Buddhi De Mal and Wagon Park back on stage
Buddhi de Mal is an exquisite singer/songwriter originally born and raised in Moratuwa, Sri Lanka and currently living in Los Angeles, USA. His latest release ‘Colours of Hate (No More)’ is a wonderful introduction to his political and unifying single. 
The track starts with sparse instrumentation and slowly builds. There are guitar strumming chords on 2 and 4 of the beat, and then the vocals, drums and bass kick in.
How do we describe the out of the ordinary Buddhi De Mal? On the one hand, anybody could tell about public facts that a Google search can quickly proffer up. Older archives will tell you about his old band ‘Wagon Park’, the blues-rock/hard rock band he co-founded and fronted in Colombo. Or about his solo career experimenting with an intrinsic Sri Lankan flavour, he brought to western folk and country music. Buddhi is also a unique lyricist; love songs, sad songs and raging dirges are all created with signature wit and wisdom.
One search offered this description of Wagon Park: Six diverse musical influences, steadfast dedication, and a stroke of traditional spice come together to bring the Wagon Park experience, an experience so exclusive one has to live it to believe it. Founded by Buddhima De Mel and Mohamed Firaz in the Summer of 2007, Wagon Park have marched on from an unforgettable debut performance, to become Sri Lanka’s most potent Hard Rock outfit.
More recent news will tell that the Moratuwa-born Buddhi went on to Hollywood a few years ago, garnering himself a place at the coveted Musicians Institute (MI)– whose famous alumni include the late Jeff Buckley, Bollywood musician Shruti Hassan, Mr. Big’s Paul Gilbert and legendary axe man Steve Vai.
Within a year in California, Buddhi formed a second band, ‘The Sutra’, with fellow MI students, Marie Weill/Charly (France), Bhargav Choudhury (India), Andrew Tokko (Los Angeles), Shae Garrett of Inland Empire fame and Anthony Kuo (Taiwan). The band’s name pays tribute to the multiethnicity of its membership, as does ‘The Sutra’s’ music.
Buddhi also released several solo singles and an EP titled ‘And God’ in early 2017. His latest single, Colours of Hate (No More) is a mammoth of a peace ballad featuring 20 musicians and Buddhi’s iconic half-speak, full-speedvocals. A few weeks ago, it was announced that Colours of Hate was nominated for VIMA Global Music Award alongside The Sutra for their original Wine N’ Sex. In Sri Lanka too, Wagon Park is an award-winner, bagging Best Band at the YES FM Home Grown Awards in 2015 and many others since first placing runners up at TNL On-Stage in 2007.
Buddhi is now home. He is in Sri Lanka for a very short stint. All ‘Wagon Park’ and Buddhi de Mal fans can catch Buddhi at a one-night-only performance on Sunday 2nd December (Today) from 4.00 pm onwards at the Lion Pub, Mount Lavinia.
In Sri Lanka, things seem to be on a downward spiral. Political coups, chilli powder in parliament and an overall pathetic state-of-affairs seem to define national narrative.
Watch Buddhi live on stage and you’ll be quick to note that it goes beyond the music; Buddhi brings a level of showmanship to his performances that fall in the realms of a good old-fashioned Sri Lankan Baila session. He grabs hold of his audience by interacting with them – reminiscent sometimes of Freddie Mercury’s live shows, as he engaged and played with his audiences instead of merely performing at them.
This is also true of his bandmates and collaborators. De Mal has a knack of surrounding himself with like-minded musicians who continue to work together, making music across the world. This January, Buddhi and his original outfit Wagon Park did just that, recording live music from opposite ends of the planet. Wagon Park stepped into the studios of Sooriya Village in Colombo to record a session of the band’s favourites, while Buddhi recorded his vocals in Hollywood. To make things really interesting, a global production team was also on board; with audio engineering carried out by Ranil Goonewardena in Sri Lanka, mixing and mastering by Indian Sashank Venkatesh and post-production on the accompanying video by Benjamin Gabriel in Los Angeles, this upcoming live release promises to be one of the most fascinating cross-border projects to come out of the music business.
Tickets for the gig will be available at the venue or through pre-booking via Wagon Park’s Facebook page.
