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I'm talking about the George Michael 'Blueprint' - a route many a music industry manager has used when considering what to do next with their 'teen heartthrob' talent.Ìý Its easy you see - you just take your teen star and get them to sing deeper lyrics with a more emotional and intelligent side as opposed to the 'love by numbers' formula used when capturing the tweenie girl market.Ìý The blueprint says "growÌýup with your fans, and they'll continue to buy your records". The reason I use this in the Raghav context is because right from the beginning he's always had an intelligent mind and it's been obvious he's so much more than the 'pop' that he released on Storyteller.Ìý The other reason I use the George Michael analogy is because no one could have predicted that the man who wrote 'Wake Me Up Before You Go Go' would go on to write albums as deep as 'Listen Without Prejudice Vol 1' - and having talked, listened to and followed Raghav's career I think he may just do a 'George Michel' on us...and that's a good thing...isn't it?

Last Wednesday I got to re-check my theory when I watched Raghav singÌý4 numbers in a small London venue with a tiny acoustic backing band.Ìý No samples, No big B-lines, notÌýeven any electric instruments! Just his voice and a 3 piece string section with some guitars thrown in for good effect.Ìý And to put it simply - he blew me away.

The set up meant I wasn't looking at him,Ìýor even doing myÌýusual DJ thing of working out how loud the PA is.Ìý Instead I just got to hear every word andÌýlyric plus every note that his mouth tried to throw out at me.Ìý It was a great introduction to his new music as I instantly realized that he's grown up emotionally in the lastÌý4 years - a lot of the lyrics wereÌýas deep as the blue sea compared to his old songsÌýand his voice seemed to reach higher (and lower notes) than before.

This may all change when the album comes out as that is definitely not an acoustic affair and having already heard 'My Kind Of Girl' in all its mastered and mixed down glory I can say hand on heart that the Desi/Hip Hop/R&B heads will be kept happy and wont have to worry about Raghav going down the Country & Western path yet! (He loves Country & Western you know....!)

Watch RaghavÌýLIVE at the CityÌýShowcase 2008 here

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