BANDRA (11): In The Name Of The Father, The Mother, The Grandfather, The Grandmother and some Hollywood Movie Star!

It has been awhile since I approached the boundaries of fundamental Catlick moral values in a blog and I am sure this one would fly across it like a cripple watching the neighbourhood kids set fire to his freshly delivered package containing his prosthetic leg from the other side of the pond.

Names, you hear them all the time. The good ones you accept, you carry on with your life and may end up finding a best friend. The bad ones, the ones which you thought you heard something, but just could not believe that you heard right, so you asked again and found out that it was right and you then pitied their dismal lives of having to move ahead in life being branded by their imaginative or drunken or dazed or smug or all of the above parents.

There used to be a trend in the Catlick baby naming procedure once upon a time, the trend usually lasted for that decade. There was a decade of saints, a decade of Movie Stars, a lost decade, a decade of hyphenated Anns, a decade of hyphenated Lynns, a decade of misspellings and a decade of mash-ups!

Somewhere in between came satellite television, the internet, the Middle Eastern boom, porn stars, Canadian immigration, Australian-born cousins , Russian hookers (not necessarily in that order) and that messed things up a bit. It added chaos to the already existing sequence of things and we ended up with names like these…

(Note: None of the names have been tampered with for comic effect. They are as you see them. I will leave it up to you to decide how they originated and sex of the person)

• Alvea

• Amberina

• Analeeze

• Annaleishea

• Annvilla

• Antobrazil

• Ashlesha

• Bellirina

• Blandina

• Celsus

• Claudelle

• Cleck

• Clestin

• Clevan

• Clitta

• Cloudina

• Clyden

• Cruzette

• Cyntilla

• Desla

• Dodsal

• Earcy

• Edelweiss

• Eglentine

• Ehrenfrids

• Elfreda

• Ency

• Eulalia

• Evachrist

• Fayola

• Femina

• Flavina

• Florinda

• Fredella

• Fvicky

• Gaynelle

• Glosinda

• Grayson

• Grendyl

• Helloy

• Hesper

• Jenesis

• Jerrelenn

• Jesvin

• Joubert

• Klerissa

• Lezvin

• Louella

• Mackosker

• Maclon

• Maclyna

• Melburn

• Meleny

• Mellicent

• Minann

• Montina

• Nelishia

• Nickson

• Nymphia

• Osbert

• Oslyn

• Placita

• Quenita

• Ransley

• Rexton

• Rochwyn

• Rodslie

• Schinella

• Severine

• Shalet

• Shiny

• Shonet

• Silel

• Silford

• Sneyden

• Tennyle

• Terryl

• Timania

• Valonia

• Vanrick

• Vynlen

• Walesa

• Wilander

• Wynzil

• Yhuela

• Yorham

• Zelishia

• Zonnette

What were the parents thinking?! What would their reasons be?!!

Tradition?

Fashion?

Trend-setting?

Superiority?

Stupidity?

We know that thinking unconventionally is good at times but not when the final product will sound like a posh version of a venereal disease.

"I heard that Mark has a bad case of the ransleys."

Leaving the parents aside, imagine the children now all grown up , meeting what they hope to be their true love, the person they think they will grow old with for the rest of their life!

"Jennifer, I'd like you to meet...Fvik...Fviy...Fvicky!

Although I could go on ranting metaphors on this topic, I think my message here is quite apparent.

If there should be something positive coming out of this blog, it would be that future generations will not to subject their children to ridicule and stop being so bloody creative! Because, Really, you are not!

PS: If you did find your name on the list, I am not the one who should be blamed for stating the obvious…

American Idiot On Broadway: Rebels with Souls

Back in the last century, a trio of misfit punk kids in a psychiatric hospital room unleashed a new wave of 90's punk rock onto a world of teenagers just getting out of the hair metal era. Plugging in that Dookie album in 1994, made them feel as anarchic as their parents did in the late 70's.

The century changed, those teenagers grew up, so did the band and ten years later, a more mature and a better produced Green Day emerged with one of their best albums of their career and even the noughties. American Idiot!

They had managed to take their punk rebel attitude, charge it up with the political situation of the time, optimize the production and take punk rock to level , it had never been before ... Operatic!

Sure, some of the fans hissed, spat, spoke about them succumbing to the MAN and loosing their scratchy one amp, one monitor almost mono underground punk sound. But Billy and the boys knew that this was the next step in maturity for them and for the genre as well.

Meanwhile, the parents of those whiny fans moaned as they witnessed Ozzy Osbourne duet with Miss Piggy, Iggy Pop sell car insurance and Johnny Rotten endorse English Country Butter!

However, they weren't done yet! In September 2009, Tony-Award winning director Michael Mayer collaborating with Green Day, brought American Idiot to the stage.

The official soundtrack of the Broadway show was released in April 2010.

The first impression you get on listening to American Idiot (The Original Broadway Cast Recording) is that Green Day has been 'American Idol'-ised

...And those whining ex-fans went " See! We told you so!"

But as you sink deeper into it, you come to realise that what Green Day together with Music Supervisor Tom Kitt have done; is taken what was a phenomenal punk rock opera album both lyrically and musically and have added on even more layers to it; be it in additional background vocals, female leads, orchestrations, horn sections, eastern percussion and even gospel choirs!

You soon forget about the Reality TV show moments and soar into the broader picture of the sound and you then come to realise that Green Day, the youth cast and the grander production takes American Idiot with all its rebellious attitude and gives it SOUL!

So now its just a matter of time until My Chemical Romance's The Black Parade does the same, given its already existing storyline and the similar operatic sound.The Goths would then have to thank the grown up punks as they put on their blackest suits and head down to the theatre.