Amrit Singh Is A Person
@amritsingh
Filmmaker, DOSA HUNT (Trailer, EPK)
Executive Editor, Stereogum.com
CEO, ASP
Esq.
A photo, if you need one, by Laura June Kirsch
Amrit Singh has served as Executive Editor of Stereogum.com for seven years, writing and producing the website into a leading voice in independent music. And now, he is writing his bio in the third person. Amrit's video journalism has appeared on ABC, MTV, and Fuse. (A collection of these clips, including that time he hosted 20 all-star indie comedians and musicians bowling for charity, are on his Vimeo page.) He also served as Editor of the University of Wisconsin International Law Journal, and is a NY State Bar certified attorney, but we try not to remind his father of this. Most recently Amrit wrote, directed, produced, and appeared in his first film, DOSA HUNT, featuring members of Vampire Weekend, Das Racist, Neon Indian, Yeasayer, and the Vijay Iyer Trio on "The Greatest Hunt For South Indian Food In NYC Ever Committed To Film!" (Here's the trailer, and here's the EPK, if you're curious.) Called “sharply funny” by New York Magazine, “part No Reservations, part Big Brother, part something smarter” by Interview Magazine, and “a short film about the Indian community’s growth and search for cultural roots in the US” by The Times Of India, the documentary has also garnered kind reviews and profiles in BlackBook Magazine, Billboard Magazine, Huffington Post, FADER, Gothamist, The Awl, Hipster Runoff, IFC, PAPER, and Hyphen Magazine, amongst many others. (BlackBook said "Singh has the mark of a fanboy filmmaker not yet jaded by the Merchants Of Cool-hood of pop music." So, he has that going for him.) If you are a fan of the radio format, you can hear Amrit talk about making it, with Yeasayer's Anand Wilder and host John Schaefer, on NPR. Or you can listen to him talk for an hour about food, identity, LA, and NYC with Food Is The New Rock. Or you can hear him laugh in the face of racism on Andrew Ti's great Earwolf podcast Yo, Is This Racist? Somewhat more seriously, you can read Das Racist's Ashok Kondabolu interview Amrit about much the same, as well as the larger themes in their work and life stories, 9/11, hate crimes, working as a corporate attorney, and making sense of it all through art and blogging at the Asian American Writers Workshop. DOSA HUNT enjoyed a sold-out three-day premiere at Brooklyn's Nitehawk Cinema, with MTV legend John Norris moderating the Q&As. As these photos suggest, everyone wore suits and looked great. The film has been an official selection at CAAMFest, Indian Film Festival Of Los Angeles, Winter Film Awards, and New York Indian Film Festival, packing houses at San Francisco's Asian Art Museum, the ArcLight Hollywood (twice), and in NYC's Paramount Screening Room, (le) poisson rouge, and Tribeca Cinemas. In writing, Amrit covered a tragic beat in 2012 music news: Most notably, an essay on the hate crime in Wisconsin and its musical implications, titled "Hate Punk & Kirtan: Musical Overtones in the Wisconsin Sikh Temple Killings." He also wrote eulogies to the great Pandit Ravi Shankar, and the great Williamsburg experimental music venue Zebulon, in addition to "Helping Beach House Plead Their Case Against Volkswagen" in response to the car company ripping off the band in a nefarious sound-alike ad campaign. It's not all blog-sadness, though: Amrit makes a Monthly Mix over at Stereogum which is a good crash course in the month's best new music. It's free and legal, just like America.
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This week’s podcast guest is…
Stereogum Executive Editor and “Dosa Hunt” Director Amrit Singh
He joins Chuck and Zach to talk about Dosa Hunt, the short film he made last year featuring members of Vampire Weekend, Yeasayer, Das Racist and more in a van looking for dosa in Manhattan and Queens. We talk about what it was like to grow up as a brown indie rock dude in America and more importantly how hot Anand from Yeasayer’s mom is.
Download the episode for free on iTunes or by putting our RSS FEED into a player of your choice. You can also stream the episode below through Stitcher:
This is a fun hour, this Food Is The New Rock podcast — in which Amrit spreads a lot of love for DOSA HUNT, NYC & LA, and in which Zach and Chuck (the hosts) say a lot about the things they love. LISTEN UP (above, in that player)!
Reminder to NYC: DOSA HUNT will screen at Tribeca Cinemas on Friday 5/3 as an official selection for New York Indian Film Festival. Come enjoy lower Manhattan with us!
Here is one hour of me saying a lot of words! FOR ONCE IN MY LIFE.
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Get down Wednesday style! Amrit Singh, the creator of Dosa Hunt, is back on the Yo, Is This Racist? podcast as we talk country music.
PS. OH DIP, if you like that sort of thing, now you can subscribe to the podcast on Soundcloud!
We work a hearty shoutout to the wonderful Southern Poverty Law Center into this one, which is a proud moment. They are good! Country music talking about the “good old days of yore,” though, is problematic. Listen in.
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SHOUTOUT TO ALL MY DOGGS. Amrit Singh, the creator of Dosa Hunt, is back on the Yo, Is This Racist? podcast today, as we talk racist dogs!
PS. OH DIP, if you like that sort of thing, now you can subscribe to the podcast on Soundcloud!
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DOSA HUNT @ New York Indian Film Festival 2013 @ Tribeca Cinemas (Friday, May 3rd)
NYC! Proud to announce that DOSA HUNT is an official selection for 2013’s New York Indian Film Festival! We’ll screen at Tribeca Cinemas on Friday May 3rd. Ticket info, and the full schedule, is here. THIS IS A NICE THING!
Bringing DOSA to Tribeca. Come through!
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This week on the Yo, Is This Racist? podcast, Amrit Singh, the creator of Dosa Hunt, joins me in the studio! Today we get a weird question about Closed Captioning.
PS. OH DIP, if you like that sort of thing, now you can subscribe to the podcast on Soundcloud!
All week this week I am the guest on the internet’s #1 podcast for laughing at racism, Yo, Is This Racist? It is the podcast-cousin of DOSA HUNT, basically. Five episodes, so please brace yourself for five reblogs. STARTING HERE!
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DOSA HUNT's Los Angeles Premiere @ The ArcLight Hollywood (Indian Film Festival of Los Angeles)
Southern California friends: DOSA HUNT is finally ready for its LA premiere, as an official selection to the Indian Film Festival Of Los Angeles. We’ll screen TWICE — at 7PM on Wednesday 4/10 and Friday 4/12 — at Hollywood’s ArcLight Cinema. HOW NICE. Tickets are available at this link.
In addition to our film, IFFLA will screen a Yash Chopra retrospective, projecting the legendary Bollywood filmmaker’s finest directorial moments — like Kabhi Kabhie and Silsila — on the ArcLight’s big screen. We’re proud to play a part. SEE YOU SOON.
LA friends, I will be with you for two weeks around these two DOSA HUNT screenings at the ArcLight in Hollywood on 4/10 and 4/12 @ 7PM. Would love to hug you there, I will be administering many hugs. Come have one!
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Dosa Hunt + a special set by Indian Bastards from Hell (Das Racist)
An event all about film, music, art and food that you don’t want to miss!
After the West-Coast premiere of Dosa Hunt, part of CAAMFest 2013’s New Directions, stay for a Q&A with filmmaker Amrit Singh as well as a special set by Indian Bastards from Hell (Heems and Dap of Das Racist)…Get your tickets before they sell out like hot dosas. This is happening next Thursday, 3/21, at our place. The perfect event for art, music, food, and film nerds. Did you see this line-up?!
Amrit Singh of Stereogum, plus members from Vampire Weekend, Neon Indian, Das Racist, and Yeasayer.
And dosas.
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The 5th Anniversary Of Big Terrific
My friends Max Silvestri, Jenny Slate, and Gabe Liedman are celebrating five years of their comedy show Big Terrific, a Williamsburg institution that owned my Wednesday nights for years and changed the way an entire city thought about comedy. During that time they’ve hosted everyone from Aziz to Galifianakis, Natasha Leggero to Kristen Schaal, Todd Barry to Pete Holmes, Nick Offerman to Reggie Watts, Sarah Silverman to Gabe Delahaye. The highlights have always been their sets, though, together and solo, through which they’ve honed lovably distinct voices, and what has always felt like a groundbreaking sort of collaborative synergy. This Time Out NY interview about the anniversary gives a glimpse into that rapport, which is as inspiring and brilliant onstage as it is off. They’ve changed the way I’ve thought about a lot of things! If you can’t make the 5th Anniversary show at MHOW, just turn your attention to showbiz.com for the next five as they proceed to take it over. Shoutout Goof Troop. ♥
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DOSA HUNT Winter Film Awards Screening In NYC On Saturday, March 2nd
NYC! DOSA HUNT has been selected to screen at the Winter Film Awards, a three-day non-profit festival recognizing excellence in independent film. Our screening is Saturday, March 2nd at the Hotel Pennsylvania’s Globetrotter Ballroom during the 2PM-5PM screening block. (The Hotel is near Penn Station.)
Tickets are $10 and can be purchased here. Read more info about the other films in DOSA HUNT’s screening block. It’ll be a nice way to spend a Saturday afternoon in the city, come on out.
NYC friends, if you haven’t yet seen DOSA HUNT, this is a nice chance. Saturday, March 2nd!
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NYC, we’re screening again for you! On Thursday, February 7th at (le) poisson rouge in the Village, DOSA HUNT will play at around 8:30PM for Co-Lab, the earlier portion of DJ Rekha’s legendary Basement Bhangra dance party (which has just moved to LPR from S.O.B.’s). Arrive before 8PM and walk-up tickets are just $5. (Or buy them online now for $10; yes, you are paying a premium for insurance.) That gets you the screening, a DJ set from Dapwell, and the dance party that follows into the night. And if you don’t bhangra, don’t worry: There’s a free lesson that precedes the party. Info on the night’s other DJs and details at lepoissonrouge.com. This is going to be great.
DOSA HUNT + bhangra, another North-meets-South Indian production, from me to you. Come through.
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R.I.P. Ravi Shankar: A remembrance of the sitar virtuoso and cultural emissary, by Amrit Singh.
The night Ravi Shankar passed, I was unable to sleep until I wrote this remembrance, on Stereogum. It’s universal, but also highly personal; it speaks to Ravi’s broader legacy, and also to the night my brother and I had our baked minds rewired in his presence. I wrote it for perspective, and remembrance, and I hope it gives those things to you. He gave those things to us. He was true and great.
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