When Najma met Gary there was no plan. Najma knew
and respected Gary’s work with Jeff Buckley (he coauthored
Grace) and Gary had loved Najma’s ethereal
vocal collaboration with Page and Plant. A couple of gigs
later Gary produced the music (including some songs originally
written for Buckley) and Najma nailed the words and
the melodies for their first album, Rishte. And in the
process a beautiful and curious transformation has
occurred.
There is blues in the mix - in particular the eerie revival of
the Skip James classic Special Rider Blues (Gary’s also a
Beefheart alumnus) and there’s Indian music too, as
expected (both Daaya and Parda are based on Ghazal
styles). But out of this chrysalis of expectation has burst a
butterfly whose wings drip psychedelic jewels. A dark and
heady funk and fey folk evocations jostle in the powerful
title track and a powerful pop sensibility underpins everything.
It would be easy to apply simplistic marketing jargon
to the music of Rishte: Indo-Blues fusion, east-meets-west
and the like. But this is to misunderstand the alchemy that
occurred when Gary met Najma - a rare confluence of
interests, talents and cosmic synchronicities that have produced
an album which is truly more than the sum of its
parts: a unique and pungent fusion.
PRESS
Please contact Mike Gavin
mgavin@harmoniamundi.com
020 7732 9658
Mojo June 09
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