Lucky Ali is back with his fifth album but music isn’t all he’s busy with

X Suie is an odd sort of name for an album. Stranger still for the world of Indian pop music, singer-actor-agriculturist Lucky Ali is in no hurry and is eager to try out a novel approach to reach out to his listeners. “We’ve recorded 16 songs for the album but we’re only releasing the tracks online. Every two weeks, we’ll release a single that will be available for download and once all the tracks are done, we’ll come out with a hard copy of the album,” says Ali. Clearly Ali’s had enough of music companies and has followed the lead of international rock group Radiohead who started the trend of releasing music online with their album In Rainbows and accepting whatever listeners wanted to pay for it. Ali has tied up with an online music portal from America, www.nimbitmusic.com , a distributor to all other international music portals. In India, Blue Frog Records is releasing the singles on their online store, available for download at Rs 45 per track. “The online music revolution has empowered the artist, we get to keep the essence of our music without being suppressed by the boss of a music company who is only concerned about the business part of it,” says Ali, with unusual candour. As for the album name X Suie means, at your own pace. “I was returning to making music after a long hiatus, I just wanted to do my own thing, my way. I had so many songs in the backburner and I just took them out one by one,” says Ali who has also included an unfinished song by his late father, comedian Mehmood in this album. The music is classic Ali stuff — about nostalgic personal journeys, love and longing and the state of the world around him.

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