Doing only Bollywood gigs can also make a band

Musical tales

Malls and restaurants in Delhi, have given food for passion to many, especially their contribution to the gig culture. The culture wasn’t so apparent a few years ago, but now restaurants are constantly looking for ‘new talent’, such a hunt has helped many bands to showcase their talent and spread their name. 

A Delhi-based Sufi rock band, Fitoor which is just three years old is slowly spreading its wings. Started with a gig in a college, the band featured in Tamasha and Robot 2, and managed grab their 15 seconds of fame. 

“I am an actor and have some links in this industry that’s how we bagged the films. I am currently working in a new serial in which the title track and music has been given by us,” says Supranshu Khanna, lead vocalist and acoustic guitarist.

Fitoor recently performed in Londoners in Greater Kailash 1. They are a seven-member team, who have carefully chosen their band members based on their forte in the instruments they play. 

Vasu Mahendru (rhythm guitarist), Vaibhav Agnihotri (lead guitarist), Mack (bass and vocals), Jatin Dhingra (percussions and vocals), Keshav Chopra (drummer) and Deepak Joshi (keyboardist) are the other six members. 

“Fitoor, means craziness or madness for anything and so we have for our music. We follow the mantra of ‘do what you love , love what you do’ so , we just love music and we only have one profession and that is our music,” Khanna tells Metrolife.

When Khanna first formed the band, he was still in school. He only had three other members with him, they participated in school annual days, inter school competitions, college fests and achieved many awards. After surpassing many competitions which small-time musicians have to win, they now host many shows in cafes, private gigs, corporate gigs and radio Mirchi. 

“Music is a highly competitive field today and playing and creating music is the true happiness for us and we’re trying our best to succeed in it as a profession as well and till now we’re doing  good at it,” says Khanna.

He believes that if one aims at nothing, they will hit it every time. “So about our future plans, I would say, ‘the future is already here - it’s not just evenly distributed’.” 

The band has till now mostly played Bollywood songs and claims to release their original very soon. “We do experiments on every song to make it Sufi rock, fusion and unplugged,” adds Khanna. 

He explains their motto, is to be S.M.A.R.T.Er, coming from the popular business acronym S.M.A.R.T. that is ‘Specific Measurable Attainable Relevant and Timely’ . “In my band I want it should be S.M.A.R.T.Er because they need to include ‘everyone’ who can revisit us again and again,” says Khanna.

By playing only Bollywood covers, the band travels across the country three to four times in a month. 

“We always travel with our acoustic instruments so we can travel and play and jam on the other hand. And about playing in the gig, we play the same set of playlist. We always select the songs from the playlist according to the audience’s demand. We always try and make as close interaction as possible among the audience so they can also feel a part of the band. If our audience is happy at the end of the day, that is what we look for,” says Khanna.