Jokebox - A new initiative for band music

JukeBox’s maiden performance at BCIC Auditorium in the city

Not even continual monsoon rain all day long could deter the music-loving people of the city from coming to the BCIC Auditorium, to enjoy the ‘Close-up and JukeBox Music Concert’ on August 2.

Two renowned band groups, Vikings and Feed Back, performed at this concert that surely was a hitherto-unprecedented phenomenon in the music scene of the country. ‘Juke Box’, however, is a group of enthusiastic youths who endeavour to establish regular arrangements for band groups to perform. From their realisation that, unlike in case of the theatre groups of the country, there are limited scopes for the band groups as regards regular performance, a few young hands joined together under the name of ‘Juke Box’ in June 2002.

The members of the team are the two brothers, Aakash and Shagor, Taufiqur Rahman, Bappa Mazumder and Shanjeeb Chowdhury, and Abdun Noor Tushar. At this primary stage of their mission, ‘Juke Box’ wishes to arrange at least one concert a month in which two bands will perform.

These concerts will be open to public through tickets at a considerable price. The concert was the maiden attempt by ‘JukeBox’ in collaboration with ‘Close-up’. The concert opened with the Vikings, the winner as the best band in Benson & Hedges Star Search, 1999. Vikings presented some ten songs that included numbers both from their own albums and popular English music. Specially, ‘Din joto dukhho toto,’ Bon Jovi’s remake of the song ‘It’s my life’ of Doctor Alban, and Bryan Adams’ ‘Please forgive me’ earned much applause from the audience.

Then the stage was given over to Feed Back, a band that emerged in the late 1980s. Feed Back presented from its old albums songs that are still popular, such as, ‘Moushumi,’ Udashi ei mone,’ and the greatest hit one ‘Keno khulechho tomar o janala.’ They also sang two songs from their forthcoming fourth album: ‘Emoni raate’ and ‘Path hara pathik shobai.’ Their own number ‘Telephone-e fishfish’ and ‘Another brick in the wall’ of Pink Floyd simply overwhelmed the audience with the frenzy of rock music.

As this first attempt of ‘JukeBox’, the concert surely was a successful one; for, the auditorium, although not very big, was packed with music lovers mostly from the younger generation. But ‘JukeBox’ strongly wishes to eradicate the ‘infamy’ that is generally attached to band music concerts. And at the same time, it wishes people not to confuse ‘JukeBox’ with the band ‘Dolchhut,’ which includes Bappa and Shanjeeb, and is very famous at present.’

JukeBox’ does not mean to take privileges, nor harm ‘Dolchhut’’s reputation. Instead, ‘Juke Box’ wants to be an institution by itself, which strives to change the present musical entertainment scene for better one both for the artistes and the audience.