Should you had been a kind of youths in Chennai between 2014 and 2019, attempting to be edgy and determining your music tendencies, it’s seemingly that you simply may need come throughout the band Kurangan by Kaber Vasuki and Tenma.
The 2 musicians who launched hits like ‘Rasathi’ and ‘Rockstar’ with distinct musicality and whimsy of their lyrics, catapulted to fame a decade in the past, offering the area for the creation of an alternate type of Tamil music which steered distant from mainstream cinema tunes. The 2 had been additionally among the many first few within the business to have referred to as themselves ‘unbiased artistes’ when solely a faint hint of the scene existed in Chennai.
Ten years therefore, a lot has modified. The band break up. Each these artistes made vivid, distinct music. Kurangan Period, the album, continues to have regular patrons although.
Tenma went on to work with, and mildew the artistes of the Casteless Collective, a band rooted in social justice. He was additionally instrumental within the creation of the Madras Indie Collective the place artistes from varied socio-economic backgrounds collaborated and met with new audiences. He made music for Irandam Ulagaporin Kadaisi Gundu and Natchathiram Nagargiradhu, movies respectively produced and directed by Pa Ranjith too. Rapidly, one might see that this music producer was turning into instrumental in making a local weather for unbiased Tamil music to exist and maybe, even thrive.
Nonetheless, across the time the scene started garnering world consideration with the likes of artistes like Arivu and Paal Dabba getting streams throughout audio streaming apps in hundreds of thousands, Tenma appeared to have gone MIA aside from the stray set of tweets on Chennai, music and anime.
The place is Tenma and what has he been as much as?
Artificially clever guardians
“I’ve been doing a number of soul-searching over the past two years,” says the musician. “I did a number of movies and had been constructing an unbiased ecosystem since 2013. Then I feel this midlife disaster hit me and I used to be like… what am I doing? Who am I?”
A quest to attach with this deeper sense of self led Tenma to take up fascinating artist residencies in several components of the world together with Indonesia and Australia. In addition to interacting with musicians from world wide and creating what he calls music of the worldwide South, he additionally visited a village in Bandung, Indonesia, the place he took to portray.
Musician Tenma
| Picture Credit score:
Steevez Rodriguez
“I dabbled in portray at Loyola [College] after I was learning Visible Arts. Nonetheless, my friends had been higher, so I by no means took to it again then. At Bandung, that they had a bunch of natural paint together with ginger and turmeric, and so I started. The expertise was spectacular and made me realise that I used to be eager about exploring the visible medium,” he says.
Since he had assisted filmmakers earlier than on units and whereas taking pictures music movies, he determined to review filmmaking on the facet too, he says. “Round this time, I got here throughout an interview with Jensen Huang, CEO of Nvidia [American multinational corporation in the field of graphics processing unit chips instrumental in the world of Artificial Intelligence(AI)] who spoke about studying to make use of AI to remain forward of the curve. That is after I tried to generate pictures of my very own and take a look at my hand on the recreation,” he says.
Across the similar time, Tenma was commissioned by the Edinburgh Fringe Pageant for his or her Voices from the South programme. He selected to create three tracks utilizing the Korukkupet Pambai and Udukkai traditions, for works underneath the title ‘Ostracised Guardians’.
Screengrab from The Valor of Madurai Veeran
| Picture Credit score:
Particular Association
Amongst them, was a track titled ‘The Valor of Madurai Veeran’, that spoke of a Dalit warrior who was elevated to a demigod and guardian standing. “I’m a non-believer, so I seemed to humanise the characters. Madurai Veeran was not only a warrior. His love story with Ponni and Villiayammal are fascinating, layered, and political. To me, this exploration of village deities appeared like a plain previous honour killing story. Through the years, he has been sanitised. However it’s a story value telling,” he says.
Tenma provides that AI helps carry these characters to life. It’s why he’s launching Pirated Movies, an AI movie and artistic studio that’s trying to fuse the world of latest tech and music movies. When requested in regards to the dialog and debate surrounding AI cannibalising jobs, Tenma says that expertise has all the time been confronted by such dialogues prior to now. You will need to keep curious by way of the method, he says.
Screengrab from The Valor of Madurai Veeran
| Picture Credit score:
Particular Association
In addition to this, Tenma says that he continues to work on jingles to pay the payments and takes up area of interest initiatives that curiosity him. He’s presently working with author Tishani Doshi on a venture, he says.
What’s on his playlist right now? “I’m not listening to as a lot Tamil music as I ought to. Nicolas Jaar is dominating my track record, however I additionally hearken to a number of Anirudh when I’m driving,” he says.
The Valor of Madurai Veeran will launch on Tenma’s YouTube channel TenmaMakesMusic on October 28.
Revealed – October 24, 2024 08:20 am IST
