--------- sounds like an apt name for what is going on around us with respect to event managers today. From half-baked promises, delayed payments to 'how to prolong making those payments', it's all there. It is this very situation that I would like to point out, affects the performance of artists, holistically speaking.

How?
When one is hosting or managing an event, one has to keep a lot of people in high places happy. Sad but true. No one said that it has to be done by compromising on the respect that a 'mere' service giver deserves. Cutting corners is almost second nature now. Ever wondered why Pune keeps slipping off India's artistically bustling cities?

Now let us not get into an Event management bashing session, shall we? There is a sudden burst of not only companies but also full fledged institutes, where students, equipped with the skill of managing your events are churned out every year. Quite a commendable achievement this. So where do these students all go? They're well nestled in add agencies, event management companies, and the corporate world organizing your little kid's birthday parties to the biggest fashion week gatherings and auto expo conventions.

Maybe all they need is a different perspective, that of a musician perhaps and that of a musician who invariably arrives at the speculated time only to be greeted by sluggish, bickering stage-men still erecting the foundations of the stage?
It is truly amazing to see how an event comes together - right from squeezing overloaded trucks into lanes wide enough for three cycles to go together (like they did in the old hindi movies) because that's the only entrance to the venue, to watching laborers, way past their prime, literally walk the tight rope to affix strobes, power cans et al, so that the sponsors name is sufficiently lit.
It definitely won't be a tale to brag about, when at 70, you sit back on your, ahem, rocking chair and think to yourself that you've done it all - the tours, playing to a sea of people, big cheques etc and you look to your grandson, eagerly looking on with a guitar in his hand trying to emulate some of those tasty licks that you played in your younger days and tell him how you broke your chin because you tripped on a bunch of wires trying to show them that you could run across stage faster than Axl Rose.

I'm sure the argument might go deeper and end somewhere at, "India is a country with freely available labour. Capital intensive techniques won't work here!" But at the end of the day, the crowds, the organizers AND the performing artists happiness is what counts, doesn't it? Somewhere, somehow we've forgotten that everyone involved has to be satisfied. I, as a musician, don't want to call the organizers, only to be faced with the latest Airtel Hello Tunes for hours together, or even be cut off by the receivers - lest I die of ear damage, the diagnosis - Hellotuneosis.

The post-gig drama never fails to bring a smile to my face. There have been instances where it comes down to who can run faster under toxic influence (because by the end of a show if you're still sober then you should be in my shoes writing this article) so that they can emerge winners in the little game of catch-n-cook-the-organisers to procure their pay cheques.

'Signing contracts', 'officially registering your band' are in today's world archaic phrases. I am obviously referring to the semi - professional yet trying to make it into the professional world of performances. Both, bands and band hirers think it taboo to even discuss about. If efficiency and transparency are your goals then there is a certain path available.

Before we venture into the more state-of-the-art face of event management - trained volunteers, workers, sound and light engineers; hi-fi, portable, efficient infrastructure; which is a function of the right kind of money being pumped into events and the right kind of attitude by the organizers, there is a certain dignity of labour that has to be appreciated, an ethical code of conduct even; an attitude that focuses on a less stressful approach for each individual.

Nobody's perfect. No one's asking anybody to be perfect. But I'm sure we can strive to be as god as it gets?

So see you at the show…

Varun