SPB The God of Playback Singing...In Ten Episodes

The term "Golden Age" has its origins in Greek and Roman mythology and is perhaps maligned in its casual overuse, especially in the filmy context. Many a superannuated artiste and film technician have tried to usurp that moniker for the era that they had peaked in. The Greeks had referred to the Golden Age to mean a mythical age of harmonious utopia, where everyone lived a virtuous life like MGR (of his movies). The gods and humans freely co-mingled and were often indistinguishable. Hindu mythology had an equivalent for it called the "Satya Yuga". When scribes and historians ascribe a certain period as a golden age, they are probably thinking of a few things: convergence of talents, great partnerships, and memorable creative output that stands the test of time. For example, the 1950s and 60s are called the Golden Age of Hindi Film music because great music composers, singers, lyricists, actors, and directors descended into Bombay at almost the same time and produced...

The year was 1979. The hippies were drifting away. The universalism of the sixties and the seventies was wearing off with them. Democracies had stabilized and military dictators were bringing a semblance of uneasy calm to their territories. India was making a valiant attempt to come out of the gloom of the Emergency. The world seemed to be heading to a better place. Two events, though, would perhaps inextricably change the world for several decades to come. A popular movement by students, maulvis, and leftists led to the overthrow of the Shah of the Pahlavi dynasty of Iran, installing the US-backed Ayatollah Khomeini as its supreme leader.  Towards the end of the year, the Grand Mosque of Mecca, considered to be the holiest place for a billion Muslims, was besieged by armed militants with a goal to dislodge the royal family of Saudi Arabia. Their motive was to return to the "original ways of Islam" and repudiate everything perceived to be western - TV, sports, music, and mate...