Tuesday 17 July 2012

Interview with Jassi Sidhu at Cardiff Mela


Despite the recent rain in the UK, the sun was shining at Cardiff Mela last weekend. Cardiff Bay was alive with the smells of Desi food and the sounds of heavy bhangra beats. Jassi Sidhu sang an impressive 12 songs in just 20 minutes! I grabbed him after his set for a quick chat.

In an interview after the split of B21 you said you still had student debts. Have you paid them off yet?
Did I say that? I didn't know that! My debts weren't that bad so I was alright. I've done pretty well for myself. I'm all right.

You tweet more about football than music! If the England team had asked you to do a song for them to support them in the recent Euro 2012 championship, would you have sung one?

I always say that on my twitter account! I don't like talking about music because honestly it is not that interesting. Most of the artists that talk about it are just making it up. I hate England - can't stand them! I support Liverpool. I am a Liverpool fan not an England fan. I'd do anything for Liverpool, anything that they wanted.

Some of your hit songs were sung by other people first. Which of your songs would you like covered and by which artists?
We sang them when we were younger, when we didn't really know what copyright was. If they get the right clearance, good luck to them. They can sing anything they want.

You have said that Singing Between the Lines is your last album. What will you do when you retire?
Retirement is in 2016. That will be 20 years in the game for me, 21 years actually. There are a a few songs I owe my friends and producers in the industry like Honey Singh and Rishi Rich. I always promised to give them one last song. I'll do a couple of songs for my friends and that's it. I’ve no idea yet what I want to do. I just want to get away from music completely.

Would you go and climb a mountain and raise money for charity?

Oh no! I have always wanted a coffee shop. It’s my dream to own a coffee shop, something like Starbucks. I want to buy a Starbucks.

Would you make it a Desi coffee shop and call it "Sidhubucks"?

No I ‘d just call it Starbucks. I love the place. I would have no problem working there either.

You tweet a lot to and about the younger artists in the industry. What are the main challenges that face them?
The amount of morons in the industry. This industry this is one of the nastiest industries in the world. I meet so many sweet kids that enter it and within a year they are so disillusioned by everything that goes on and unfortunately I say to them this is what it is actually like. Everything you see on Facebook and Twiter about how amazing the shows are is a load of crap. Most of us are just sitting around. There are only a handful of artists who make a full-time living and I‘m blessed to be one of them. The rest of the kids that get in the game, they come in here bright eyed with all their hopes and dreams and I watch them slowly crumble and get ripped off. Its such a sad thing that if I can just tweet or even offer advice it's the least I can do

You mentioned stupid comments on Twitter and Facebook. Has social media done any good for the Bhangra industry?
It is a double edged sword. It’s great you can interact with your fans but then you have to deal with the morons that have some stupid comment to make about it. It is great exposure as your music travels overnight round the world but it has also let a lot of idiots through. But you take the good with the bad.


No comments: