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Take a ride to Oz

Australian band Taxiride has certainly come a long way since its debut, with a self-produced album and over half a dozen hit singles under its belt

PHOTO: BHAGYA PRAKASH K.

HIDDEN FROM THE VIEW We haven't advertised the fact that we've struggled to the top, say Taxiride

Flooded as we are with unimpressive one-hit-wonders and imitation bands, there are very few acts that stand out from the crowd. Naturally, the ones that do, like Australian band Taxiride, automatically get a captive audience on those rare occasions when they come by. In India recently for VH1's Rock Rules, the band is still riding high on the success of its 2005 release, Axiomatic.

"Axiomatic means a self-evident statement that doesn't need proof to be believed," says lead vocalist Jason Singh. The running thread throughout the album is one of conspiracy theories, he explains. "There are a lot of lies in the upper echelons of the corporate and political worlds. It's more about what you don't know than what you know." But before you wince at the thought of lyrics with a delusion of grandeur, he adds that it also sums up everybody's perceptions on the band.

Dream run

After all, they've had an almost-perfect dream run ever since they first got together in 1997. Reportedly, they were signing their first recording contract in the U.S. while they were still relatively unheard of back home. Indeed, says Jason, when they first started touring Australia after long periods in the U.S., almost everyone thought they were an American band. The name of the band too, has something of a dreamy story attached to it.

When Taxiride first got together and created their demo, they weren't sure how their music would do on the market. So they passed their demo to a cab-driver friend who played it to all his fares, and relayed their feedback to the band. "So that's the first place that our music got heard, on a taxi ride," explains Jason.

For many people, that perceived lack of struggle translates to a lesser value attached to them than bands that have been through the stuff that sells a self-help book. However, says Tim Wild, a founding member of the band, luck alone couldn't have got them as far as they've come. "We haven't advertised the fact that we've struggled to the top, but that doesn't mean those struggles didn't exist. The media sees only the tip of the iceberg, but not the hard work and long hours that went on behind the scenes." And just as the weight of that assertion hangs over us, he jokes: "We seem to be doing the hard work in reverse. We got really famous first and now we're getting a little less popular."

Besides featuring another top 40 hit single "Oh Yeah", Axiomatic is also a landmark album for the band because it is their first self-produced release. Although both Tim and Jason contributed creative inputs on both the other albums, this is the first time they've done it all. "This time, we knew exactly what we wanted," says Jason, "and didn't want to explain ourselves to anyone." Thus, the album is as it was originally intended, with very little changing between the first demos of each song and the final product.

Much has changed since their debut album Imaginate. Members Dan Hall and Tim Watson quit the band before the second and third albums to pursue other interests. But Jason is pragmatic about it. "It's always been Tim and I, and people come and go." But that hasn't made much of a change, he asserts. "Maybe in essence some things have changed because we don't need to accommodate others in our songs now. We don't have to worry about giving people parts and so on and we can just go out and do it."

As much as things have changed, though, they have stayed the same. The ethos behind their second album Garage Mahal still holds true. Every song they write still aims for that middle ground between the grungy and the grand. "It's a broad spectrum of contrasting elements," says Tim. "Actually, that's what we should have called the band," chimes in Jason. And thanks to the VH1 concerts in Mumbai, Bangalore and Delhi, that spectrum is only going to get broader. Tim reveals that while in Mumbai the band picked up a tabla, and as we close the interview, they were already talking to a Bangalorean about buying his sarod. As things look, fans are in for a taxiride they wouldn't expect.

RAKESH MEHAR

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