Watch Anand Bhaskar Collective’s Inspirational Video for ‘Main Hoon Zameen’

Mumbai Hindi rock outfit Anand Bhaskar Collective always seems to surprise us with what they have up their sleeves. Hence it comes as no surprise that they are one of the most diverse bands in the country. With their latest music video for the anthemic “Main Hoon Zameen” – produced by A Glass of Whisky Production and directed by Anand Karir – the group has brought together extraordinary people from different walks of life doing remarkable things for the greater good.

In the clip, we are introduced to animal rescuer Reshma Shelatkar, environmentalist George Remedios from The Turning Tide and Ramesh Raut of the Prayas Foundation an NGO working on educating underprivileged and homeless children. The video goes on to show these individuals going about their selfless work whether its Remedios rooting a plant, Shelatkar feeding cats or Raut conducting a class interspersed with footage of the band performing the song live. The band’s frontman Anand Bhaskar says, “[The concept] was to create something that celebrated heroes who go out and do what they think is the right thing to do, without PR, without expectation of accolades.”

Bhaskar adds, “This is precisely why we chose people who don’t have big wealthy backers to do social work, people who’ve been doing whatever they can to the best of their abilities to make a difference.”

The track too stemmed from the emotion of being oneself, according to the musician. Incidentally, this is the first time Bhaskar stepped away from penning the lyrics to an Anand Bhaskar Collective song and instead left it in the capable hands of Karir with whom he built a relationship with ever since he broke into the advertising industry. “I remember being drawn to his out of the box thinking and charisma. For me nothing could be better than having my mentor write lyrics to a song I compose,” says Bhaskar. He adds, “I absolutely loved his [Karir] process of using metaphors in his lyrics, making the philosophical impact of the song even more emphatic.”

Sonically “Main Hoon Zameen” includes fleshy guitar parts by Hrishi Giridhar, a hooky violin line by Shravan Sridhar, steady grooves from bassist Neelkanth Patel and drummer Shishir Tao as well as Bhaskar’s soaring vocals. Towards the end of the song, the band also introduced a choir featuring vocalists Shubhangi Joshi, Maanuni Desai, Siddharth Khaire and more to create a wall of sound as the song reaches its peak.

As the coronavirus pandemic has affected plenty, the vocalist tells us that he and the rest of the band are doing well in this crisis but hopes “the poor people get all the essentials they need at this time because it’s a terrible, terrible situation.” The band’s plan now is to release a new song every 45 days. Next up is a track called “Jaadoogari” as part of the group’s forthcoming EP Ufaq which will also include “Main Hoon Zameen.” Bhaskar says, “We’ve also started writing the next EP, so yes, our releases are going to be a lot more frequent going forward.”

Watch the video below: