Bengaluru’s AKOG Go Heavy, Navigate Dilemmas on Debut Album ‘A Rock And A Hard Place’

AKOG aka Another Kind of Green members are seated around an office desk, taking a break from their day jobs (except bassist Vishal Varier, who’s on the call from home, since he’s a full-time musician) to talk about their new album A Rock And A Hard Place.

As college friends who came together in 2016, AKOG have released a steady run of singles, but an album was something they were sitting on for about a year and a half. Late in 2022, drummer Sanket Chakraborty says the band put an end to their pondering and put together seven tracks in the span of two months. “We had changed our songwriting approach and I think as individuals, we went through a lot of things that came into our writing,” he adds. Guitarist Chethan Kadoor, seated next to Chakraborty, says, “We were too obsessed with perfection and reaching standards of professional labels and all of that. Yes, it’s important and we still have that goal in mind but we felt it shouldn’t be an obstacle to put things out.”

Across seven tracks, AKOG – drummer Chakraborty, vocalist Shikha Chandrashekhar, guitarist Kadoor, bassist Varier and keyboardist Anand Murali – go beyond their previously anointed tag of “fun-rock” to get a lot more emotional, somber and heavy. “Monkey (In the Middle)” stretches into saccharine pop-punk highs and anthemic refrains while “Circles” threatens and finally breaks out into grandiose rock/metal riffs. There’s Evanescence-laced energy on “Ask Me Who I Am,” while “Candy Stripes” – a favorite for all the band members – has an infectious, buoyant rock edge. The album closes with their blistering song “Light It Up,” a previously released single.

The heaviness started with a few songs being tuned down to adjust to Chandrasekhar’s vocals and when the band heard the peppy pop-punk first draft of “My Diary” sent in by Kadoor, AKOG knew they were heading towards a different sound for A Rock And A Hard Place. Bassist Varier says, “Chethan had such a finished product to show us and in the middle section, there was a breakdown. I was like, ‘Whoa, we’re going somewhere with this!’ I think another thing with us is that we all have so far secretly loved the heavy parts of our songs.”

The release of the album came after a time of transition for the band members – they had all graduated, began working and became “stuck by corporate timelines” to be able to meet as often as before. There was closeness (albeit virtually) during the pandemic and the Zoom calls and band meetings have been carried forward as a regular occurrence. “We get all of our communication done in a very short span of time. So we’ve just found this as a very optimized and efficient workflow which helps us navigate through our personal lives as well,” Kadoor adds.

Thematically, Chandrashekhar and Chakraborty say they very much drew from their individual ideas of relationships, identity and more. “I wasn’t a very popular kid in school, but music was part of my life. Girls and boys would say, Oh you’re a good singer. That’s all you have for yourself but you’re probably not going to do anything with it. And then some of those people getting back in touch with me now, seeing AKOG performing and releasing music, they go, ‘Dude, it’s so cool. You’re like a rock star.’ I didn’t need acceptance from them, but 16-year-old me would feel very good about herself,” the vocalist says about “Ask Me Who I Am.”

So inspired was Chakraborty by the outsider, unbelonging hook of “Candy Stripes” that he says he wants to get it tattooed: “I’m just a stowaway in their candy stripes.”

The band plan to launch A Rock And A Hard Place with a gig in Bengaluru soon. Chakraborty says there will be music videos from the album as well. “And obviously we are planning on some tours as well. So hopefully those fall into picture,” he adds.

Listen to ‘A Rock And A Hard Place’ below. Stream on more platforms here.