They might have been branded MTV India's Next Big Thing, but the five members behind fusion band Rajiv & Johan, were performing together for the first time when they impressed judges to win the network's talent search.
The quintet – which takes its name from their charismatic frontmen – came together just a day before the auditions for the Gulf-wide competition, hosted at Dubai’s Music Room in November and this month.
But that did not stop the musicians going in with high expectations.
“I’m not very surprised we won,” says the bassist, guitarist and singer Johan Roy D’souza. “Because we had a very good show, and the judges didn’t have much criticism of our performance.”
Those judges include musician and actor Luke Kenny, best known for his role in the Bollywood hit Rock On!!.
But while the full band may have been assembled especially for the contest, it was based on a long-standing relationship between its two founders. Both long-term UAE residents, Johan met singer and guitarist Rajiv Sapru six years ago, and they began performing as a duo this year.
The Next Big Thing competition, aimed at expats from the subcontinent, inspired the pair to seek out other musicians to fulfil their dream. First they recruited old friends Keith Roche on keyboards and Mahesh Raghvan on keyboards, GeoSynth and guitar. The final piece of the puzzle was finding a drummer – they recruited Bhargav Raghavan a day before the auditions on October 17.
However, his decision to join the band was only finalised once the band’s slot among the 13 finalists was confirmed.
“Finding a drummer completed us,” says 38-year-old Rajiv. “But we had all known each other for just a few hours when we played for the first time.
“We said to the judges, ‘If you push us through to the next round, we have a drummer’.”
Such an arrangement made for a scrambled set list. The band describe their music as a mix of Sufi traditions with rock and pop, mixing covers and originals.
“We didn’t have a sound of our own before the auditions,” says Johan, 33. “We met the night before and decided what to play.”
Such spontaneity clearly worked, with the band trumping runners-up Rooh and Dhruv to win the final round’s top prize, and the chance to record and shoot a video for an original single to be screened on MTV India.
The band now needs time to figure out what track to record, with eight originals written so far. However, a year from now, Rajiv & Johan hope to release a full album and a few more video singles. “We’ve always been interested in doing original music,” says Rajiv. “There’s only so far you can more forward in life playing covers.
“We want to create an identity. We definitely need our own original music, we’re really working on our own stuff.
“We’re very, very thankful to MTV to give us this opportunity. It will have a big effect.”
• Find out more at www.facebook.com/rajivandjohan
rgarratt@thenational.ae
