POINT OF VIEW feat. RON BUMBLEFOOT THAL (GNR) – THE INDIA TOUR DIARY (JUNE 2013)
A tour is not tours till you feel it in your bones and till it hurts you to a point that you feel that you need this tour to go on till it kills you. This is exactly how I felt when we hit the airport to come back home to Dubai from Calcutta, which was our last tour stop before we headed back to Dubai for a gig the very next day, only to be told after landing that all our gear including guitars and luggage was lost in transit and will not reach us till next night, which is well past our gig timing for the next day. Now that, my friends, makes a great Tour Diary! I have never written a Tour Diary before and I did not plan to write one for this tour as well. But after a lot of thinking I felt, well why not! It was after all, a wonderful tour with so many learning’s and so much fun. I might as well share it with people. Some might laugh, some might learn and for the ones who were involved it will bring back nostalgia. So here is what happens when an Award Winning Band from Dubai who no one in India really cares two f**&^ks about, tours India on a back to back tour schedule.
A flood of thoughts runs through my mind thinking about how this tour started and how much realization it had brought to me and to my friends in POINT OF VIEW. It’s great to step out ones comfort zone and throw yourselves to the lions once in a while. And this is exactly the way I felt at the start of the tour. Right from the time I picked up my first so called Hard Rock Album (Hysteria by Def Leppard) to the point where I thought of Joey Tempest being the hottest chick to front a rock band (which I was so terribly wrong about); I always wondered what it takes to be on the road. I have played various small gigs in my life as a musician, but they cannot be classified as a back to back tour. This tour finally helped me explore all those hidden mysteries of being on the road and a lot more, that happens on this phenomenal journey, that we call THE TOUR. I am not much of a blog writer but I hope this little note of mine, might inspire, teach and maybe entertain some of you musicians who have been working towards achieving their goals and their dreams as a musician.
Our first stop was Hyderabad, the IT capital of India, Hyderabad, also known for its Hyderabadi Biryani. We were having fun right from the word go (On flight fooling around video –http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=GhnI04AGIlk)
Weather was great, our flight was on time and the good looking Air Hostesses from Indigo made the flight worth it. Landed at the airport to be received by our two awesome drivers for our little stay; holding a placard that said “NIKHIL AND TEAM” and that is how it was at all the cities we stopped at. Point Of View as a band name just seemed really uncool at that point. NIKHIL AND TEAM it was!
So Nikhil and Team progressed to our little hotel called Casa Luxurio which rocked. Cozy rooms! The hotel was just a stone’s throw away from HARD ROCK CAFÉ Hyderabad. Not to forget an incident where a Transvestite tried really hard to extract cash from us at a traffic signal; unsuccessfully. I knew I was back in INDIA! Ron (GNR) joined us in the evening straight out of a back to back tour with GNR.
So we knew he needed sleep, right from day 1. We had not jammed with him since October 2012 where he came into Dubai for our album launch, but we just knew that it was gonna be fine. We knew that we would play his songs right and he would play ours absolutely fine. It is this chemistry that makes us feel at home with Ron. Day 1 in Hyderabad was pure relaxation and we had no clue about how insanely exhausting this tour was going to be at the end of it all. The surprises were plenty. The next day at Hard Rock Café Hyderabad was full of wonderful hospitality; courtesy: Hard Rock Café Management and loads of Media who came in to interview Point Of View and of course Ron from GNR. We met some fantastic people from the press (TOI, Deccan Herald and more). Sound check done and we were all ready for our first gig in INDIA. We were expecting a huge crowd and that is when reality hit us. It was raining; it was a weekday; and no one really knew Point Of View. If anyone came in it would be because they wanted to see Ron Bumblefoot Thal from GNR and then say .. oh there is Point Of View as well. Let’s check them out. We were clear in our minds that this tour was put together to have fun and introduce Point Of View to the Indian audiences, even if it meant riding on top of a big name like Ron Bumblefoot Thal. So with that thought we got onto the ride.
We had about a 100 odd people standing in front of us on a Week Night with some serious rains lashing the city. Well only 100? Yes only 100! And we said, well what the heck, we are here to have a good time and we are gonna make sure we party hard with the 100 in this room tonight. And party we did. Hyderabad had one of the most interactive crowds amongst all the places we visited on this tour. People sang along and the gig only got better with every passing song. At the end of it all, there was this one really special episode that would go down in memory lane for me. This was a slightly older couple who literally begged us to play Stairway To Heaven by Led Zeppelin. We had finished our final bow and wrapped up the set but their persistence was amazing. They would not let us get off stage. And we kept contemplating. Finally Ron said, “Well, let’s do this”. We had someone in the crowd who was carrying an acoustic guitar and he passed it onto stage. So here is the scene as it unfolded; Ron playing an acoustic guitar to 100 people with no line out. Me singing a song that I had not sung in ages with my mic pointed to Ron’s Acoustic Guitar; The rest of the band singing along with no microphones and pure enthusiasm powering whatever vocals from the stage. The 100 people singing along like it was the last day on earth was a moment that still brings goose bumps and fond memories. We clocked 2.5 hours on stage. This was that one night that will go down in memory lane. Needless to say, the after party was right then and there. We wrapped up this party at 1 am with the wonderful thought that, now we shall hit our beds for a 5 hour snooze and head to the airport by 7 am for our 10 am flight. But destiny had something else in store. We were informed about a new schedule which had our flight now leaving at 6 am and we need to be at the Airport by 3 am. And this is how it all started for a bunch of 6 guys who thought, touring was gonna be easy.
Somewhere on this tour we also encountered a “HAUNTED DOOR” at Hyderabad Airport.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7vjkOAyPgJY&feature=youtu.be
So we reach the departure lounge at Hyderabad Airport at 3 am, with no sleep to head to our next destination; the wonderful Garden City; BANGALORE! 6 am on a propeller fuelled plane was not exactly what we were expecting but we kept our fingers crossed for the propellers to keep going till we reached Bangalore. We took a Spice Jet flight and there were about 10 people on the flight with no Air Hostesses. We pretty much had nothing to fantasize about on this flight. There was a Flight Purser and 10 other passengers with no eye candy. And even if there was eye candy on this flight, our eyes were wide shut, thanks to the sleep that never came our way.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8G43QJ44f_Q
We gave ourselves the benefit of doubt and thought, well Bangalore is where we will get our share our sleep and then head out on stage. 10 am, cool weather and we were in Bangalore and loving it. Yet again, placards that said, NIKHIL & TEAM greeted us yet again. Point Of View was slowly dying out. Nikhil & Team it was. It was my first time in Bangalore and I loved the morning drive into the city.
I could see lots of greenery and it was all natural. The transition from a desert location (Dubai) to a super green city was perfect. We got into our hotel at around 9 am and were told that our rooms were far from ready. This meant we had to kill 1 hour in the lobby despite being sleep deprived. Well, we got so far, so we said; let’s take this in our stride as well. We decided to go in for Breakfast as we waited for our rooms to get ready. The hotel was immaculate and I loved it the moment we walked into it. It was called The Chancery and I was thinking, man I wish I had more time on this tour to enjoy this hospitality to the maximum. But there was another thought that was worrying me more. From a vocalist point of view, the only thing on my mind was a good 8 to 12 hour sleep before I hit stage. We got into our rooms around 10:30 am finally and by the time we settled in it was 12 noon. Just when I thought that, it was me and my bed in solitude, I heard hammers banging through the walls and the ceiling. I was trying to sleep and here I was trying to reason with Hammers banging into my walls. It was brought to our notice that a part of the hotel was under renovation and we were checked into the exact same section, which meant that the hammers were not going to stop. So much for hospitality from a so called 4 Star property. The hotel was awesome but the hammers would not let me enjoy this lovely room I had. I was trying everything I could to sleep and just when I thought I managed to get a wink, the phone rang. It was media calling for interviews. Well the interviews had to be done. It was media after all, even if they were calling in at an hour that was not designated to them. So at the end of it all around I managed to get a 2 hour nap, with the hammers and constant phone calls and I eventually stepped into sound check at 4 pm. This is when it started dawning on me that, the one thing that I am going to die for on this tour, is SLEEP. And so it was! No sleep at Hyderabad and now 2 hours sleep before the gig at Bangalore. I had no idea what was gonna happen post gig and I was not even thinking about it. I had friends who were gonna turn up at the Bangalore gig and I was so looking forward to meeting these friends who I had not seen in ages. We kicked off the gig around 10:00 pm to a packed house in Bangalore. We were told that a weekend would have attracted a packed house. But we were happy. We only wanted to re-live the Hyderabad experience once more and re-live we did. The crowd was fantastic. They sang along, danced along (despite Bangalore supposedly having a no dance rule in pubs; weird + shitty). It was a fantastic night also because I personally got to be on stage with one of the most talented guitar players in India, Mr. Bruce Lee Mani from Thermal & A Quarter. So I had the privilege of touring with Ron (Lead Guitars – GNR) and Bruce (Thermal & A Quarter). Life is good. No complaints. I still kept cringing about the sleep factor though
We wrapped up our Bangalore stint at 12 midnight and got back to the hotel to catch about 5 hours of our planned sleep. But that was not to be. I had left my sunglasses back in the venue and so I decided to go back. By the time I got my shades and came back in it was 1:30 am and by the time I hit the sack it was 3:00 am. So yet again, my sleep was limited to 2.5 hours after the gig. Lobby call was 5:30 am. And I was late as always. At that point, everyone in the band was given a little lecture about punctuality by Ron, after which I was always 30 mins early at every lobby call, on the rest of the tour, even if it meant skipping a morning crap.
So with an average of 2 hours of sleep over the last 2 stops, we were headed to a gig I was really looking forward to. My city. My Mumbai. The lack of sleep seemed to be the least of my bothers.
This leg of the tour was all about Nostalgia. I was playing a gig in my city after exactly 10 years. My last gig was in July 2003 at Not Just Jazz By The Bay and I was re-surfacing exactly 10 years later to do a gig in Mumbai. It was an amazing feeling to be on home ground. More than all this, I was gonna be playing a gig with my 6 month old daughter Samaia in the audience. What better way to initiate her into the world of rock music.
We landed in Mumbai around 12 noon to be welcomed by lashing rains and plenty of traffic. Yet again, I could see the mayhem ahead. Media Interviews lined up, plenty of traffic, a good 45 minute drive between the hotel & venue; all signs of no sleep yet again. We landed at the hotel around 2 pm and 4 pm was sound check. We decided to shower and head to the venue straight away. I had to handle media emails for the next stop (Delhi) and asked the rest of the band to go ahead. The traffic was bad and we decided that we were not coming back to the hotel and we were gonna stay at the venue itself till 10 pm and kick off the show. We wrapped up sound check by 6 pm and Samaia landed up with my family. She clearly could not adjust to a new place with so many new faces and she screamed louder than Judas Priest and cried heavier. With a stone on my heart a decision was taken. She along with my wife would head back to my hotel room and miss the concert, as she clearly was not ready for this. So mother and daughter headed back and we got busy greeting friends and acquaintances who started walking in. It was funny. My batch mates from school and college turned up in full force. Old friends from bands back in the day turned up. Some unexpected visitors from the scene were also to be seen. It was an interesting audience and it was clearly the busiest gig we had done on this tour, so far. This was also one of our best gigs, with good friend Fali Damania who volunteered to help us on the sound console. It was also a memorable occasion to have Warren Mendonsa (Zero/Blackstratblues) on stage with us for a jam. It was a privilege and the icing on the cake was good friend Tublue who came all dressed like a character from Star Trek/Transformers. I still did not know what he was wearing but the love was overflowing. The gig was pretty crazy and we played our hearts out. We played on till 12:30 am and despite the rainy weather, the place was packed. It sure was a night to remember. Was cool to see my 7 year old niece singing Third Eye and was cool to see my dad in a Point Of View tee shirt.
Yet again, we got around 2 hours of sleep that night before we left for Delhi at 6 am in the morning. We could feel the fatigue kicking in slowly. My voice had clearly started showing the signs that I did not wanna see. We packed our fears and joys and headed into the capital city of India; NEW DELHI!
New Delhi lived up to its reputation of being the Capital. Yet again we had the NIKHIL AND TEAM placards greeting us at the Airport with 2 punjabi speaking drivers welcoming us. None of them really knew where our Hotel was.
We were put up in a nice little cozy joint about 30 minutes from Hard Rock Café but as we were running late as always, thanks to traffic, flights etc, we decided to head into Sound Check directly, not realizing how much fatigue had already set in. We landed up at the venue to be welcomed by some nice and very hospitable HRC staff. Hustling between gear, new friends (Adil & Vee) and HRC management and Sound Check, we managed to grab some lunch. The Press was chasing us and what made it even scarier was the fact that I was losing my voice, due to lack of sleep over the last 4 days. I kept thinking, that I still had a gig in Calcutta the next day and then in Dubai the day after. The thought of losing my voice on stage was driving me nuts, although something like this had never happened to me before. The words “if there is anything most precious on tour, it is SLEEP” kept ringing in my ears and all I could think of was, wrapping up sound check and heading back into the hotel for a quick nap before hitting stage. All seemed to be going ok, and Ron seemed to have a spell of faint unconsciousness during sound check. Now we knew this was getting messy. The man had not slept properly for the last 4 days. He was also on tour with Guns n Roses before joining us on the Indian Tour. It was all hitting him. And I was like .. F*)*&k. This had to happen now ! More than anything, we all were really concerned for his health and the fact that we still had 2 more shows to go with him was worrying me. The fact that a lot of crowd was coming to this gig to watch him, more than watching a new band like us, was unnerving me, as it brought up the possibility of POV having to take stage tonight without him. We headed back to the hotel, with Ron pretty disoriented and falling asleep every now and then in the car. The moment he hit the bed in at the hotel, he was gone. It was 5 pm and we had 3 hours to freshen up, take our naps and head back to the venue by 9 pm to rock out a set for 2.5 hours. As much as I tried I could not get any sleep. The thought of losing my voice at the gig, worried me. The whole band morale was on an all-time low, with Ron’s situation and my voice situation. But what the f&*(())k ! The show had to go on. We got ready to leave the hotel at 8:30 pm and a tough but wise decision was made. Ron would rest tonight and POV would run the Delhi show. Ron was completely not willing to go with this plan but eventually he agreed only for the sake of the fact that we had 2 more shows to go and if he continued like this, the results could be disastrous for the balance shows. We got on stage, amidst, loads of sound issues. A small on stage spat between Siddhu our friend/sound-engineer and Chiro our dear drummer made things even more interesting. So now we had 5 issues to deal with:-
1. No Ron Bumblefoot Thal on stage, when a lot of people had come to see him with us.
2. No Sleep and Immense Fatigue
3. My voice which was sounding like a chipmunk
4. Sound Issues
5. The onstage Drummer-Sound Engineer Spat.
But me, being me, had made up my mind. This gig had to work. I was on an overdose of Halls Throat Lozenge’s. I owe the success of that night to Halls. We got on stage and after the first 2 songs, pretty much got onto easy mode. My voice came out fine. The sound stabilized. The crowd was very appreciative. And we had one hell of a jam with our guests and dear friends; Nitin, Subir and Saurabh from Parikrama, Adil & Vee, and Surojit from Them Clones. It was a fun night at the end of it all with a special mention to the guys from Wildlife Trust Of India. End of the night, the gig was fine. Everyone was happy. Ron was missed but the show went on.
We headed back to the much needed comfort of a bed for the next 4 hours and were up at 6 am to head to Delhi Airport. We did sign a guitar for the Wildlife Trust Of India at 6 am before leaving our hotel.
Our next gig was with E365 Media Solutions in Calcutta at an Arena called THE FESTIVAL and it was the biggest venue on this tour. My voice was slowly getting better although it had taken a good amount of beating. We landed in Calcutta amidst a lot of fanfare with an entourage of cars and volunteers from Calcutta greeting us. We were tired, sleepy but the enthusiasm and fanfare around our arrival in Calcutta pretty much woke us all up. Our host & Agent, Kinjal Bhattacharya was at the best of his hospitality. We almost felt like a bride that was entering her husband’s house for the first time. We were the center of all attention. Was lovely basking in all that attention!
Somewhere in my mind I knew that another round of fatigue is bound to hit us very soon but we had to try to get some sleep. That was the only thought ringing throughout. We headed straight into sound check at the venue. It was pretty crazy. Massive venue called Nazrul Manch and handling sound was a nightmare. The Acoustics of the place were not at all easy to handle. But the guy at the desk was doing great. He clearly knew the pros and cons of working at this venue. We met loads of people in Calcutta and I managed to re-lose my shades which I had so carefully recovered in Bangalore, after they were lost there. I guess their time had come.
All I could think of post Sound Check was BED & SLEEP. We hit the hotel. A cozy little place called The Wise Owl. Simple place with the basics was all we needed. All I need was the bed really. My savior Halls was in my jacket pocket. They had become my confidence booster post Delhi. Good old Indian brands never fail to let you down. That was my conclusion. We got to the venue at 9 pm all charged and ready to rock it out. And rock it out we did. The venue far from sold out but there were enough people there to get a riot going. The exceptional Tuki from Krosswindz joined us on stage and jammed with us.
It was the perfect closing concert to our tour. We also got to share the stage with 2 wonderful bands, Hacride and Nothnegal. It was unfortunate that we could not meet them or spend time with them, but we know they wowed the audiences. I guess we got a better reception, mainly because of Ron who was with us. But yes, having said that, we know a lot of people in Calcutta who had come to watch Point Of View.
And we also were aware about the couple of Calcutta based musicians who were dying to watch us and would have given their kidneys to catch us live, but due to reasons unknown, did not turn up at the gig. Besides all this, this was a memorable gig for one more person in the band. Calcutta is hometown to our drummer Chiro and he was really looking forward to this gig. And well guess what! He got hit by the fatigue, the moment he landed in Calcutta. This was pretty much a re-run of the same thing that happened to Ron the night before in Delhi. It was crazy. Chiro eventually did play the gig with a lot of enthusiasm and gusto but we could see that he was on the edge. All in all it all ended well and we could confidently say that we survived Calcutta and finally wrapped up a successful Indian Tour. Now where the f*&^%k is the BED??
Our Indian Tour had not yet ended. AIR INDIA flew us out the next day to Dubai via Mumbai. The flight was a wee bit late, but it was comfortable as hell. AIR INDIA rocked. And we finally landed in Dubai at 11 pm in the night to play a gig the next day in Dubai. And just as we thought, all was well and we could finally sleep a little before doing our Dubai gig, BAD NEWS HIT AGAIN – AIR INDIA had left all our gear and luggage in Mumbai during the changeover. This blog can go on and on. All I can say is .. this tour was a fu*()))&&^n blast. We knew that there was so much to learn from this tour, but we wanted to save these thoughts for later. Hopefully someone (like me) would have the time and patience to pen all this down. It taught us to appreciate what full time musicians like Ron do for a living and how much effort and commitment it actually requires. It also taught us all the aspects of a long tour in terms of logistics, planning, finances, discipline and most importantly, THE NEED FOR SLEEP.
Point Of View would like to thank everyone who made this tour possible and everyone who supported this tour and Point Of View will be back very soon, with an easier schedule. If there was one thing that we missed on this tour, other than SLEEP of course; was the fact that we could not spend time & explore all these new places we visited. The next time around, we would want to plan an easier schedule. North East India, Mumbai and Delhi are on the list towards the start of 2014 and we definitely are coming back. Hopefully I will not need to carry HALLS, although I love those things J
Signing off with a video from our Dubai gig one day after our India Tour ended (http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Lo-CZkl2CVY) & with a line from our song “CHAINSAW”..
WE’VE GOT DAMN STRANGE OCCUPATIONS, KEEPIN WITH OUR STATIONS
BUT WHEN WE’RE OFF THE TRACKS, THE CHAINSAW BRINGS US BACK
Love & Rock N Roll
Nik Uzi (Lead Vocals – POINT OF VIEW)
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