Sunday, November 24

Kerala Arts & Craft Centre, 19:30
Sunday has become my busiest day. The clubs today feature a lot of Minecraft, and that still requires me to attend. I began at midday and finished at 18:55.
I had intended to go to the final day of the International Music Festival at the Arts & Craft Centre but decided not to bother. Then Irma messaged me to remind me, and then Olya messaged me to ask why I hadn’t come.
I called a rickshaw.
I just missed Wild Wild Women, a group of female rappers who rap in saris. According to The Hindu,
The collective also aims to be inclusive for women of all age groups, and an attempt to convey this message is their choice of the sari as their performance attire. Hashtagpreeti says, “It was Krantinaari’s idea to wear sari on stage. In a sari, an Indian woman can relate to us more strongly, be it an old woman or a kid,” says HashtagPreeti.
I did see Afrodelic though, and enjoyed them. They “are the project of guitarist and producer Victor Diawara … Born in Lithuania, raised in Mali, Victor lived in Germany and Ireland before permanently moving to back to his mother’s home country Lithuania in 1997.” They had Indian musicians from other bands at the festival joining them at some points, and they worked seamlessly.
The staging had a maximalist vibe to it. Flares, cannons pumping out confetti, drones circling the stage, massive screens at the rear: all contributed to the feeling that we had more in front of us than some indie bands in a converted quarry.
A Tamil rapper Asal Kolaar followed, and clearly half of the audience had come to see him, and knew every catch phrase and every aside by heart. He hardly had to do anything because the audience had decided en masse to guarantee him a successful night.
The Canadian death metal band Martyr that followed him sent us all scurrying for the exit, and thus stymied my chance of seeing The Yellow Diary, who I had really wanted to see.
Oh well.