I think I am tone deaf: Vishnu Raghav

At the centre of it all is Roby Abraham. All the people gathered in the makeshift room are here because of him. There are musicians, a singer, a director, a cinematographer, and other technicians. In less than a day, they have managed to shoot a music video in that room, set up somewhere in a building being built in Edappally, Kochi.

Roby is the composer here, and with him is the band Everafter formed by mates Madonna Sebastian, Ashwin Aryan, Rex George, Joel Varghese and John Thomas. Vishnu Raghav, actor and short filmmaker, is the director of the music video Veruthe.

“We were all here to do it for Roby. It was more a gathering of friends than work,” he says. “The song is like a test video of the band, the first one shot after they formed as a band.”

Vishnu had known Roby since the time he acted in Theevram as Dulquer’s friend. Roby was the music director. After that, when Vishnu made short films and ads, he’d rope in Roby to do the music. The connection brought them together again for Veruthe.

There were more connections here. Cinematographer Swaroop Philip, who worked in Orkut Oru Ormakoot, Vishnu’s first acting venture, took the camera for him. Appu Bhattathiri, who has edited Vishnu’s short films, became the editor.

“The colour grading was done by Livingston Mathew. He was in Mysore, Swaroop in Kochi and I would be in Thiruvananthapuram. We would exchange samples on WhatsApp and rework on it.”

Vineesh Banglan was the art director. Among the musicians are Motherjane’s John Thomas and Vivek Thomas. You could see John on the drums, and Vivek has done the mixing. “I couldn’t figure out which instrument was playing when I heard them all together. I think I am tone deaf,” laughs Vishnu.

But then he has always been a big fan of Avial and Motherjane. And Roby was particular he got all the band mates on the video. “He wanted it simple, without any gimmicks. He wanted it raw.”

So you see Madonna, who played Celine in Premam, sings the song. She has also acted in a Tamil film and is busy with King Liar in Malayalam now. Vishnu himself is on a break from acting, after Saaradhi.

“Everyone has been asking me about making a feature film. I should take it up seriously now. I have a one-liner ready,” he says.