By Hazel Tariang
Khasi National Awakening Day led the way for Dymbur, a Khasi Thraat Metal Folk band, to release their fourth single, “U Tirot Sing,” in collaboration with the Khasi Students’ Union (KSU) which also features folk/contemporary singer-songwriter Desmond Rimaki Sunn.
The primary objective of the song’s release was to bolster the idea that we are all the ‘Tirot Sing’ of our generation and that we must stand up for our motherland, our roots, our cultures, to fight for our rights, and most importantly, have unity amongst ourselves and veer away from the “crab like mentality” of tearing each other down rather than encouraging and supporting one another.
When asked as to why a song on U Tirot Sing, something that has been done time and again, Cornelius Kharsyntiew a band member said that several writers from other genres have highlighted him, and Dymbur, being a metal act have noted that no metal band has used that particular vocal technique, such as scream vocals, and hence wanted to try it out. Adding that only Shillong residents are aware of that particular freedom fighter, they sought to popularise the unappreciated freedom hero by releasing a bilingual song (Khasi and English), so that people all over the world would know who he is, acknowledging that they had fan bases all around.
“Only the people of Meghalaya, and perhaps the people of the North East, are aware of him, and if you ask the people of Delhi about Tirot Sing, they have no idea. They wouldn’t know who he is, but they would be certain to know other freedom fighters like Bhagat Singh if you asked him about them,” Kharsyntiew said.
According to Andreas War, another band member said that the collaboration with the KSU came into being because to write something about a freedom fighter or something to do with culture, one has to be sensitive and at the same time one cannot afford to make mistakes because the main intention is to portray him to the world and in the best light, so they thought why not get in touch with someone who really knows about our freedom fighters and the first person who came to mind was Donald Thabah of the KSU.
“We made the decision to omit any dates, names, and other data in order to avoid turning the whole thing into a documentary. Instead, we made the song into a sort of war cry, a wakeup call,” War added.
After further brainstorming, they came up with the idea of enlisting a well-known Khasi singer-songwriter to hum the Khasi portion of the song, and Desmond Rimaki Sunn was their choice. The first thing Sunn asked when he was called was whether he needed to scream his lungs out? The band then jokingly retorted, “No, no shouting will be done by you per se.”
Instead of making a boring music video to promote the song, they opted to be innovative and made an animation video. They did this by contacting a skilled animator Benji Syiem, and as a result, the entire song was ready and waiting to be produced and a few months down the line, here they are releasing the music video to the world.
The current Dymbur line-up comprises Lancaster Mawthoh (vocals), Cornelius Kharsyntiew (guitars/vocals/duitara/mieng), Andreas War (guitars/ka bom), Gaudy Shullai (guitars/duitara), Mayson Dkhar (bass/shwa shaw) and Sain Shullai (drums).
The band has also previously released three songs, all of which touched urgent and sensitive topics like rape, child abuse.