KOZHIKODE: The music lovers of Malabar have a new reason to cheer. A group of young guns, hailing from Kannur, has received worldwide recognition - the team has won the Rolling Stones Metal Award this year, a rare recognition for a band from Kerala. 'City Express' caught up with Varun Raj, the lead guitarist of the band who brought home the award in the best guitarist category, when he visited the city recently. ‘The Down Troddence' has been around for a while now. For those of you who know them, we don't need to tell you about their debut album ‘How are you? We are fine. Thank You.' For others, meet, ‘The Down Troddence' or TDT as they are commonly called, a thrash metal band that was born in the most unlikeliest place, Kannur! The team members got an opportunity to stage themselves in the Rolling Stones Metal Awards 2014, last month, where they were nominated under several categories, which include the best band, best guitarist, best album, best keyboard artiste, best song, best art work, and a couple of others. And by the time the event wound up, the ‘Adiyaalans' (as they call themselves) won themselves eight awards.
Speaking about his entry into this field, Varun says, “It was my dad who introduced me to music”.
He laid his hands on guitar first at the age of 7. There was no stopping him from then on.
He started attending classes under Philip Fernandez initially and later when his interest in music grew, he began to attend classes under Pramod Reynolds, who is based in Kozhikode.
“Pramod sir once gifted me with a CD of Metallica," he says. Thus his voyage into a new genre of music began. Soon, Varun, along with a couple of his friends, initiated a band called ‘Don't Rest in Peace,' in which he played for two years. Winning accolades is nothing new for Varun as he has won several awards at the state-level school and university youth festivals. Besides, he was selected as the best guitarist at the university fest for four consecutive years. Later, influenced by many metal artistes, band and music albums, Varun, alongside the now TDT members Sushin Shyam, Munz and the rest of the team, staged his first ever gig at Vimal Jyothi Engineering College - 20 songs, in which they covered everything from metal to Bollywood rock songs, including their own composition ‘Death Vanity.' “We jammed and practised a lot before the show. It was our first-ever concert and we were really tensed. The crowd response was very good, until a father (priest) from the missionary college mistook the word 'master' in the song ‘Master of Puppets' for ‘bastard.' The principal came up on stage and there concluded our first gig”, remembers Varun. After that they started doing gigs outside the city, especially in Kochi and Bangalore.
“Since our genre was a little different one, ie., folk-thrash metal, and as we were hailing from Kerala, we had a small number of fan-following by the time we were settled as a proper band. This led to the launch of the music video ‘Shiva,' which won the best music video at the IndieGo South Asian Music Awards that year.”
The major turn of events occurred when they released their debut album last year.
Apart from ‘Shiva' and ‘Death Vanity,' tracks such as ‘Nagavalli' and ‘Muck Fun Mohan' helped them gain more fame.
“Tracks such as ‘Nagavalli' have brilliant guitar riffs, with a touch of classical music, which stand out and underline the band's genre, but again the best guitarist award is something which I had never even imagined,” says Varun. “Steve Vai, Guthrie Govan, Metallica, Megadeth and Rex Vijayan are some of the musicians who have greatly influenced me.”
“The road till here was tough. People don't really encourage metal music in our city. That's the reason we had to shift. And as a band we had to face many challenges. But now it feels like everything has paid off,” says Varun. Varun and his band are already engaged in the work of their next album.
“The lyrics and riffs of the songs to be included in our forthcoming album are still in process. And you can expect our album very soon,” concludes the guitarist.