It’s not often that you hear of women taking road trips with girl friends, crossing the length and breadth of the country on their Bullet motorbikes. It’s high time we changed that, isn’t it? Well, the ‘Angels of Rock’ by MTV, have you covered.
Renowned singers Akasa Singh, Anusha Mani, Shalmali Kholgade, and Jasmine Sandlas undertake a journey of epic proportions to meet inspiring women across the country and create songs about them. Anusha Mani and Akasa Singh take time out to speak to us about the show, the rides, and everything in between.
“I got a call from MTV, and was intrigued because something like this hasn’t been attempted on Indian TV before. I have always promoted girl power and questioned gender norms. It also had music. So, I never had second thoughts,” says Akasa Singh. Anusha Mani, whose most recent song Gulaabo from Shaandaar was a massive hit tells us, “The show is about travel and women empowerment, for which we travelled through cities like Mumbai, Gujarat and Punjab in search of inspiring women.
We also ended up documenting their work by writing songs around each of them. It was unique because we’ve all lived such comfortable lives and this was a ride through rural parts of the country,” says Anusha.
The show, which has a 35-strong woman crew and an all-female cast as well, is set to change perceptions about women. Akasa tells us about working with the cast, “It was magical how we got along so well instantly. All of us are extremely different but we went through something so intense together that an instant sisterhood was formed.” Anusha agrees, “This idea that women can’t get along is silly. We got along beautifully and looked after each other. If one person was left behind while riding, we’d wait for them and leave no one behind.”
Talking about writing for the first time, Akasa explains, “Writing about romance and sadness is easy but these are real people and experiences. I remember watching the Hockey University team practicing at 5 am in shorts while we were dressed in three layers. Such women are so inspiring that writing and composing became slightly easier than we expected.Our research shocked us at the amount women were doing but not being recognized. From fire fighting to running community radio, they’ve done it all and we loved interacting with them. It’s very different from any reality television I’ve seen because it proves that there’s nothing women can’t do,” iterates Anusha.
She goes on to talk about her biking experience. “I never thought I’d be a riding a bike with the relative ease that I did. I used to practice in my society and became extremely comfortable with it. My bike and I went from being enemies, to friends, then to lovers in a very short span of time,” she laughs.
Despite the challenges of varied weather, rural settings and the usual pestering by male motorists, both of them say they’d jump at an opportunity to film another season. Anusha says, “I would do it again in a heartbeat because travelling gives us so much perspective. We’ve been too comfortable in our lives and I’m very glad I got to do this.” Akasa adds, “I keep telling the producers that if they do end up doing another, to definitely take me in because they’ll never find angels like us! The whole experience made me think a lot about how women are so much more than what is shown. It was extremely gratifying.”
