rich — by the same people who drank his expensive, imported wines. Things were generally said on his back, for many who laughed at him, were indebted to him, yet he would learn about them from some source. They even gossiped about his English tutor.

It was this social humiliation that had made his father want an acceptance for his son in a world he could never manage to enter. He wanted his son to make it big in fine arts, or literature, or some such — what he called — higher ventures. Rakesh wanted to enroll into commerce stream, and later join his father’s thriving business, for that seemed to be the most logical thing to do. His father refused to even entertain the possibility, and made him enroll for arts stream.

“I’ve earned all the money that will be needed by you, you don’t need to waste yourself earning money”, he insisted “Taste the high-culture, and make your mark there”.

But Rakesh had no artistic aspirations, neither fine, nor performing. Nor did he believe he had a way with words. So he pulled through the M.A years, hoping his father would see sense, just to discover that his father wanted him to go for higher studies, abroad. In humanities! It was there, in the creative writing courses, that he realized that writing wasn’t such a big deal. He decided to try out his hands.

His father did not live so see the publication of his first book, which instantly became a best-seller. Rakesh wondered if it was a good thing, after all.

In particular, there was one remark Rakesh was glad his father would never hear. It was the first time he had taken V home. This was long after his father’s death, when he was living there alone. V had observed the house without saying a word. But when V had had a few drinks, he had finally passed his judgment.

“Now I know how you can turn out kitsch so regularly”

Live in the time of twitter

A step by step guide to regaining sanity 2.0.real

Or

Live in the Time of Twitter and Real-Time-Web

I’ll be honest. It’s a misleading title. But then it’s catchy (or so I think), and also displays the writer’s knowledge (if one can call it that) of the literary work that inspired (as defined by Bollywood music directors, story writers) the title. It hardly matters, then, that the article has no connection whatsoever to that literary work, or the title. Actually it has some connection to the latter (I have to keep someone interested!).

Yes, that’s the first mental adjustment you should make, before its too late: everything in web 2.0.real (or whater version that’s out right now) is designed to catch your attention.  Attention first, content later.

It’s not very dissimilar to people faking things in their resumes, to pass the first cut — for when you’re competing with people who’re faking royally, those who don’t fake never make the first cut, despite the real content (as opposed to real time? lol, I didn’t say that!) in their resumes. It’s after the attention (or first cut), that the content becomes relevant.

So to get back to the point (did we ever go away from it?):

1. Just because it’s catchy doesn’t mean it’s worth reading.

Yes, learn that as fast as you could (except, make an exception for this blog).  And save the disappointment (except for this blog). In short: don’t trust the lead ups. Don’t trust the title. Scan fast, and decide if you want to spend time reading it.

Here is the corollary:

2. Not everything needs to be bookmarked

Gone are the days when you clicked a link, and bookmarked it, tagged it, put it on this list or that. Organized it …

Gone gone gone…

That only made sense, when you actually meant to come back to those links for a detailed look, for ruminating, for thinking over (mean the same thing? I know. It’s for effect), for reading about and around them. And that only made sense when the links were far and few, that you could actually do those things.

Remember this: too many bookmarks is no bookmarks.

Sure you’ll get a couple of links in hundreds that you come across on twitter on a daily basis, that you’ll need/want to bookmark. But the rest you need to treat with the same respect (or lack of it) that you would afford, say, a conversation you have with a colleague over a cup of tea in the office pantry. You listen. You comment. You forget — trusting your brain to bring it back, if it ever became necessary.

And that brings us to the next point:

3. Not everything needs to be read with full attention

Yes. What’s more: it cannot be done, so don’t try doing it. If you ever learned about  sampling theorem, you know what to do. If you didn’t, go read about it NOW (haha: that’s rule 4, we’ll get there). And forget rule 3 while you’re doing it.

The problem of the ‘real time web’, as of now, is that it’s a waterfall.  And till things get sorted out, with filters, meta-filters, agreegators, and meta-aggregators, and net-oracles (yes!) come to your aid, you’d do well to glance and discard. Even at the risk of loosing content. Yes. (That’s rule 5. We’ll come to that).

Keyword is: fast. Yes, real-time-web demands a wire-speed decision making about value proposition of a content. You’re maybe lucky enough right now: you still have a few milliseconds per lead. Soon, you’d have microseconds. Then nanoseconds. Sharpen up your skills, or you’ll become one of the unreal-timers.

4. Now is the time

Now, is the time when everything has to be read. Not later. Not tomorrow, not sometime later. Those were the old days. It’s now or never,  for most of the content you’re reading won’t be relevant tomorrow, or day-after. Why not ‘not read it at all’? Well if you can do that, you’re the liberated. You, my friend, were not sucked by the matrix. And you my friend, are a big fat lier: for you wouldn’t be reading this stupid howto then. Not this far, at any rate. If you’re here, you need help, dear. You’re already sick. Like me.

5. It’s okay to miss news

Yes. Remember this: all ad campaigns are trying to sell you what you don’t need. And so it is with the real-time-web, and tag lines of its creators.

So when they say: “Share and discover what’s happening right now, anywhere in the world” don’t take it literally. Don’t take it to heart.  Share what you can. Discover what you can. The rest — you’ll thank me for this insight — was always there, and you were good at missing it, not not even knowing you missed it. And you could live with missing all that. So don’t forget ‘that’. Say with me: it’s okay to miss news.

6. Don’t throw away the baby with bathwater.

Yes. For all my sarcasm, scepticism, cynicism, there is lot to be found there.  Things for which you should forget rules 1 to 5. You’ll bookmark those things, tag them, put them on lists. You’ll read about them, around them. Blog about them. Update your world-view with them.  You’ll read them later; reread them even.

And that is why, it’s a good thing that you’re sick. Like me.

Go, get real!

Naya De-Waar

Deewar 2.0?

(A bit late in the day to post it. Didn't get time to create the graphic. Would have been more relevant a month back, I guess)

Rushdie Talk: Authors@Google

Authors@Google has some interesting collection of talks. I enjoy watching on of those once in a while. This video where Rushdie’s talks chiefly about The Enchantress of Florence, is another charming exhibition by the man, who has a way with the words, love him or hate him.

Noteworthy is the long Q&A session at the end.

While talking about ambiguious characters in The Satanic Verses (which I haven’t read yet), he says (quick transcription by me, so not verbatim):

“… you have devilish angles, and angelic demons. I’m sounding like Dan Brown now … which i guess would be good for my bank balance but bad for me in every other way … but anyway, i did it first”

Watch it unless you hate him blindly (it’s an hour long video).

Unpresidented?

The latest Amul gem!

Broad Brush Paintings – Episode 2

Previous Parts:  Episode 1

“Why do you keep on writing in this same, crime thriller genre?”, V asked Rakesh.

Rakesh is the author of four highly successful crime thrillers. He makes quite a bit through the royalties, and generally spends his time sitting in one cafe or another talking to his friends — when he’s not writing something that is, which is seldom. He doesn’t have to put too much effort in writing, because all his novel have the same blueprint, with details varied. Besides, the accuracy of the details is not important to him. Or to his readers.

“Because it comes naturally to me. I don’t have to take efforts to write that stuff”, Rakesh answered, puffing on his half-burned Marlboro Light. Then, carelessly, he threw it out of the window of the dilapidated Irani cafe.

V looked at the wastage, annoyed, but then it occurred to him that it was better than wasting one’s lungs. He hated cigarettes. Normally, he wouldn’t sit with someone smoking, complaining that the smoke gave him asthma. But Rakesh was an exception. He had soft corner for Rakesh, despite his (what V called) pedestrian writing. Rakesh and he went to the college together, and he was one of the few friends from back then with whom V could still connect.

“But what’s the point? Aren’t we writers supposed to get out of our comfort zones?”

Rakesh looked at V quizzically. He wondered if he should pick issues with the phrase ‘we writers’. V, as far as he knew, had wrote nothing that qualified as writing, not in the world he inhabited at any rate.

“Have you ever done a honest day’s work as a writer?” he asked finally, looking out of the cafe window, at nowhere in particular.

“What do you mean?”, V asked, trying to sound nonchalant, yet his voice betrayed a tinge of anxiety. Or was it reproach?

“I mean, have you written a single page of prose, keeping in mind who will want to publish the shit?”

“You mean, honest work in this line means taking other people’s judgment of what’s right and wrong, or suitable/unsuitable for publishing, as one’s starting point?”, V said, his voice agitated. He waited for the answer to his rhetorical question. As he expected, no answer came. For a brief moment V held his pose, in every sense of the phrase, and added in faked nochalant voice, “I guess not”

“I thought as much”, Rakesh said.

“Why would I want to be a writer, if I were to accept that as a starting point?”

Rakesh sighed. He didn’t have time for V’s childish questions.

“The trouble with the world of art is that people come here trying to escape the hard right and wrong judgments, believing they can redefine right and wrong”

For all his faults, V thought, I can still talk to him, because he at least understands the fundamental questions of life. Not too many people these days had time for those fundamental questions. They were so lost in the mundane facts, and problems. It was hard to even talk to them.

What about Chaitali? He wondered …

Long back, when they were dating, he remembered he could talk to her. She understood. She even had answers that seemed to align with his. Or was he too eager to find an alignment? Like the Indian pundits who would fix up any horoscopes. Not that he believed in horoscopes, but wasn’t that cheating? And sometimes, both the parties would do it, each believing that the other cares for horoscopes. Or was it that they wanted the other party to think that they believed in horoscopes — thus establishing their ‘traditional’ credentials?

But what about Chaitali?

He shuddered. Maybe he had cheated himself? Even before he knew there was alignment on things that matter, he had stopped judging? How much more ridiculous was that? He who hated arranged marriages, had he arranged his own marraige by the same methods, in spirit? Nah, he said to himself. Chaitali was okay. She still understood the questions, and their importance. It’s just that her answers had changed over the years, while his had stayed the same. Was it because he never had to taste his answers, in the real world, as opposed to all the imaginary worlds that he tried to create, while she had to?

And Rakesh? He looked at Rakesh, who had lit up another Marlboro light, and seemed to be waiting for him to say something. Trouble was V had no idea what it was. Then he remembered the thread.

“And?” he decided question was the best option.

“And soon they realize that unless they’re genius, they are more constrained by rights and wrongs as defined by someone else — and there isn’t even a way to resort to objectivity. Hell, those are random rights and wrongs, that can never be defeated”

Trouble with those who can think through other people’s shoes, V thought, is that you can never judge. You always keep the case open, for further evidence. He loved Chaitali, so judging was now superflous. There was a time and date for it. He had done it. The case was closed now. If he reopened it, it will just stay open.

“Unless you’re a genius?”, he suddenly said, picking up the thread finally. This was getting interesting.

“If you’re a genius, you can escape them in your lifetime, yes. But down the line, you become another random set of rights and wrongs. In a sense, you lose to the system by being endorsed by it. And worse: you can’t even fight, because by then you’re long dead”

“Do you think you are a genius, V?”, Rakesh asked suddenly.

“Ummm?”, V said, half automatically, half deliberate.

Rakesh laughed. “You do, don’t you? You conceited, arrogant bastard!”

“Well I don’t know if I’m a genius, but I don’t think I’m ordinary, at least”

“No one thinks they’re ordinary, dear. Welcome to the club”

Diwali Musings

Trying to figure out where the festive mood has gone. Tamaso ma jyotirgamay. May the light shine within — each and every soul 'enlightened'. Let the lives brighten from within and without …

Happy Diwali to everyone.

Note: Image from ( covered under Creative Commons — see the link)