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Coldplay To Jay-Z To AR Rahman: The Best, Good, Not-So-Bad and Ugly Of Global Citizen India

byRachna Srivastava
21st November 2016
3 minute read

With more than 80,000 fans, Global Citizen India Festival 2016, indeed, seemed like a sky full of stars. There was so much awesomeness in one day, that I am having a huge musical hangover from the more than eight-hour-long extravaganza, I attended. To sum it up here’s the best, good, not-so-bad and ugly bits from the whole show.

Best

Coldplay was there to ‘Fix’ us:

This one’s a given. Of course, it was Coldplay’s more than 90-minute long spectacular performance.

The performance involved all their best hits A Sky Full of Stars, Fix You, Clocks, Scientist, Up and Up, Hymn for the Weekend, Viva la Vida, Every Tear’s A Waterfall, Paradise et al.

But the crowd went batshit crazy when Chris Martin sang ‘Vande Mataram’ with A.R.Rahman.

 

It was quite a moment.

chris-martin-ar-rahman

And, when he sang a couple of lines from Arijit Singh’s ‘Channa Mereya’ before breaking into ‘A Sky Full of Stars’, it was just tooooo good.

 

Adding to the energy was Chris’s cute attempt at speaking Hindi and not to forget the amazingly beautiful fireworks display, helium balloons and confetti.

“Yeh humari khushkismati hai ke hum itne khoobsurat desh mein aaye hain,” said Chris.

 

A.R.Rahman’s stupendous musical delight:

Watching A.R.Rahman live was just mind-numbingly good.

ar-rahman

The maestro captivated the audience, with not only his mellifluous voice when he sang Tu Hi Re, Humma Humma, Andha Arabic Kadaloram, Dil Se Re.

 

But also with the colourful stage lighting that complemented the songs to the T.

 

Jay-Z’s heightened our ‘state of mind’:

American music royalty Jay-Z’s 45-minute long performance was an uber-successful India debut.

He rapped his way through Chaiyya Chaiyya, Mundeya Tu Bachke Rahi, 99 Problems, Empire State of Mind, Drunk in Love, Holy Grail, to name a few.

 

And the crowd went crazyyy.

jay-z

 

Good

The Vamps and Demi Lovato:

The British boy band, The Vamps, made everyone sway to their hit numbers and were more than excited to perform in front of a huge crowd of 80K plus people.

demi-lovato

As for the ‘Confident’ girl Demi Lovato, she received a lukewarm reception but was looking stunning in her golden avatar.

 

Shankar-Eshan-Loy and Farhan Akhtar:

Leaving everyone ‘Breathless’ with their performance, the audience went ‘Jhoom Barabar Jhoom’ with Shankar-Ehsaan-Loy.

The trio set the mood perfectly for the show.

 

And, picking up their energy was Farhan Akhtar with his rocking performance.

farhan-akhtar

He crooned Sinbad The Sailor, Rock On, Havan Karenge and also, Atrangi Yaari with megastar Amitabh Bachchan.

 

PM’s address:

Keeping his address short and sweet, Prime Minister Narendra Modi spoke to all at the venue through a video conference call.

In his usual style, he even cracked a demonetisation joke. The only bit we missed was hearing, ‘Bhaiyo aur behno’ in classic Modi style.

 

Not-so-bad

Sonakshi Sinha, Shraddha Kapoor, Ranveer Singh and Bollywood tadka:

Since it was such a star-studded day, we also got to see Sonakshi Sinha and Shraddha Kapoor sing, while ‘Bajirao’ Ranveer Singh awed all with his electrifying dance performance.

global-citizen

When Arijit Singh took to the stage, there was an echoing applause around and the melodious crooner impressed all with his medley of hit numbers.

 

That’s not all, there was a surge in the celeb count as they were there to introduce artists and lend support for the three Global Citizen causes for India they’re part of. The causes are – Gender Equality, Quality Education and Water, Sanitation and Hygiene.

frieda-pinto-sachin-tendulkar-shah-rukh-khan

The line-up included Ayushmann Khurrana, Arjun Kapoor, Parineeti Chopra, Shraddha Kapoor, Sonakshi Sinha, Vidya Balan, Sonam Kapoor, Rana Daggubati, Dia Mirza, Alia Bhatt, Katrina Kaif and of course, Shah Rukh Khan. The crowd cheered the loudest when Sachin Tendulkar and SRK were on-stage to introduce Coldplay.

 

Ugly

During the incredible day and well-organised event, there was not much to not like. But since the heat was sickening and fans were standing for as long as ten hours, there were many who fainted or puked or felt sick as there was no drinking water in the beginning of the show.

But, free water was provided later and the organisers were constantly urging everyone to keep themselves hydrated and paying attention to their needs.

This was the first of the many Global Citizen India Festivals in India. More to come. We’re so damn excited thinking about next year’s artiste line-up. Aren’t you?

All images are from WIZSPK.

Cover Image Source

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