Watch Perfect Strangers Jazz Up Narcissistic Tendencies on ‘Selfie’

Apart from loud chatter, if artists had to draw up the next major peeve at gigs, it would be the incessant photography when they’d rather you just heard and saw the music through your own eyes. Bengaluru rock band Perfect Strangers’ guitarist Debjeet Basu says the selfie-taking crowd at gigs was pretty much the main reason they wrote their new song “Selfie.”

Basu maintains that talking during songs remain the biggest annoyance, which is why they decided to take an ironic tone in the first single off their upcoming crowdfunded album A Strange Connection, due in April. “We saw a couple hardly interested in our music, but used us as a backdrop, looked super involved for a second, and took a selfie. It got us wondering about the irony of the word Selfie. What does a Selfie stand for? Who you really are or who you want people to believe you are?” says Basu.

“Selfie” might clock in just shy of seven minutes, but the band flitters effortlessly between funk, jazz blues and rock, led by Raphael Emileenaa’s charming delivery of hooks that stick in your head. The eight-track album, according to Basu, largely deals with contemporary issues ”“ from abuse (“Blow-Up Doll”), to “the stigmatisation of the queer community” on “Wild Side,” and “the quirks of the current music scene” on “Just For Gigs.” He adds, “Songs that talk of the more universal yet personal themes of love, loss and making music (”˜Valerie’, ”˜Stay’ and ”˜Breaking Away’) balance out our list and vary the tempo during live shows.”

For “Selfie,” they found a suitable starting point for their jazzy, funky track with friends studying at the Prague Film School in 2016. With help from motion and design agency Pukka Jugaad in Bengaluru, Basu says the patience paid off. He adds, “We have been saving up from gig payments over the last year to afford this.” They also raised Rs 8.26 lakhs via crowdfunding to put into producing A Strange Connection and the video, as part of promo plans. Basu says about the band’s idea behind crowdfunding, “We took a strategy of working backwards and got stuff like album art and merchandise done first. I’ve noticed they are always left towards the end and people don’t end up with good finished products. So our album art, merchandise are done and work for the second video has started.”