Metal magic with a difference

Bangalore has always been known to be a great platform for music and it’s no exception for the metal genre.

The City has produced some great bands over the years and many of them have played out of a garage. With a strong focus on promoting new talent and encouraging different genres of music, ‘Garage Jam’ at Sonido Musicals presented the ‘Sounds of Metal’ recently.

Talking about ‘Garage Jam’, Arwen Magma, the host of the event, said, “This takes place every Friday. It’s a platform for artistes – both amateur and professional – to showcase their talent. We started this concept in October, 2012 and the crowd and  bands have grown over the years. Every year, we have two to three new bands performing and making it big in the City.” 

There were three bands performing that day: ‘Spaghettify’ (hard rock), ‘Neutrotopsy’ (extreme metal) and Brahma (progressive metal). They brought in a different flavour with their eclectic mix. One of the bands got the crowd talking with the introduction of a female vocalist. There aren’t many metal bands that have a female vocalists and the audience were curious to hear this unusual spectacle.

 ‘Spaghetiffy’ comprises of members from different fields of engineering and currently includes Joewin Shamalina (vocals), Vamshi Krishna (guitars), Harish Jayanth (bass guitar) and Amol Mahendra (drums).

Joewin Shamalima said, “It’s been amazing. There’s a different feel to the band. As a female vocalist, I draw the crowd. The choirs I was a part of helped me get to this stage. Our music comprises of the day-to-day struggles most of us face.”

The female audience were enthralled by her performance, ending the stereotype that only men are into metal. They were happy that a woman had finally taken the spotlight in the metal scene in the City.

“This is a great platform for metal bands to perform. Any female singing is good indeed. It set the band apart from the rest. This proves that women can do just about anything and sing any genre. They should encourage more women into metal bands. But this is a good start,” said Namrata Rao, a student of Christ College.

Also featured that evening was a pair of twins studying in twelfth standard who were performing for the first time. Their father was beaming with pride while they were performing.

“We’ve always had conflicts with culture and the way we bring up our children. We force them to listen to Indian filmi style and Carnatic music, which is great here but not worldwide. So I have encouraged my boys to be a part of a metal band so that they can make it big some day and take the Indian spirit into this western music genre,” said Sunil Ramdas, the father of the twins from ‘Neurotopsy’. 

When asked what inspires them to make music, they said, “Our original compositions revolve around social issues, like that of the Delhi gang-rape. We wish to spread social awareness through our music and seek inspiration from daily events,” said Vyshak, one of the vocalists.