A band of boys and girls, from Hyderabad, Andhra Pradesh are on their way to creating history after being featured on VH1 with their single – ‘Losing Mind’.

Hailing from diverse backgrounds, vocalist Sumitha is a graphic design student by the day, DJ040 works with a defence establishment mixing djing and missiles, rapper Roll Rida aka Rahul is a B.Tech graduate, vocalist Sanjana is a publishing specialist – all met through common friends and of course, their common interest – music – a year ago.

The Hindu

Here is the video that supposedly made its way to VH1 channel,it looks slick – somewhat Mia-ish (glitterati), but definitely original. Maybe someone with a better ear for music (compared to me), can comment on it

Here’s a shout out for the upcoming uber band – Indus Gharana.

About a month ago, I was on the SAJA panel discussing The South Asian Blogosphere and How it is Changing the Media. Embedded below is the episode of the podcast, feel free to leave your comments below.

When you do get a chance visit the SAJA blog, they do a great job of keeping us in the loop about Desi events happening here in the US. They also analyze and discuss events from a Desi angle.

As most of you should be aware by this point, the TSA changed its security policy yet again. The most affected seem to be the Sikhs, Amardeep over at SM had a post about this from a month ago. He writes

I’m also worried because I have a feeling the new policies may be deployed selectively and in a non-standardized way at different airports, and according to the whim of individual TSA agents, who may or may not understand what the Sikh turban represents. Some Sikhs will certainly be asked to remove turbans even if there’s no positive indication of anything concealed. (I’ve found that agents at smaller airports, like Manchester NH or Durham NC, are much more strict about enforcing policy than are the agents at bigger airports. At Philly, where the security lines are quite long and the agents are harried, they don’t look twice if you wear a turban — they know the deal. And they usually won’t bother to stop you even if you have fluids — no baby formula or bottled water hassles…)

I entirely agree. Even rules like running shoes through the metal detector was not a part of the drill in the major airports until much later. I know because I fly so often. It will come as no surprise to me if the rules are skewed at different airports, because let’s face it, that’s how things always work.

Discussing the issue an RJ referred to the turban as a “diaper”, which is not boding well with our turbanators.

RJ Al Rantel was discussing US airport security in his talk show KABC 790AM on September 10 where he allegedly said that if his own 80-year-old mother had to take off her shoes during a security screening, “… then why shouldn’t a Sikh be required to take off the hat that looks like a diaper they wear on their heads?”

The initial thought on my mind was that this was a radio station in the middle of nowhere. And boy was I wrong. KABC 790AM is in Los Angles.

The bio of Al Rantel does not have too many surprises.

He’ll push your buttons, but you won’t change the dial. Al Rantel uncovers the events and newsmakers who don’t always make headlines, but whose stories impact our community in a controversial, meaningful and dramatic way. Al’s show is unpredictable in content, diverse in subject matter and covers topics from politics to pop culture trends and emerging lifestyle issues that create sizzling debates and that vie for our attention.

Conservative by nature, yet surprisingly liberal in his thinking, Al believes in taking personal responsibility for one’s actions and challenges his listeners to reason with logic, evidence and facts. His tongue-in-cheek, tell-it-like-it-is style and engaging personality have taken him from behind the microphones to in front of the cameras on: The O’Reilly Factor; Equal Time; The Fox Report; Politically Incorrect with Bill Maher and CNN’s Talk Back Live.

So Al believes in taking personal responsibility and like to reason with logic and evidence. Really? It does not look like from his comment.

And whats more surprising is that the RJ who claims to create sizzling debates is not up for one.

Singh has written a strongly worded letter to Rantel, challenging him to an on-air debate. Rantel’s team has not yet responded.

Ignorance is one thing, but to claim you like to use logic in reasoning and then make a fool of yourself on live radio is another.

Al , your mom’s shoes is not the same as someone’s religious head gear. And if you do not know, research before you speak.

I think this is pure ignorance, what do you guys think?

[update]

Anna over at SM updates us with the contact information for the radio station.

Our mailing address is: 3321 S. La Cienega Blvd., Los Angeles, CA 90016.

To advertise on TalkRadio 790 KABC:

Please Contact: Matt Mallon (310) 840-4955

If you have feedback for any of the departments at 790 KABC, please let us know!

And since we would like one place to talk about this, go on over to SM and share your thoughts.

Komal Trivedi
Photo from Boston Globe (Globe Staff Photo / George Rizer)

Ever so often we come across people in the entertainment industry who take the South Asian diaspora to the next level. With one foot inside the door, they make our cause of being heard and understood easier.

Meet Komal Trivedi, A British DJ, who has made Boston College her home. Sipping Chai and spinning Bhangra, Komal is on WZBC, 90.3 from 7 A.M. to 9 A.M every Thursday. Like everyone else, I have to switch to the “International” radio or TV station in a Major city, at the right time to even hear Desi music, but being on FM, she is making waves.

When you cant find what you love, you go ahead and create it, and thats exactly what she did.

Asian Underground burst into the British mainstream in the 1990s, but Trivedi says that when she moved to the Boston area three years ago, this type of music was difficult to find, especially on the radio.

Trivedi was eager to fill the void, so a colleague at WGBH, where Trivedi is an executive assistant, suggested that she approach the Boston College station, where the colleague worked as a DJ in his spare time. The colleague showed Trivedi the ropes at WZBC, and just over a year ago “Bricklane Beats” was born.

In her interview, she talks about her show “Bricklane Beats”, how she started the show and about borrowing tapes from her dad, which is a collection of songs from old Bollywood movies.

Read the rest of this entry »

As Sanjaya blazes his path through American Idol season 6 (he made the top 7 at the time of posting this), UberDesi’s coverage of his surprising ascent is also starting to garner some attention. I was a guest on Dr. Blogstein’s Radio Happy Hour show on BlogTalkRadio, which is a variety/pop-culture talk show. I guess Dr. Blogstein liked my Sanjaya coverage on American Idol and extended an invitation. I was not too sure about the whole thing. Now I may be able to string together a few coherent sentences over the relative safety of the Internet while blogging but I hold no grand delusions on my public speaking capablities. But you only live once, so I agreed.
I called in to the show Tuesday night 9:30pm E, Indian accent and all. We had a lively discussion on, who else, Sanjaya. We also talked about American Idol, Sanjaya’s sister Shyamali and the influence of Bollywood and desis on American pop culture. It was a cool experience for me and Dr. Blogstein and his crew were fun and lively.
You can listen to the show or download it from here (1st show on the list). My segment starts around 37 minutes into the show. Have fun listening and remember, this was my first radio appearance ………. ever and I was nervous as heck. So go easy on the brother.