The Song Story

This is the title song for the short movie Stinking Cigar by Arun. Stinking Cigar produced by Eternal Rainbow creation was shot in NJ and is scheduled to be released in trigger street.com very soon. I take great pleasure in working in this project.

Daddy’s Girl Original Sound Track from [Short film] Stinking Cigar by Arun Lead Vocals:Alisha Thomas,Words: Udhaya, Composed by Srikanth Digitally Recorded at Studio1234 Acknowledgements: Dr. Thomas, Arun, Jayashree Srikanth. All Rights Reserved © 2000, Sri Inc

After reading the movie script, I felt creating simple theme music for the story will carry the mood in the story line all thorough, Director [Arun] also insisted on the theme music concept. After reading the script while traveling from Silver Springs to Washington DC frankly it took me about 20 minutes to get the melody line in my head. Same evening the basic track was laid and the projected theme music was kind of ready, a prototype version.

Arun and I had planned a song for the title credits. My plan was to embed this theme music as the “chorus” for the song. It seemed workable to the team. Before everything I have to find proper words for the score. I requested my writer Udhaya to come up with words that fits the mood, since Udhaya had already worked on the dialogues in the short film, he came up with the words very quickly, to my great surprise the chorus lines he sent in the first cut matched my theme melody 100%. Best part was, Udhaya had not heard my theme music; even Arun had not heard it till then.
I preferred them hear it only after I complete the arrangements. After this great coincidence, I started to feel more energy presence to complete the song. I created a basic groove for the track and started to record vocals with Alisha, Alisha has already sung in my composition, we did the “Bharatham” track, as of today downloads for this song ranges around 2500+. So I was really happy to work with her again. A great find for my composition, Alisha as usual did the track quickly; she and her dad Dr. Thomas took a rough mix of the track to review it.
On my side, reviews after reviews, I started to feel about my backgrounds, it did not jell the way I wanted, I was complaining to my peers and more to myself about this. I felt the beats and arrangements needed rework. So I took the drastic step to scrap out the existing arrangement, decided to rework this from scratch.
Alisha for her part, just like me a self critic, clearly told me she wanted to redo major portions of it. Thanks to Dr. T who created the energy to work again on this track.
During the long weekend when everyone was relaxing on their paid holiday, we recorded the vocals again, this version seemed to jell quite well, finally got it mixed, sounds were balanced and the date of release was set.Working on an English track is new to me; I have no prior experience of any sort, still was keen to learn this cross over music and wanted to try it out. I can also put forth some Indian music ideas over it. Arun provided a great arena to test this out, with Alisha’s and Udhaya’s great support, I was able to do this to our satisfaction, I hope people would welcome this and encourages us to work more. Please listen to this track and send your comments.

Srikanth.

ICC aka International Confusion Committe

I was reading an article in Rediff, by Prem Paniker , he was literally furious on certain restriction on the play field for the ICC Cup being held now in the UK.

It seems, no other food product other the sponsor’s products are permitted in the ground
The ticket contains a list of food products allowed ranging from chips to cookies. This is to protect the sponsors from the Ambush marketing. I don’t want to discuss if I agree with him or not, however his point seemed very clear.

In my opinion, ICC’s approach in this matter is rather unprofessional. Their new clause clearly invites trouble. Let us take NFL or NBA or a cinema theater here in the US as examples. They prevent this ambush marketing by not permitting any out side food. Hey! Rule is very simple; if you want to munch something while being entertained inside the arena you need to buy food at a premium price from the outlets run by the sponsors themselves - simply no outside food allowed, it you carry food, it will be dumped. No mercy to anyone. This rule does not apply to water.

The issue of not allowing outside food is clearly treated as a policy matter. Law clearly protects this if it is announced as a company policy well ahead of time. ICC known for its slipshod or careless behavior should have brain stormed this issue properly with professionals who are capable or have previous experience in planning such policies and events. I do not know if ICC has such policies, at the same time I would not be surprised it they have clause that is buried deep inside the policy pages known only to ICC office bearers. What else you could expect from Malcolm Speeds and Jagmohan Dalmiyas, in spite for their mediocre or no organization capacity cricket has come a long way, thanks to its poor aficionados, if not for their blind patronage, Speeds and Dalmias cannot have their first class air travel. It is time that ICC honors its real patrons "the fan" by improving the amenities and other facilities for the fans, instead of making a gaga over this ambush marketing issue.
[2 min interval]

PART 2
THANK YOU DISHNETWORK.

Hey! do you know I did not subscribe for this ICC cup? Right from 2000 I have been watching cricket via Dish network. All cricket matches were kind of affordable, but today it has reached a point that I cannot subscribe cricket on Dish network, basically Dish network and Kelly broadcasting system are the sole copyright holders for cricket telecast in USA. They want a greedy $250 for both Holland cup and ICC trophy. Seriously on all give and take, the real matches starts only after the minnows being eliminated. How can Dish network expect me to pay so much and watch games that are mere academic interests of ICC? I doubt if I will watch few games in the line up for free.

How can dish network expect me to pay and watch Bangladesh vs. any country? Frankly I don’t mind spending my time on the following alternatives. 1. Lawn mowing 2. SQL data back 3. Lotus notes programming. 4. Exercise. 5. Learn multiplication tables above 12.

Agreed, I am cricket fanatic but not a fool. Do you know the entire NFL [American football] season on Direct TV is much less than ICC Cup? Ridiculous, with such high telecasting cost, ICC wants to spread this game around the world, a mere dream that will never come true. Only way to attract more people to watch cricket is easy access. Anyone would think twice to spend huge to watch an unknown game. Added to agony, listen to this, cricket fanatics like me who cannot afford a mammoth $250 were blessed by Cricinfo.org, they offered live unofficial commentary for $19.99 for all the games. The cricket chemicals in my body reacted at once and subscribed for this service. But alas few days before the tournament they sent an email stating that they cannot bring live commentary because of copy right restrictions and they refunded the money, they have promised now to bring the finals and India vs. Pakistan live for $5.00. [whisper: Hope dish network does not read this] I was denied commentary for other matches.

A relief came via BBC, BBC sport 5 promised live radio commentary via the internet, Hey don’t rush, KBS and Dish Network wanted more brutal punishment on people who failed to subscribe the ICC cup, they fought for copyrights and blocked commentary in USA. Commentary can be heard live in UK alone THANK YOU Dish network and KBS or who ever did this to all the cricket fans in USA. Hey! What the heck, football just began first week was simply awesome, for now, I am cured from this cricket mania.

Proof of Concept

Proof of Concept

I happen to watch a movie last Saturday evening in SUNTV, STAR, Staring Prashanth, Raghuvaran, Jyothika, Kodambakkam Dad (a.k.a) Vijay Kumar.

Here are some of the bits and pieces of the movie; Prashanth is a “thayagi” [not just because he is son of Thaygararjan], it seems he accepts petty thefts charges on behalf of others and serves jail terms for them. So the cops call him a “Thayagi”. I missed the movie from reel one; I was watching ESPN foot ball news. However I joined the movie action some where in reel number 5, where Prashanth helps a bunch of prisoners to dig a tunnel out of the prison. They build perfectly round tunnel that will make Sumerians and Egyptians jealous. I really don’t know what the jailers were doing when these thugs were busy digging a mini size “kolar thanga vayal”, added to the fun, area of the jail was about 20x20, [PCO/STD telephone booth] in which 10 prisoners are put together, even Abu Gharib prison seemed wider to me. [Abu Grape or Abu Graph or Abu Gooorp I really don’t know, you may want to check cable news for latest pronunciation].

Prisoners escape thanking the good hearted Prashanth, but the truth is Prashanth misguides them; the tunnel goes directly out to a manhole in a police training camp. The plan is they would get caught as soon they go out. Instead of wasting the time, Prashanth could have told the cops right away about the escape plan and earn one more thayagi credit; in turn we would have been saved from one more stupid cop comedy, after this BS, the gang leader vows to settle account with Prashanth [please book mark this]. Prashanth then goes out of the jail

(Pudsu kanna Pudusu , loud kugumam Advt. Followed by Aswini Aswini Aswini herbal oil and Padar thamarai cream I have never heard of this Tamil word “padaR thamarai”, need to call 1-800-kONar to verify its validity.)

Vijay Kumar in action sneaks out from Anna international Terminal, three thugs are very upset to see him escape. Gulf Air, Air Bus A320 lands in some airport, Vijay Kumar meets with Shadows Ravi who seemed to be the care taker of Vijay Kumar’s son, he is a spoilt kid and is being hidden from the evil world for some reason. It took me about 10 minutes to get this plot right. [Warning: Tube lights might take longer] But to have a son with such a bad acting and behavior, I would prefer Vijay Kumar to hide from the world.

Flash Back. [Pudsu kanna Pudusu , loud kugumam Advt., they promise to tell about Actors Pay scale]

Flash Back, Raghuvaran’s son is child prodigy swimmer called Lingeswaran, he is being kidnapped by Veerapan look alike. Vijay Kumar is the police chief who handles this case. He does not budge in for the kidnappers. In turn Veerapan Junior takes out the poor kid. Raghuvaran is very upset, he plans to kill Vijay Kumar’s son. You many ask this, how come Raghuvaran knows that Vijay Kumar has a son? , answer: Vijay Kumar’s son, about 5 years shows up in the dense forest pestering his dad to go back home. He must have come there for a vacation or something. So the point is in order to save his son from Raghuvaran he hides his son in some foreign country where gulf air flies. He also lies to his wife [Sri Vidhya] that son has been kidnapped. I am very sure that the person who comes as Vijay Kumar’s son must be the director or producer, unless other wise no one would even consider him. He simply goofs up, over acts and irritates. In this process he breaks about 10 glass bottles and I broke few in watching this agony.
Prashanth meets Jyothika they fall in love. [That’s all, how and where does not matter]

Police now pester Prashanth for more sacrifices [”thayagams”], but Prashanth sneaks out and goes into a wedding hall where he searches for his girl, the one and only Jyothika. He gets caught by Vijay Kumar, because he was doing some "Boys" type acts that should make Ananda vikatan say "cheeee" once again but instead -- Chhhhhhhhhhhuda Chhhhhhhhhhhuda (tamilA…oh oh) cup coffee , irritating Ananda vikatan advt. shows up.

After this, Police shows up and gives Prashanth a (T) certificate , they tell that he is a Scapegoat for others; Wow! VJK [please I cannot type this name fully anymore] gets a plan, asks Prashanth to act as his son, according to his plan Raghuvaran will take out this guy by mistake. Poor Raghuvaran, I think like Karna he can use only one bullet for his entire life time.

[Pudsu kanna Pudusu , loud kugumam Advt followed by SunTv news synopsis that boasts Tamil shall be made a Red language soon, one more time - PKP [Pudsu kanna Pudusu]. Researchers have found that in about 24hrs, the number of times PKP commercial shown is more than the actual number of meaningful pages in Kungumam.]

Poor VJ [sorry VJK is too long] shows a picture of his wife and Jyothika. At once he agrees to take the place, as his son, he enquires about Jyothika in the picture, it seems she is “mama ponnu” Jo’s dad is brother of someone in the family or I called it as P.Vasu’s theory.

Thank god she does not become his sister that too after 3 great songs by A.R.Rahman.

Ok that’s it. I guess the movie would have ended after the sun TV news.
And finally, the reason I called this article as proof of concept because this movie tries very hard to prove a concept. They prove a movie can be made without a screen play, story or a director. The only reason it is called as movie is it was made using a film role.

Colossal waste

After a fortnight of Olympics, my fellow country men and women passed their usual nose cries via various medium on India’s performance in the Olympics. Many took their Blog/diary entries from 2000 and vented it out. [Condemning the government for not promoting “other” sports, Cricket was trashed for its popularity etc.] Few new Blog writers saved them to be used in 2008. The only silver medal winner was glorified with wealth of various kinds, this Indian wealth glorification made the super power ball winner jealous at times.

All said and done we are now back to our favorite sport “Cricket”, India started their overseas season on the wrong note by losing the Asia cup, then they washed their hands in Holland cup, after these two great preludes, our national pride, The SHAHARA India cricket team continued their vacation to the land of Lords and labkudasses, England.

First one day, India lost to England. India scored 170, was simply bundled out in 42 and with a hatrick. English scored those runs quite easily, top score, the Ex-Pat Indian Vikram Solanki.

As far as Gangully and co, it is one more match for them to play [very mediocre] cricket. For a change I did not subscribe to watch this live, thanks to BBC which provided live commentary on the internet. BBC commentary has never been biased in the past, this tradition continued again in this serious. BBC commentators were very happy to see England trash India; however they made very cautious comments and did not gloat about their victory. Sanjay manju and co should take a note of it.

Indian team a boasted lineup of seven batsmen managed to score 170 in 42, on a wicket which promised 250 plus. Shewag was out cheaply [oh! that is how he plays, you never know when he will click. But if he clicks that’s it he will trash all the bowlers.] Mr.Think Tank Captain, Mr.Lentil and Mr. Wall failed once again.

However Kaif scored a blue moon 50 and ensured his place in the team for next 30 years or until his retirement which ever comes first. Yuvraj Singh a promising talented overestimated player did not help Shahara India. Lucky Gavasker Jr after a painful 20, was happy to get out..

I have questions for the team STINK TANK,

Like Dravid being trained in wicket keeping for next 20 years,
Why don’t we train Laxman to carry drinks?
Why don’t we train Gangully to use his Brain?
Why don’t we train Kaif and the entire middle order in Batting ?
Finally
Why don’t we train Kumble to understand that there is life [for others] after his retirement?

Kumble was trashed to all parts of the ground, his final figures were 6.2 0 57 0. [sale promotion: 2 Noballs] Flint off simply smashed 3 sixes and scored 34 in 24 balls, the winning shot was a six. Sweet! Thanks to Anil Kumble. Oh ya, I hear sanjay manju and co saying he is an injured tiger, he will come back at you with vengeance and yada yada yada.. Dam this team. Further talking about this match in the Blog is a colossal waste, forget it. I think the only way India could score above 200 as of today is make Injured Sachin play book cricket from the pavilion