KOCHI: It is going to be a show `for old times’ sake’.
Kochi’s old rock band `The Hijackers’ will perform at the Bolghatty palace gardens on the New Year’s eve.
‘The Hijackers’, the six-member band that rocked Kochi in the 70s, will be performing live at a meeting of old Kochiites who knew each other and partied together in the 70s.
“Most of us know each other for decades.
But, we never get time to meet each other and our families do not know much about the olden days,” says B R Ajit, the brain behind the meeting, styled 'For Old Times’ Sake’. Ajit sent mails to his close friends who are known to each other for at least 20 years and are in the 45-plus age group. “Each of them, to whom I sent this note, can invite their friends with whom they have `vibed’ for several decades. At the function, they can sit with their friends so that none of them will feel lost or left out,” he said.
To give the much-needed boost to the evening, the Hijackers will be playing yesteryear hits.
“We were at our peak in the late 60s and in the 70s,” says Ravi, the lead guitarist of the band.
Ravi, along with Hari, Venoo and Kicha, were called `Blue Angels’ when they were studying at Maharaja’s College and used to play the instrumental versions of popular western numbers.
When crooners Sudheer and Kuttan joined them, they became `Hijackers’.
“When the duo left, we had Jayan and Joseph. When they also left, it was John Antony, T S Radhakrishnan and Glen Gillbanks, with whom we cut a disc with our own composition. We even did a month-long concert in Kenya,” remembers Ravi.
If they were rockers then, Ravi is a leading lawyer at the Kerala High Court today, Venoo, the rhythm guitarist, and drummer Kicha are now businessmen. Jayan and Joseph are into plantation and real-estate business in Coonoor. Among the other three, Radhakrishnan composes devotional music, John Antony is a good guitarist, Kuttan alias Captain B K Iyer sings country and western songs and Glen is settled in Sweden. Sudheer and Hari are no more.
“We will be belting the music of the 70s, while our children, the second generation, will sing some of the latest numbers for the young crowd which will attend the programme along with their parents,” says Ravi.