Fellow artiste Rahul Guha Roy celebrates the 50 years of Lou Majaw’s life in music
LOU MAJAW’S celebration of fifty years in the music culture – for his music is more a culture than a business really – is remarkable for its avoidance of the kind of nostalgia that marks most golden jubilees. It is instead intended as a milestone that flags off the prospect of better, higher quality work that he intends for the future while providing his fans, friends and well wishers a peek into the five decade long journey as a songsmith and performing artiste that has brought him to this point in time as one of India’s most celebrated pioneers of rock music.
On 23 May 2015, Lou will be onstage in a concert featuring himself, his venerable band of fellow musicians and an array of guest artistes who have been associated with him on a road well walked. Apart from showcasing the trajectory on which his music has evolved over the years the concert is a way of drawing attention to the fact that one does not have to follow some stereotype to be successful. In India a vast majority of musicians find success in the format of film director, playback singer or being a highly rated session player in film-oriented work. Lou Majaw is none of these.
Rising from a modest background in Shillong, he has managed to become an untiring ambassador of home grown rock music with an underlying message of love, tolerance and harmony which he has taken to almost every part of India. From Calcutta to Bangalore and Gauhati to Goa there isn’t a town or city where the serious aficionado of rock music is unaware of his role as a pioneering presence in the country’s rock history. He has done this with minimum fuss and maximum dedication with the Lou Majaw live experience continuing to be an explosive energetic juggernaut that can never fail to excite, enthuse and educate an audience.
The Road Ahead as a concert highlights a number of themes that have informed and provided the basis of Lou’s music and general philosophical outlook as member of the human race. In the context of music, he believes that what we should do to achieve a certain excellence is to “keep on working and keep on moving”. Stasis being the breeding ground of apathy and decline, Lou says that one of the important aims of the event is to, “create a gathering of fellow musicians to have a meaningful time”. An event that would be replete with songs and poetry, to give both the participants and those who witness, an insight into, “what music can do and what power it has”. He says from the earliest days when he started out in Calcutta many decades ago he had “the hunger” to taste that power which may be called a spiritual tug of sorts since music is in the end a “blessing”. In a lighter vein this legendary warrior of rock and soul music also mentions that the move to the City of Joy came about because, “I ran away from the nightmare of reality. Yes, I was a coward that’s why I ran away”.
In hindsight that spectacular act of cowardice has given us a musician and human being who has touched us with the artistic brilliance of his work and the grace of his thoughts. The Road Ahead concert will be yet another opportunity to sample the man and his work 50 years down the line from where the story began.
The story of Lou’s life may have begun in the then vibrant musical scenario of Park Street in a Calcutta that was throbbing to the strains of jazz, blues and rock, but it was in his hometown that he would actually lay the seeds that would go on to blossom in the years to come. Having by then discovered Dylan and the power of his songwriting Lou had a sense of wanting to develop a sound, style and craft that would have individuality beyond merely imitating other artistes. After a successful stint with Blood and Thunder a leading group of the time Lou went on to create Great Society – a band that emphasized originality to a greater degree than his earlier efforts.
With beautiful songs and a somewhat haunting original Great Society captured the imagination of a generation of music fans and found national acceptance and admiration. At this point one should also mention that some of Shillong’s finest musicians like Fairman Pariat, Bert Cooper, Arjun Sen, Sam Shullai, Rudy Wallang and Ferdie Dkhar have at different points in time worked with Lou, lending both heft and true musicality which his songs truly deserve. Indeed, they are world class in the truest sense of the term. As the Great Society juggernaut kept rolling through the country the inevitable frictions and difference that are so much a part of rock band history everywhere began to take hold. However, two fantastic albums Breakthrough and Dance Your Ass Off were released in cassette tape format. Featuring golden tunes like Sea of Sorrow, True Loving, paint A Picture, Come Home and Shadow of the Sun, the albums remain a fine example of the best that Indian rock had to offer in the eighties.
In the post Great Society period, Lou has become an iconic father figure to a whole new generation of musicians and fans. His energetic live shows, charismatic smile and a reservoir of songs both originals and covers that he performs in his unique fashion, is now the stuff of legends. The annual Bob Dylan birthday tribute is now a well known show in many parts of the country and draws listeners from other countries as well. The Road Ahead concert will feature a number of guest artistes from other cities like Uday Benegal (Mumbai), Vasundhara (Delhi) and I (Rahul Guha Roy, Calcutta). Other Shillong bands like the Strait Brothers, Fourth Element and Serenity choir will add their own distinctive musical voices to the event.
I suppose Lou Majaw’s 50 years in music could be called a triumph of the spirit against the aging of the body. A triumph of soul over the triviality of our mundane daily lives, but curiously the man himself has a somewhat startling observation to make. “No one really knows anybody. Sometimes we don’t even know ourselves “says Lou, clearly indicating that the process of introspection and a search for somekind of meaning has far from ended. Perhaps it has actually only begun.