Followers of the Dubai rock scene are no strangers to Point of View and their brand of ’80s rock, inspired by the likes of Police, U2, Pink Floyd, Toto, Whitesnake, Dream Theatre and more. The five-piece band, who released their debut album, Revolutionise the Revolutionary, in 2012 and are currently working on their second album, have just dropped their first music video for 3rd Eye, a track from their first album. Here are excerpts from an email conversation with frontman Nikhil Raj Uzgare, where he talks about “jinxed” music videos, the artist-fan relationship and future plans.
You launched your debut album Revolutionise the Revolutionary in October 2012. The first video’s coming after almost four years. Why the long wait?
Well we had to answer the same question ourselves. Let’s just say this was a video that took up blood, sweat, tears, persistence, luck and some amount of money.
After our album release, we got tied down with touring and we always had the video shoot at the back of our minds. Come late 2013, we had a well-known Dubai-based global ad agency offering to shoot the video. They wanted to send it across as their entry to the Cannes Advertising Awards. We spent a good amount of time conceptualising and shooting. Sadly the whole team left the agency and the project got stalled. Being a little disillusioned we gave up on the video and continued playing shows over the next few years, while we worked on material for the second album.
In 2015, we had a good friend, George Durzi, who came up to us and said that he would love to shoot a video with us. So yet again, we embarked on shooting a video for the second time for the same song. The Fridge, at AlSerkal Avenue, was nice enough to support us with a venue to shoot at. We shot it and when it came to the editing stage, it got stalled again, as our current video editor had some personal commitments. The editor we found [next] was locally based and had all the right intentions but for some odd reason the process was moving at a snail’s pace. At this point it was mid-2015 and we had pretty much come to the conclusion that this video was jinxed and it was not going to happen.
But somewhere in our minds, we knew that we had to release this video. It had become a personal challenge. We continued our search for a good video editor and in late 2015, we met a fantastic Bollywood film editor in Mumbai called Amit Kumar, who has worked on very popular Bollywood films such as Shor In The City, Himmatwaala, Shivay and more. He offered to edit the footage we had. It did take a little time but towards the end of 2015, we felt that this was finally going somewhere.
Why did you pick the song 3rd Eye for your first music video?
Every band goes through the dilemma of picking their first song for a video. The mind says pick up the song which appeals to the masses — song number four, Unreal. But the heart says, pick a song that defines the band’s sound and image — 3rd Eye. We went with the latter. 3rd Eye has always been a song that we have loved to play onstage. It’s got this tremendous energy and an opening riff that I believe will go down in history. It’s a song that a lot of people love to watch us perform live for the sheer energy and raw power it transmits to the audiences. Also the fact that it runs an odd time signature makes it appeal to a niche audience which comes from a progressive rock background.
Did you know what kind of a music video you wanted from the beginning? What were your inspirations for the video?
We had a lot of interesting ideas but funds being limited, we decided to just go ahead with a straightforward band video shoot, where people can see who the band is. Maybe the next time around, we might do a casting and more, depending on budgets or if a corporate wishes to fund it with a product placement. As far as inspiration goes, I guess it was as simple as, we had a song and we needed a video. There was nothing specific.
How relevant is a music video in today’s time when everyone’s streaming music on their mobile phones?
I personally believe that today’s generation listens less and watches more. A lot of channels such as MTV, Channel V etc, have had to resort to reality shows to keep their game alive. YouTube is where the action is. Hence, a video is still very much relevant. A lot of today’s listeners are not exactly as loyal to their band/brand/music as they were at one time. There was a time when people used to buy CDs, vinyls, merchandise...
I have come to believe that today the connection that an artist makes with the listener is very impersonal. And the fact is that I do know that there is a huge audience which hates listening to music on low format and hates the fact that they don’t get band CDs anymore. I personally also believe that the industry will come [full circle] and streaming will die out. Music and the relationship between the artist and listener will be restored to its past glory.
What else is the band doing right now? More music videos on the way?
The band has a lot of interesting things going on. We just secured an endorsement deal with Warwick bass guitars. We have got into a partnership with a leading local music equipment distributor called Techniline Electronics. We have a gig lined up on October 21 with a fantastic band from North East India at The Music Room. We are also headlining the Harley Davidson Mena Rally at the Bahrain F1 Circuit on November 11 with our good friend Ron ‘Bumblefoot’ Thal [former Guns N’ Roses guitarist] and we have a gig coming up at Stars n Bars — Yas Marina during the F1 Races in Abu Dhabi. Besides that, we have two fantastic guys who are recent additions to the band and the band is sounding better than ever. So yes, there is lots to look forward to on that front.
As far as music videos go, we have come out wiser and stronger from our first experience and I think we are just going to go ahead and shoot more videos from the old album, regardless of the fact that it’s four years old. Plus we plan to shoot a video for an upcoming single from the new album as well, as we ourselves are kind of bored with the old stuff and itching to release new material to the audiences. So I can safely say that we have mastered the art of killing the jinx.
