Punk Up the Jam

Courtesy of The Wolfmen

The room smells of pickles as lead vocalist Chris Constantinou saunters into the studio licking his finger tips, savouring all that’s left of his lunch. The Wolfmen give a thumbs up to the Indian cuisine which has made for the most part of their meals through a week of recording at Empire Studios in Andheri, Mumbai. The London-based punk band is pillared by veteran guitarist Marco Pirroni and lead vocalist Constantinou, both of whose experiences date back to the days of the burgeoning London punk scene in the Seventies.

Pirroni gave his first crucial performance on stage with Siouxsie and The Banshees on their stage debut – with Sid Vicious, later of Sex Pistols, on drums – in 1976. Vestiges of Pirroni’s and Constantinou’s history with the popular punk act Adam and the Ants can easily be seen on their debut album Modernity Killed Every Night due for release in August. Drummer Daniel Strittmatter, guitarist/keyboardist Phil Harvey, and percussionist Preston Heyman complete The Wolfmen, though Harvey and Heyman didn’t come down for the India sessions of another album featuring Daler Mehndi.

Achille Forler, Managing Director, Deep Emotions Publishing India, envisioned a peculiar experiment with sound on a collaboration with Indian pop star Mehndi and The Wolfmen. “I had been chasing Daler for the longest time through nearly six years,” says Forler. Mehndi did come around at last: about a year back he played Forler a demo of his new album asking Forler of his opinion. Forler’s bizarre response in defining it as a rock record perhaps had the right effect on Mehndi. After Mehndi gave Forler the go-ahead, he sent the demo across to three music producers in London asking them to work their music around the samples. “It was an amazing voice, we used the voice mostly to get our emotional information”¦ it was just these series of verses, we had to pick a suitable verse for a chorus,” Pirroni speaks of their first reaction to Mehndi’s melodies. He further suggests the complete contradiction of sound but not having to compromise on their style: “We just arranged our music keeping Daler’s base melody in mind, we didn’t attempt to sound different.”

Of whatever Mehndi heard at first from the three different producers he reckoned The Wolfmen would do most justice to his album. The band braced Mehndi’s vocal samples with Pirroni’s guitar chops, Constantinou’s vocal drizzle, and Strittmatter’s chasing drums ”“ on the whole punking up Mehndi’s high pitched Punjabi ditties. What’s sorted in this unheard-of meld is that both the artists have kept true to their original sound. Though Mehndi didn’t seem very happy at first, says Constantinou: “Apparently, after listening to the reworked track we sent back, he didn’t speak to Achille for over a week.” Mehndi confirms to us that he was in fact pretty disappointed with the end result at first. “The instruments were way off my melody, I was slightly angry.” But Mehndi was patient as he believed that the track suffered a damaging disconnect as they did not working together in the same studio. He chose to mend this by flying down to London early last year and recording with them in person.

In August 2007, the first track ”˜Two Eyes (Do Naina)’ was leaked on the radio, spending four weeks at number one on the BBC Asian Network chart. London-based DJ Bobby Friction described the track as “the greatest crossover song to have come out of India.” Even Mehndi seems content with his foray into rock now. “I want to attempt every genre from pop, rock, sufi to ghazal through my musical career, this is just the first step for me,” says a very optimistic Mehndi. Though only two tracks are ready as of now – ”˜Two Eyes (Do Naina)’ and ”˜Thieves and Liars (Chor Uchakke)’ ”“ five more tracks were recorded in Mumbai. According to Mehndi they need to be worked upon immensely before he could deem them as complete. So it’s going to be a bit of a wait until the album release.