Indie Music Calling

Twenty five shows across 22 Indian cities, in a little under two months: This is Hai Khabar, the biggest indie music festival in the country. In May this year, Worker Bee’s homebois (an entertainment company based in Chandigarh), announced their first official cross-country tour with Samar Mehdi and Saby Singh. The cross-country indie music tour has already been to Jammu, Solan, Chandigarh, Lucknow, New Delhi, Jaipur, Nagpur, Mumbai, Ahmedabad, Pune, Surat and Goa, heading to  Bengaluru this weekend.

Samar Mehdi and Saby Singh have an established fan  base in their own right, both highly trained in classical music, the theory peppered with their own tastes and outside influences. And Saby says his most valuable asset, is his ear. “My grandfather taught me in unconventional ways, that I am beginning to understand now. He focused more on developing my instincts, rather than making me just learn theory. I think that helped me establish my routine as a songwriter more than anything.” Growing up, he wanted to be a physicist, his love for music returning to him later in life, “It is a means for me to understand who I am and my purpose,” he says. As rock star Sting once said, “music is the economy of silence,” a philosophy that Saby lives, crafting music around silence, not the other way around. He has a range of influences too, growing up with “Rafi Saab, Lata Mangeshkar, Manna Dey and my mom, who by the way, is an exceptional singer,” he smiles. Later, he would discover American rock, then British music. “It changed my life. I wanted to be in a band. Right now, though, I am listening to a lot of prog and singer-songwriters.”

Samar Mehdi, hails from a middle-class family in Bhopal, where a familial emphasis on practicality overrode his early passion for music. Not that it stopped him, though. He would sneak out to music lessons, learning to play musical instruments at a young age. It only served to strengthen his connect to the art form. “I decided to become a full-time musician when it became obvious I wasn’t going to be able to do music on the side,” he recalls. “I was 28 when I left my job in  Mumbai and came  back home to put all else aside and just work on my music.” Mehdi is a percussive finger-style guitarist –where a single guitar is used for rhythm and melody, emulating the sounds of an entire ensemble. “I started writing music in this format because I have always written songs that involve multi-layered arrangements and I didn’t want to compromise on that even though I was going to perform them solo. It was a question of what works best for my songs. I also reconnected with the 10-year-old version of me, the boy who wanted to push his abilities to the limit and then push those limits.”

The rapport they share is strong. “If there is an artist who I’d have loved to tour with, it would have been Samar. There is so much to learn from him. His approach to music, how ambitious he is about his art, his interpretation of rhythms, his pursuit of excellence – it’s a privilege to tour with such a fine musician,” Saby says. Samar reciprocates the sentiment, describing Saby as a “rare gem in the Indian Indie scene. It has been an honour to go on tour with him and witness him in action on stage,” he adds. “When he performs, I am no longer the artist standing beside him but a fan, completely in awe of what he creates. It’s incredible how, although we are vastly different musically, there is so much we have in common. It fits as one big show, instead of two separate acts.”

Saby has an EP release in the pipeline, which will happen soon after the tour ends. He is also working on a full-length album that he will produce himself and hopes to release in 2020. Samar, on the other hand, has outlined for himself a series of short-term goals and is working hard to have his music reach more people everyday. His second EP is on the cards too and he promises that there’s plenty of new stuff on the way.

Kunal Malhotra- founder of Worker Bee says, “Saby and Samar Mehdi enjoy their fan following in the metropolitan cities and the other parts of the country alike.
It is not limited to one demographic. It is far and diverse. With this tour, we wanted to take over all of that. We have worked rigorously to put together every detail to ensure that we and our fans do not miss out on anything.” Tickets for Hai Khabar are available on Instamojo and buying them entitles the buyer to a digital copy of Samar Mehdi’s debut EP ‘Urooj’ and an exclusive sneak peek into the pre-production of Saby’s upcoming music.

What: Hai Khabar tour in Namma Bengaluru
When: June 28, 8pm to 10:30pm
Where: The Courtyard, 105, KH Road (Lalbagh Double Rd),  Shanti Nagar, Bengaluru