Turbulence en route to Nowhere.

It’s a fucking genuinely enlightening experience. Waking up in the morning and for that one split second, you have no idea where you are. Okay, the menu on the right side table tells me we’re not in Delhi, it’s a guest house in Chandigarh: we’re off to a fabulous start. There’s somebody singing in the shower. Also brilliant, i’m not alone in this memorable experience. My mouth’s minty, which not only means that I was neurotic enough in my habit to brush my teeth last night, but points more to the fact that it wasn’t so long ago that I did brush them. I did change too – I’m wearing pyjamas. So far we’re doing great. There’s a white shirt and a black v-neck sweater hanging off the chair next to me. Doesn’t look like something I’d wear, but then I forgot my suit in Delhi – so I ended up spending half of what I earned at the gig last night buying those two things. I did look good though. “New York Pretty Chique-Boy”, that’s what my drummer was kind enough to suggest – where I’m flattering myself is, with the ‘-que’. I believe he was going for chick. It works for me, I guess.

The gig was fun enough, but not for it’s playing. The perfect sound, with the perfect venue and just a lot of a communication breakdown. The cues were all over the place and every one was pretty confused. Well, I was making a mess. In any case, right now I just couldn’t be fucked. On the other hand, the bass tone was beyond divine. It was the kind of tone that reminded me why I play the instrument I do. It was an outdoor gig, so on appearance: It was cold and all the trees were lit up with small white lights. It was foggy and it was beautiful. The crowd was pretty receptive and if not receptive, really attractive. The pianist we were playing with was kind enough to clarify that this was a very classy gig. Man, Punjabi women. I’m from Delhi – and I may harbour some false notions about seeking intellect, but fuck it, this is beyond a soft spot. I talked to a few women last night – but at these weddings and parties it’s like being in the middle of a jungle. It’s all out Darwin.

I digress.

Back to the room. I’m obviously more than hungover. Mostly because I’m still a little high. There’s more than two bottles of white wine in my system and more than a couple of shooters. I never take shots. I guess I was on vacation last night. The edges of my eyes are still vibrating. Lets see, my wallet’s still around. What comes next? It’s funny, it’s always the cellular phone. I’m convinced that I’ve lost it. I roll out of bed and I can barely stand. I check the bass, my backpack and the table. No sign of it – anywhere. I try calling it – no luck. I check my skinnies’ pockets, nope. It’s funny how the only thing that’s bothering me is the idea of invasion of privacy. I finally move the blankets and there it is, in all it’s black cold metal. I suddenly feel sick – and it’s not the alcohol. I walked in at round about 5 in the morning, swayed in is more accurate – packed away my bass with the love it deserves, changed my clothes, brushed my teeth and picked up my phone and fell asleep with it on the other side of my pillow. Something about this doesn’t click for me. I’m not this person.       

My body and mind feels like they’re broken. Maybe it’s from drinking and dancing last night – but it’s probably from the past week. Drift usually rehearses about 4 days a week – and the schedule’s been pretty consistent for a few months now – since August to be accurate. This particular week, we got ourselves a perfect score card. Morning rehearsals Monday through Friday followed by four days and four performances. Friday and Saturday at the aman, Sunday at the Polo grounds with Nicolas and finally Monday at Chandigarh. 

Sunday is worth mentioning because I got to do and see a lot of things I hadn’t seen and done before. For starters, I’d never been near a polo ground – leave alone watched a match. I now know the rules of polo – it’s like very-up market football. The funny thing is the teams switch goal sides every time some one scores – I don’t know why though. I imagine it can be disorienting if you’re having a spaced out day – but then I imagine people don’t day dream much on charging horses. Speaking of which, I got to see a lot of horses really up close – that’s something. They have really big eyes and I like that. The crowds that turn up for these things are well, pretty self-explanatorily, the crowds that turn up for these things. I did see a guy who looked like a very colour blind and pimped out Chick Corea. The actual playing time was somewhere around ten minutes. You could call the sound system awful – but that would presuppose the existence of a sound system. I basically got handed a 50-foot cable and was told to go stand on the field with Nicolas.

When we finally had to play – it became all about latency. I played one note and then I heard a flanger-overdriven-distorted sort of sound blare out of the speaker just about one or two seconds later. It was more than  a disaster. I played through the track we were doing but it really didn’t make any sense, after a while there was just no sound, so Nicolas played moreorless accompanied. It was a bit sad because there were quite few people who did huddle up around us to watch. I don’t think I’ve ever sounded worse in my life. Faulty cables. 

It’s strange because slowly all of my instincts are telling me to pack up and fuck off. I need to wash this all off. The bad-tones, the shaky playing, the masters with it’s uncanny ability to sneak up on me. It’s probably just cumulative ‘something’, but I feel like there’s a layer of dirt on my general perception and I’m begging for clarity. In any case, I’m grounded for the next two months or more, on account of playing and more so, because of the masters semester final exams which are coming up in a little under two and a half weeks.

Detergent anybody?

 

Up, Down (And if I'm in the mood) Maybe Round and Round.

I think the deal with studying Philosophy and pretty much any other non-technical subject, is that you ought to take it seriously, but never too seriously. Retrospectively speaking, when I was doing my bachelors, my premature understanding of the same idea, was something I was pretty kicked about. On one hand, I was genuinely interested and open to being affected by it. On the other hand though: I really tried my best, to keep from using it to fill a vacuum in my life – or the spaces that were the deficiencies of my personality. Think of it as the contrast between, “I study philosophy” and “I: study philosophy”. There was enough of the latter going around me.  Still is, actually. The only thing that’s probably changed now, is that I take most of the philosophy I’m exposed to as either for granted or as being uninteresting. I would place jazz at the centre of myself at times, but that too wearily as I don’t have that enlightened and intimate a connection with the art form (yet?) and the moments of it I may or may not experience are fleeting at best.

I figure if there are perceived spaces in your life, there’s really no point trying to fill them with things. People, places, arts whatever – its about coming to peace with the gap, or re-arranging yourself, till it’s not there.

I digress though. What I meant to bring up was something that’s been on my mind lately – and was further consolidated yesterday morning, when Nicolas used the same phrase and arrangement of words. He was talking about how he feels he needs to return to a healthier, more focused and concentrated lifestyle – and how circumstances at present are seemingly unconducive to the same.

More relevant: being the accompanying sensation that life is cyclical – and the best that one can really do (to a certain degree) is ride the wave with some amount of style and hopefully have it, if it’s a good one, last as long as it can or, hold it together – if it’s a not-so hot wave.

I don’t mean to sound fatalistic about the whole thing – it’s not that there’s no control. You can alleviate the symptoms and consolidate yourself – and when you get good at It – you can almost ignore the cycle, but there’s not much you can do to the cycle itself. There’s no forcing it in either direction. The reason why I brought up Philosophy at all, was because a lot of the Buddhism we studied talked about the cyclical nature of life – both in terms of practical every day material and in a larger overbearing metaphysical sense (though I am pulling this out of context just a little).

I think this was a big reason why Indian Philosophy got so popular and managed to find its way into the self-help and spirituality sections of Barnes and Noble & Borders and co. It’s very coping oriented. There’s just enough metaphysical abstract content to satiate the average western spiritually-starved mind; but yet enough practical how-to-deal content that just sounds like good advice.

How to navigate around every day muck: Negative thoughts, sensations of isolation, anger, temptation and so on. 

Returning to the idea of cyclical phases of life – what could one be talking about? Well generally the understanding that on the broadest level: there are positive phases and negative ones. More specifically, the breakdown can go on. Phases of exhaustion; of freshness; of optimism; of creativity; of self deprecation; of motivation; of demotivation and so on.

What’s on my mind, is just a little stranger though. For me, the question seems to present itself at the stage where you’re firm with your understanding and perception of life as being in cycles but you become too familiar and you just don’t feel like directly engaging with them any more (by virtue of the fact that they are cycles).

I understand living in the moment – and the family of accompanying one line gems like, “It’s not the destination, it’s the journey” – but sometimes, you just want to say, “Hey man, I’ve seen this movie before. I know how it goes”.

Not to rob life of it’s element of surprise – we all know chance can go out of it’s way to sideline you, when you’re just sitting around on that Tuesday afternoon, but in a more retracted sense – the motions can get pretty mundane (?). No matter how exciting the content of your experience is.

The only bailout here, really is just that though: experience. The idea that as an active and passive agent engaging in perception and undergoing change, in the cycles of life, you will experience – see, touch, taste, feel – things that give you the sensation of a fuller existence.

That’s the gamble I guess.

On lighter notes: I had something happen to me last night that probably best provides insight into the failing connection between the movies and real life. I was driving back home from the gig last night and it must’ve been round about 1am and as I took the turn for the house, there was this gorgeous but slightly scruffy and old retriever just standing on the corner of the road – looking very lost. It was a really cold and some what foggy night. You couldn’t see great – but as far as I could tell, it was on it’s own.

I thought about it for a second and stopped the car moreorless in the middle of the road and walked upto it. The dog was a real sweetheart and I played with it for atleast a minute - and then out of nowhere, this girl on her phone (with her mum about 10 yards behind her) pops up looking very worried – not for her dog, but more so by the creepy dog-napper/possible rapist who’d abandoned his car open in the middle of the road. I didn’t really bother saying much, since her mum was freaking out from behind those 10 yards (not that she herself was particularly keen on 1.15am conversation). So much for my serendipitous engagement. I was even dressed well. What do you know.

Hm. I’m playing jazz-duo with Nicolas during the break of a polo match in a couple of hours today. This is up at the Jaipur polo-ground, which happen to be in Delhi, but I’m still clueless as to it’s whereabouts. So I should spend sometime on Google earth figuring it out. Should be interesting.

Lets hope experience compensates.

On a smaller and more self-promotional note: Drift will start playing live jazz at Baci (in Sunder Nagar Market) as of the 18th of this month - which is a Thursday. As far as I know - we will be playing every thursday for the course of this month. The venue is a very warm cafe and the gig's will be fully acoustic and intimate. I hope and expect to see a lot of you there.