The Great Britain granted India its independence on August 15, 1947, 200 years of colonial rule. The English governors and troops left India but left behind Britain's cultural influence. Many British nationals and English companies like HMV(His Master's Voice)/EMI(Electric and Musical Industries Ltd)/RCA(Radio Corporation of America) stayed and catered to this emerging market and an Anglo-Indian clientele, which flourished in this "NEW" INDIA.
The swing and lounge acts in the early '50s gave way to rock bands in the late '50s and early '60s in cities such as Bombay and Calcutta. The emerging scene in these cities found inspiration in the broadcasts of All India Radio, which featured Western pop in its programming. Recording labels such as RCA/HMV/EMI also pressed records from Western rock acts, even those of some pioneering Indian rock bands, although in limited quantities.
India's Western-influenced garage scene flourished from the mid-'60s and through the'70s. With the release of The Velvet Underground's Indian-influenced masterpiece 'The Velvet Underground and Nico' and The Beatles released 'Sgt. Pepper's Lonely Hearts Club Band' in 1967, saw a thrilling garage-rock scene cropping up in college towns such as Madras, now known as Chennai.
The founding of the rock zine Junior Statesman and the Battles of the Bands held by the Simla cigarette company at Shanmukhananda Hall in Mumbai, was largely an underground scene and the first to spawn psychedelic music in India. This new wave inspired film composers like Maestro R.D Burman and the brothers known as Kalyanji Anandji to take the psychedelic plunge in their landmark Bollywood recordings of the '70s.
The early '70s saw the demise of the Simla Beat contests,and thats when Junior Statesman teamed up with clothing manufacturer Cordel to host the JS-Cordel Beat Contest. This was an inspiration for the second wave of Indian psychedelic bands. These groundbreaking underground bands were great influence to the fuzz pedal beneath the guitar of Bhupinder Singh(Frequent R.D.Burman collaborator).Unfortunately, most have wallowed in obscurity, their contributions to India's psychedelic scenes floating as ghost notes within the commercial Bollywood scene of the '70s.
Here are a few songs for you to check out the Five Lost Gems From Psychedelic India.
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Psychedelia
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