BANGALORE: A man in a camouflaged army jacket walked in to the room. Paula Abdul lifted her eyes from the table in pleasant astonishment, Randy Jackson guffawed and Simon Cowell let out a perfect little English gasp. Long hair, long beard or the long-awaited entertainer, it was difficult to pin down Sean Michel with just any of these. And once he threw the voice across the room, it was hard to say whether he was a better singer or a better cartoon standing.
And as he walked up to greet me before his show at Opus, the American Idol season 6 contestant couldn’t veil his compelling smile that affably peeked from beneath his trademark Fidel Castro beard that goes before him much like an effective curtain call. Touring India for a month is what the singer has on his agenda, and after a couple of concerts in Chennai and Pondicherry, the man was in Bangalore and he looked delighted to perform in the city. “A friend of mine I know in India asked me to come and play here and in Nepal.
That’s what brings me to this part of the world,” he informed me.
The singer who hails from Little Rock, Arkansas, who swiftly shot to popularity with his participation in American Idol knew how to hit the right note with the judges at the auditions.
“I wasn’t a great fan of American Idol. I took part in the show without knowing much about it,” he said. But dressing up as uncannily as possible did raise a few eyebrows and that is exactly what he desired. As the judges rummaged for words that would best fit his appearance (Fidel Castro, Jesus Christ, Osama Bin Laden!), Sean looked pleased as he knew he put them on the thinking mode. “I didn’t dress up to look like him. I wanted to look as homeless as possible,” he quips.
“I wanted to make people think.
There is a lot that goes beyond the appearance.” And his music definitely does.
With his second album, I know I’ve Been Converted, he has perhaps marked a new territory for gospel blues artistes, making up for the not so lofty sales the first radio rock album acquired. “My new album is a blend of blues, rock and even hip hop, unlike the first album I did,” points out the musician. The album which houses the song, I know I’ve Been Converted, originally sung by Mississippi Fred McDowell narrates the story of his life, he admits. “And the album is like a personal story of my interaction with God,” he says as he quickly reminds me, “Musicians are meant to be servants. And we make them Gods.”
