Anish Nadh’s Blog

Today an old student of mine pinged me on Instagram, after I posted an old video of mine. Looks like he’s auditioning for a spot in his college band now and he also has a show this Sunday with his band.  I still remember him, when he came to me in his 4th grade, how soon time has passed! He also shared some of his videos ! He plays pretty well for a 16 year old! This made me happy!  I’m slowly getting back on track with my own things. I’m in the process of letting go of things that don’t belong to me. In fact nothing belongs to me. Everything is within me. The me in me is seeing the you within me clutching a redmi eating ramen from Youmee and we are in one happy place. Hope that made sense.  Now off I go to trip on some Swami Nityananda stuff! Bye!  

Mahesh was also writing songs and we thought instead a if being a cover band we must focus on originals and be a band. Ravi joined in to play bass and introduced us to Ashwin. We jammed and played a lot of shows and took every opportunity we got to play our own music. Johansson also joined the band as the sound tech. I felt this band was all about front man and his songs. The band was named Mahesh and the mix. 

 Jared was in our band slain when he was just thirteen years old. He is an amazing drummer! We used to call him karadi as it rhymed with Freddy, his nick name. Freddy wasn’t a drum machine, he could get any beat, on any subdivision and had a thorough knowledge of beat subdivisions and poly rhythm. He could drown the guitars down and break ear drums with his drumming! It was strange playing with a child. Most venues didn’t allow kids, but Freddy was an exception, they never asked. 

Bryden was the guitarist of St Joseph’s P U College. The band was called Shamans! Judah had heard of his guitar playing prowess and offered him a deal he couldn’t refuse! Be the guitarist of Slain! Bryden was amazing! He was playing Iron Maiden solos with his eyes closed. What I liked about Bryden was he also was into Acapella and pop music like MLTR.  He was this tall huge guy! We spent lot of time playing music and talked very less. The only thing we spoke about was about bands. I had the amazing opportunity of introducing Nuno’s music from extreme to Bryden! He still thanks me for it from time to time. I have one incident that deserves a separate blog post, that and more later! 

Stephen wanted Petrucci’s “State of Grace” played during the bridal march, at his sister’s wedding. That’s how I met Judah. It was him on the piano and myself on the electric. I had my trusty Supra distortion all wired up and ready! We never had much practice! But Judah was amazing and an intuitive player. He was just 16 at the time and was already playing amazing arpeggios. Stephen guided him through the chord changes and he nailed it.  Judah was quick to tell me about his band Slain and how they were winning college fests! Being the  college fest victor myself, I wanted to tell him winning college fests were nothing! Instead I told him that, there’s a band called “Haven” if you can beat them, you’ve made it. I never thought they will beat the band. He made it his personal mission to beat them.  Few months later I get a call, it was Judah! (By now I had a basic Sony Ericsson phone) “We beat Haven”. The news papers had the original members of Slain on page 3 the next day! 

Stephen was my friend from school. In the assembly we stood together, he was slightly taller than me. He played a little bit of guitar and we sometimes talked about chords. After I moved to Kammanahalli, I was near Stephen’s place. We jammed on a few songs, I also showed him some chords. Stephen gave me the GP4 software, and I was on it, learning songs, doing exercises! It was an amazing software, that had tabs of almost any song you could think about.  Stephen and I played a lot of guitar in college, we were called in to play invocation songs every time there was a college event at KJC. We also started a gospel group called signature which later had Bryden Lewis taking over after we passed out of college.  Stephen also invited me to play at his sister’s wedding march with A keyboard wizard kid in his 11th  standard!  That’s how I met Judah! 

 I was walking back home one day after church and I saw a guitar body being hung out to dry at a workshop! I walked in and it was Arul’s guitar factory! He was building a classical guitar from scratch! He was kind enough to allow me in and he even showed me a harp guitar that he’s making for someone! I had recently seen Andy McKee playing one! He explained to me the process of making guitars and I became a frequent visitor there! He was kind enough to answer every question I had patiently. He made this shop in the memory of his son.  I would’ve learnt to make guitars from him had I stayed there in Kammanahalli.  Arul passed away during Covid. He had helped me set up my classical guitar and it still plays so good. 

 I listened to Frank Zappa after Kenny gave me a vcd, a documentary of Frank Zappa and the Mothers, it was a crazy documentary with an insight into how this band worked. Also I was very curious because Steve Vai was in that band!  Thermal and a Quarter also happend to quote them in their song Paper Puli! So I was quite fascinated. This documentary was not for me, but I discovered the exposure of politics in their art form 

BSM started getting a little too expensive for me. They increased the fee all of a sudden. I spoke to Kenny and he agreed to teach me free of cost. I learnt music at the new BSM campus and then moved to the Arul’s guide workshop.  It was only because of this I was able to progress much further in classical music. I later moved to jalahalli and the classes became difficult to do.  

 Kenny, was my music teacher at BSM! He was relieved that I already knew how to read. Kenny showed me through the formal way of learning the guitar. The posture, the foot stool, the nail files and everything! Classical guitar grounded me, I was not free to do whatever I liked! My teacher was not drunk anymore! He paid attention to everything, and corrected me. He gave me the discipline of what a music teacher must be. He instructed me to be 10 minutes early and prepare for the lesson by tuning and keeping my music stand and foot stool ready! I was an hour early, I practiced and spent time at the library at BSM, reading about Mozart, Beethoven and Paganini! None of them played classical guitar! I preferred learning to play caprice 24 over Tarrega! But Kenny brought my attention back to the book and helped me progress through the lessons quickly though the school wanted him to teach slowly to retain the students and the fee.  I have more to write about Kenny, more in the next one! 

 I taught guitar to some friends and Cherian was one of them. He was completely tech savvy! He had the latest softwares, lime wire at that time! Took two days to download a video or an entire album! Cherian had them all. You ask for an album he gave you the entire discography with bootlegs!  I got Steve Vai, Dream Theater, Satch and everything! And Cherian had even more! He was willing to share and write them down for me. I also got some instruction dvds written and we practiced a lot! Cherian was into the whole death metal scene while I tried Vai on my Givson and it sucked!  I owe the bulk of my music education to the wealth of information that came from him! God bless him!  

Joshi took me to David’s house one day. I heard him practising. He also played some Racer X live at Whisky a Go Go dvd, on his computer. Joshi helped me get some of the dvds and wrote them for me.  I saw Yngwie playing with a symphony orchestra, but David didn’t want you share his rare music collection. I was mesmerized by the speed and accuracy with which Yngwie  played! The internet was not quick, it took about a week to download any video! I was upset that I couldn’t get Maalmsteen. Joshi gave me some more more dvds copied! And thanks to him I heard some amazing bands! 

The next week it was classes with Along. Satem introduced me to him in their mother tongue and I heard him say “talented”, they were talking about me.  Along started his classical guitar lessons with me and boy was he drunk. He didn’t stink as much but he was high as a kite. He was a good teacher, very methodical and talked highly of his teacher Kenny from BSM!  Along was very strict with the posture and technique yet he was patient. I did not have a classical guitar, I learnt to read notes again after those piano classes with Kaundinya, I was good at keeping time but not great at identifying notes.(I’m still struggling with that.). After lessons I would walk from shantinagar to Cathedrals to catch my bus. I still can’t believe that I walked this far with my guitar in my younger days! 

 Joshi took me to his teachers Along and Satem! We walked through the streets of Shanti Nagar and entered a half constructed incomplete building. Joshi showed me an old Hero Honda Splendor bike and said “Machaa he’s here” we had no phone. We had to make an appointment and just show up.  I met Satem that day! Along was not around. Joshi introduced Satem as the most amazing solo player who played Eric Johnson, Steve Vai and Satch! I was quite impressed with his playing.  They lived in an unfinished house lot of open windows, must’ve been very cold during winters. But Satem asked me to play on his guitar, and I did! He liked my playing and gave me a few exercises to do! I did them religiously! He said “Come next week, Along will teach you classical! And we’ll alternate classical and electric guitar”. I was thrilled to her this, I worked hard and never missed any class and waited for the next week for classes with Along!  

Joshy was another friend from Cathedrals, my junior! He was a huge fan of Joey! (who isn’t) We bonded over our common language Malayalam! He loved music and never seemed to get the rhythm right, but he worked his ass off practising 5 hours a day, filling his books with notes and tabs.  He took lessons with Ebi and was suddenly playing finger style. Joey never really taught me how to play finger style, but Joshy was willing to share. He even introduced me to his teachers, Ebi, Along and Satem. I learnt music from all of them! They helped me get my techniques and theory in place.  Ebi taught me jazz chords and some fingerstyle classical music, Along taught me to read music and Satem taught me how to play electric guitar! These guys were masters! I will write about them later!  I am indebted to Joshy for leading me to the right teachers! Though he was an engineering student, he ended getting a sales job at Reynolds! And like any pure Malayali does, he moved to Dubai! The last l heard was

I had a class mate, from my hometown! Avinash, he was quite a metal head! Though he never had a music talent, he accompanied us to all the shows that we did as a roadie! He carried our guitars pedals and cables! Once I saw saw him writing some notes in a hurry, and on closer look I noticed he was writing “For whom the Bell Tolls” by Metallica, trying to remember the lyrics.  His parents were not happy with his choice of music, and that made him pursue it more. I even visited him in Kerala, after he left college and I lost touch! It will be amazing to meet him someday! 

I learnt to play the 4 finger G chord from Joey. We hung out a lot during my second year at cathedrals. Joey had some peculiar quick food remedies. Egg puff sandwiched between buns, raw Maggi with the added masala! He was quite some character. Coloured hair, the girls loved him.  He knew how to play and improvise a solo and always strived to improve his abilities without copying any one. His playing is unique to this day.  Joey was also a perfectionist he didn’t like it when I missed the F# note during his solo! He kept yelling F# at me and I still didn’t know  where it was at Bishop Cottons fest. We ended up winning it anyway! Joey always saved the day when it came to fests. We hung out in between after I left college and shared our love for Mr Big and Extreme. 

Haniel was one of the guitar students of Jayanth uncle back in the days. He played quite ok, and he was more Bollywoody kind of a player. He had a peculiar way of twitching his shoulders while playing some cool chords to draw in attention. The girls in church loved him.  He left an electric guitar with me for some time, he was also using a flanger pedal. It reminded me of the 80’s South Indian movies. It was not a very cool sound with my peers.  His electric guitar stayed with me for a long time. I decided do take it apart! I removed all the screws and pickups and put it all back together. As if by magic, a lot of screws were left behind in excess! I didn’t know where they went. I atleast understood how an electric guitar looked like in the end! 

I joined the Saturday guitar lessons that happened in church. I was all set with a book, guitar and a pencil. Showing up to the next building was really easy. Uncle noticed that I already played a little bit. The first thing he did was teach me tuning. He de-tuned the strings and made us tune. He taught us to use one tuned string to compare the others. In a day day and age where tuning apps and devices were unheard of, we relied on our ears. This was an important lesson indeed.  Uncle was more encouraging the more I played. He taught me some more, while the others struggled with basics. I watched his every move. My rhythm playing improved drastically because I followed him. I played with him. It was all practical, I learnt everything with just listening to his sound and imitating him. 

Jayanth uncle, Greying hair, black beard, the go-to person for all the Holy Cross needs. He took care of the youth and Sunday School. He taught me how to tune the guitar and a lot of chords to practice. I watched him playing chords like a hawk and picked up every little thing he was doing. He was more than happy to share the cool things he was playing through the free lessons he gave on Saturday evenings. He was patient and waited until we got it right. He corrected us every time  we went off.  I massively improved on my guitar playing skills! Skills that will stay with me forever. I owe it to uncle Jayanth, he was the spark I needed. Today as I make a living teaching music, I write this post with gratitude to uncle Jayanth.