Imran and I originally planned to give this song to Mr. Akhand as a thank you for his contributions to Bangla music and to our lives. Unfortunately, he passed before we finished recording it.
To Lucky Akhand: A Personal Goodbye from a Stranger
In 1992, my father took me, eleven and a budding music fan, to see my favorite band Feedback live. They played at the Engineering Institute Auditorium, with a female chorus backing up the mighty Mac Haque. The highlight of the show for me was when they performed “Palki”, a song dedicated to their late friend Happy Akhand. Twenty-five years later, I can’t help but think of that song again as I consider Lucky Akhand’s gifts to Bangladeshi culture.
Tar kotha je cchoriye acche boba batashe,
Tar smriti je shonali pakhi shurer akashe,
Shob jawa ki shesh jawa hoye, phire she ashe,
Kan cchuwe she gaan cchuwe she royecche mishe.
For someone who recorded only a handful of songs under his own name, Lucky Akhand’s influence on Bangla music is pervasive. Without delving into the countless songs he wrote for the likes of Kumar Biswajit, Ferdous Wahid, James, Ayub Bacchu, Samina Chowdhury, and Tapan Chowdhury, let’s look at the album he’s best known for, Neel Monihar. “Age Jodi Jantam”, “Amaye Deko Na”, “Neel Monihar”, “Mamunia”. Four of the Greatest Hits of Bangladeshi Music just from one album. That doesn’t include his songs that Happy Akhand sang, like “Ke Bashi Bajaye”, and, of course, the immortal “Abar Elo Je Shondha”.
What do you do when your work is the thread that forms the tapestry of an entire culture? Most seek fame. Some are forgotten. Lucky Akhand was neither—a household name, revered by musicians, yet shunning publicity and quietly creating memorable tunes; taking part in every major movement of Bangla music. He was signed by HMV when he was a teenager. During the War of Liberation, he was an artist at Shadhin Bangla Betar Kendro. He was the musical director of Bangladesh Betar. We breathe the cadences of music he crafted, even when they don’t bear his name. He wasn’t just the songwriter sui generis; he composed much of the music you hear when you turn on the radio, when you’re watching television, when you’re listening to songs of freedom on national holidays.
I doubt many would recognize him in person. I met him once, when he was interviewed by Radio Foorti. I was working on its music database at the time and spent a good year obsessed with the song “Neel Monihar”. My songwriting partner Imran and I would speculate interminably on what the “monihar” really was. We visualized desert landscapes and Ennio Morricone treatments where a steel-eyed cowboy hands a blue jewel to his sweetheart before walking off to meet his destiny. “Shudhu mone rekho”—remembrance is all he asked for.
When I met Mr. Akhand, I was disappointed by what his quiet, unassuming demeanor. He was a genius. Why didn’t he act like one? Instead of proclaiming how he came to arrange chords and notes in his inimitable way, he was professorial, avuncular. He was the politest person I had ever met. But I wanted bombast.
I think of how quiet he was, with a head full of starlit melody; how he meditated before played; how he mastered every instrument and the art of song; how the musicians I considered masters considered him a master. And I think of the melancholy of his being. How it must have felt to lose your best friend, musical soulmate, your younger brother, before you’re even thirty. Lucky Akhand took a decade off to mourn his brother Happy, and did not release any music under his own name between 1987 and 1998. I can’t imagine—just as I can’t imagine how he wrote so many of his songs—how it affected Lucky to lose Happy and yet be surrounded by evidence of Happy’s life and work. It’s disrespectful of the dead to speculate, but I hope that he took solace in the joy Happy left behind, staying true to his name.
Under the gentleness and philosophy, he was a warrior. You’ll find video of him singing “Age Jodi Jantam” on YouTube, sitting in a wheelchair and breathing through a tube, surrounded by some of the musicians whose lives he touched. Even with a body ravaged by cancer, unable to stand up, he gives himself fully to the song. And to the end, he worked on writing new material.
Artists pass, but art lives. I have wept at his music but I do not weep that Lucky Akhand left us. I like to think of Lucky Akhand and Happy Akhand together. Brothers reunited, writing songs in the key of forever. The day passes. Night comes.
Abar elo je shondha, shudhu dujone,
Cholona ghure ashi, ojanate.
credits
released October 3, 2017
Original lyrics and music by Lucky Akhand
Vocals: Mithun and Rajeeb
Bass: Josh Cohen
Keys: Saad Chowdhury
Guitars: Imran Aziz
Drums: Arafat Kazi
Mixed and mastered by Saad Chowdhury
Artwork by Farhan Aziz (homage to Edward Hopper's Nighthawks)
An ambitious pop song cycle about human loneliness and fear, thick with harmonies and buoyed by tight musicianship. Bandcamp New & Notable Jun 27, 2018
Ben Wheeler uses an East German synthesizer and a Soviet flanger to create hauntingly weird yet bright and open electronic soundscapes. Bandcamp New & Notable Feb 10, 2022
20 years into her career, Kate Nash returns with her debut for Kill Rock Stars, full of the rich songwriting for which she’s known. Bandcamp New & Notable Mar 20, 2024
On the first new High Llamas record in 6 years, Sean O’Hagan creates abstract tracks that reflect the kaleidoscopic palette of modern pop. Bandcamp New & Notable Jan 13, 2024
