The Famous Headbang!

Every rock musician (well .. I am going out on a limb here by saying ‘every’), let me rephrase .. quite a few rock musicians including me loved the image of the headbanging rocker! and a large part of that image was the long hair swinging wildly on stage which combined with the lights and the smoke on stage made things even more enticing!

So when 5 guys clad in lungis go up on stage and sing Indian Folk music, the last thing the audience expects is such wild headbanging! but the Raghu Dixit Project is not just another band doing ‘fusion’ music (what is that anyway! .. the definition is so muddied now its like saying ‘alternative’ ..). We love being ourselves on stage and enjoying the music we play … its based on a concept that Raghu kept telling us about .. if the performer enjoys the performance, the audience’s joy is doubled and that joy is translated back to the performer until one point when everyone’s experience is elevated. This goes for Raghu’s wild jumping, his ghungroos, our synchronized dances, the headbanging, everything!

What I wanted to share was a sequence of images that were captured at our launch gig where I was headbanging away (I think the song was Gudugudiya .. a song I LOVE playing on stage!!) and Shilpa managed to snap this …

Hey Bhagwan – The Video

This has taken a long time to happen. The video was shot long long back in Bombay and all of us were waiting for everything else to come together before we can let it loose and have everyone see it.

And now it is finally here! Please to take a look at the FIRST EVER music video for ‘The Raghu Dixit Project’ and let us know what you think. You should also be able to catch it on MTV India and hopefully on other channels soon!

Without any further ado … ladies and gentlemen .. ‘Hey Bhagwan’

People seem to like us :)

The lovely folks at OML and BabelFish decided to give copies of our album to a few bigwigs in the music industry so that they could listen and tell us what they felt about the music and other things … Not surprisingly, they had some very good things to say as you can see here …

A Star was Launched!

It finally happened! after what seemed like eternity, the next step was taken … and everything happened perfectly!

It was sometime around 3.30 when we reached the venue and everything was being set up. The venue itself was wonderful! it was at the ‘land’s end’ at the Bandra Bandstand. This was literally at the land’s end with the ocean behind us and tons of trees all around with a very earth and rustic feel to the whole place!

The audience sat on the stone cut steps of the amphitheatre, there was a separate enclosure for the cameras (well … it din’t hurt to try!!) the sound was just perfect and things just couldn’t get better! The show did start a tad bit late .. but then, we had waited so long that a few more minutes to get things just right was not at all a problem and the audience din’t seem to mind either! many of them were close friends and family of the band, quite a few of them had flown in from various parts of the country to be there and witness the moment.

The show itself was very emotional, and inspite of Raghu claiming it would be just another show for him, none of us could help feeling a little lump in the throat and we choked up with emotion of the moment finally here!

   

Our latest and greatest fan, Mr. Sanjay Dutt himself came up and recommended the album and told everyone that he is a fan of the music and wished us luck, Vishal and Shekhar spoke about how they were inspired to start a label because of Raghu’s music and then proceeded to jump start the party! it was quite heartening to see them jumping around in the crowd revving everyone up to have a good time! If someone has the video of Vishal and Shekhar singing ‘Mysore Se Aayi’ with the band, please put it up and let us know!!!

 

And just like that … it was done! but this is just the beginning of many good things to come!

Update – Thanks to our very dear friend Vinay Shukla, we managed to find the perfect picture that shows Vishal and Shekhar enjoying ‘Mysore Se Aayi’

The Album Launches Today!!

In a few hours, the dream will be realized … atleast in part! This time round there is no stopping it! The album shall be launched at the Bandra Fort Amphitheatre this evening at 6.30 PM. It will be a super spectacle ….

Quite a few friends of the band are making the trip down from Bombay and shall be here to witness the launch. The launch itself is quite a party! Sanjay Dutt shall launch the album along with Vishal and Shekhar. We saw the reactions of the bigwigs in Bollywood to the album and everyone has only good things to say!

The mood here is quite upbeat and things are very hopeful and expectant..

If you are anywhere in the vicinity, please get yourselves to the Bandra Fort Amphitheatre this evening and celebrate with us!

Mommy I’m on TV!!

NDTV gave its viewers an exclusive pre-launch look at the album and an interview with Raghu from the venue at the Eastwind Festival.

Here is Raghu explaining the concept of the ‘Bonus CD’ and the other contents of the album on air. Also, keep an eye out for our humble boy as the album was receiving rave reviews by the NDTV host

Still to come … Tons of pics and stories from the MTV Alert photoshoot, the testimonial from all of Bollywood (well … most of Bollywood atleast) .. So watch this space!

The Album and its Fans – Part Deux

More sightings from the Eastwind Festival. Manjyot and Sanjeev from Seher with their copy of the album .. They have always been great friends of the band and a great source of encouragement and support!

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There have been a LOT of new developments and its tough to just keep up with the pace at which work is happening here. Everything is being put in place for the launch on the 26th. If you are anywhere in the vicinity of the Bandra Band Stand, try to make it for the launch. More to come on that soon.

The Album and its fans – Part Uno

Since the album started surfacing yesterday, it was time for me to kick start my new series .. So ladies and gentlemen, without much timewasting and such things, I present to you … The brand new series …

“The Album and its Fans!!”

   

Shriya from MTV Delhi buying her first two copies (of many more to come) of the album. And she was visibly pleased that the moment was documented!

   

Shreyas from RadioVeRVe was quite shocked at first to see copies of the album out in public! (well .. maybe that picture was staged ) but eventually, he ended up buying quite a few copies of the album and started his effort of not just giving the bonus CD away but also the entire album itself and also getting a lot of his friends to buy the album (these guys were quite shocked themselves .. but that was for other reasons )

   

So how do you figure in this series?!? You take pictures of yourself with the album or your friends with the album or any pictures with the album in it and you send it to music at raghudixit dot com and I will select pictures from there and post them on the blog!

So lets see the pictures coming in … and watch this space for more of ‘The Album and the Fans!’

The CD has begun surfacing!

So we just got back from playing at the Eastwind Festival and as we were getting ready to go to the festival, Raghu started getting messages from people congratulating him about the album and how lovely they thought it looked and stuff like that!

A visibly shocked Raghu made a few calls and it turns out, the Counter Culture store at the festival decided it was time to start getting the CDs out! and had actually started selling CDs!!!!!

So its official people … the CD IS OUT!!!! The official launch is on 26th in Bombay and the CD will be available at a store near you … very soon! But the CD is out and its time you guys who got it started telling us and everyone else what you thought of it.

These are a few pictures to whet your appetite, of the album on sale and the first few fans to buy it in Delhi! We clearly outsold any other artiste on sale at the EastWind Festival … Now we’re hoping that will happen country wide!

Raghu made quite a few fans today and signed many autographs and most importantly, the wait is finally over! and this time there is no more postponement …

We now step into the next chapter!

Gift a CD!

Staying true to the promise I made to all of you, here is the first unique thing with the Raghu Dixit Project CD that all of you will go out and get!

Every CD you buy will have 2 CDs in it. The main CD which has all the songs in the album and a CD that you can give as a recommendation to someone.

This is because we noticed certain things about how people recommend music. You really love the band (We are hoping you will love the band!) and then you meet someone who you think should definitely listen to the band and you can then do one of two things

1. Tell the person how great the band is and where they should go to check the band and its music and where they can buy etc…

2. Give them your copy of the CD and ask them to listen and give the CD back to you … but in most cases, the CD never comes back to you and it really isn’t the right way to do it!

So here we give you the third wonderful option!

You meet this person you want to recommend the band to, and you take the bonus CD from your CD case and you give it to that person and say .. “Here .. listen to this awesome band! and I’m sure you’ll like their music .. now go buy your own copy of the CD … because the CD itself is so well designed that you will love to have it!”

Now your friend will buy the CD (in all probability .. we always assume the optimistic scenario) and then s/he will have her/his own copy of the lovely music we make and 2 CDs that s/he can give away to people. And the story continues that way … Eventually the whole world will have our CDs … and if you take into consideration the 6 degrees of separation theory, it should not take too long

So now .. lets hear your take on this .. and also, from this blog … I promise one seriously fun filled Raghu Dixit Project goodie bag for anyone who can tell us the most creative way you plan to use the bonus CD and actually do it! So let us hear it!