Day 4: A handful of recs for British Asian musicians
I must preface these recs by saying that the British Asian music scene is huge and sprawling, and I am no expert in any part of it! The recs are nothing but a jump off point really for anyone who might want to explore a bit further.
To generalise hugely, when the term British Asian music is used, what you might expect to hear is a fusion of traditional bhangra/desi sounds with western music, mostly dance, rap and hip hop although there are folkier influences out there too. The scene is dominated by first and second generation Southern Asian immigrants (primarily Indian, Pakistani and Bangladeshi) with lyrics in a mixture of languages including English, Hindi, Punjabi and Urdu.
British Asian music is in a really vibrant period currently, especially in London where huge events like the Notting Hill Carnival and the London Mela offer a natural home for bands and artists. The BBC offers pretty good coverage of the scene overall through the Asian Network. I find it sometimes frustrating that Asian music is such a niche category in the UK: you hear a huge amount of music of black origin on mainstream radio here - soul, hip hop, the category they weirdly define as "urban" - but very rarely do you hear anything with that British Asian sound. That's presumably because soul, hip hop etc are popular in the States, whereas bhangra/desi is as much of a niche concern there as here, but USians should correct me if I'm wrong with that assumption!
Asian Dub Foundation
I don’t where else I could start other than with ADF, a highly politicised group of musicians and rappers who have been hugely influential on the scene as well as more or less introducing me to it with the album Community Music in 1995. They operate as something of a loose collective, like the Wu Tang Clan, and their music is a mixture of everything including the kitchen sink. They have a commitment to activism in British Asian causes, from the campaign to free Satpal Ram to the establishment of their educational wing to the newly announced Beat Back the BNP tour. (The BNP is an extreme right wing racist political party who seem to be gaining a horrifying amount of ground here at the moment.)
Bags more info available at their website, which also streams their music - having a surf around whilst listening to whatever happens to stream while you're there is probably the best way to get a taste for all the different things they do.
MIA
I got brown skin but I'm a west Londoner, educated but a refugee still.
If you've heard of anyone this list before it will be MIA, thanks to the music she wrote for the film Slumdog Millionaire. (Paper Planes might sound familiar even if you didn’t know her name.) Born in Sri Lanka and brought up in India and then England, Mathangi Arulpragasam is one British Asian artist who probably has crossed into the mainstream at least here, with two full albums both (quite rightly) adored by the music press and her singles played on BBC Radio One (the "youth" music channel, which I probably should not still be listening to.) She has spoken often and eloquently about the difficulty of being a Tamil in the UK (and the West more generally) when that word is immediately associated with the Tamil Tigers and terrorism and she has repeatedly denounced the violence in her home country. She's also an artist and has made some short films. I might be a bit sort of in love with her.
More info plus music again at her website.
Tigerstyle
I wanted to include Tigerstyle partly because they're constantly tipped as the next Asian act destined to break through into the mainstream, and partly because they're from my home town! They are two Scottish Punjabi brothers who started out in music with the specific remit of trying to re-energise the Asian music scene in Glasgow which was considerably less alive than in London. They organised a series of club nights (which were regarded as painfully hip, as I recall - naturally I was not cool enough to actually be at any of them) before going on to record music of their own and remix tracks for huge rap artists like Busta Rhymes and Eminem. Their latest album - Mystics, Martyrs and Maharajas - came out last year.
You can hear a bunch of their most recent stuff on their youtube channel: Son of a Sardar is a good example of their politics, and Balle! Shava! is probably the biggest hit they've had to date. More info is available on their myspace or on their official website (although it's a bit out of date.)
Niraj Chag
Niraj is a new artist to me. I wanted to include him because he is at the more melodic end of the musical spectrum I'm discussing, and his music is really beautiful. However, I don't know much more about him that. Google tells me he was born in Southampton and lives in London. The songs are all sung in Punjabi, which I don't speak, so I can't even tell you what they're about. I think all I can do is let the music speak for itself as an explanation of the experience of an Asian man outside of Asia. More info on his website.
(The links are all to youtube.)
Bangles
Ur Jaa
The Offering
Sushil K Dade
To finish with something a wee bit different, here's another Glasgow artist. Of Indian descent, Sushil Dade records mostly under the name of Future Pilot AKA. He is particularly interesting to me as a Scottish person since he puts Asian sounds together with Celtic folk instruments and ideas to come up with something really unique and really gorgeous. The Glasgow music scene in general has a very DIY aesthetic with people collaborating all over the place and setting up their own labels/clubs/collectives, and you can usually tell when Sushil has been involved in something because his sound is so distinctive. He curated the first (and maybe only) Burns Mela last year.
I can't seem to find anywhere online you can hear his music so I've uploaded one of his albums from a few years back, Salute Your Soul (sendspace link to a zipped mp3 file.) All his stuff can be downloaded pretty cheaply from www.bleep.com.
I've tried to include a mixture of stuff so hopefully there might be something in there everyone can enjoy. There's so much more music out there - if you find anything that you love, please do rec it to me!
To generalise hugely, when the term British Asian music is used, what you might expect to hear is a fusion of traditional bhangra/desi sounds with western music, mostly dance, rap and hip hop although there are folkier influences out there too. The scene is dominated by first and second generation Southern Asian immigrants (primarily Indian, Pakistani and Bangladeshi) with lyrics in a mixture of languages including English, Hindi, Punjabi and Urdu.
British Asian music is in a really vibrant period currently, especially in London where huge events like the Notting Hill Carnival and the London Mela offer a natural home for bands and artists. The BBC offers pretty good coverage of the scene overall through the Asian Network. I find it sometimes frustrating that Asian music is such a niche category in the UK: you hear a huge amount of music of black origin on mainstream radio here - soul, hip hop, the category they weirdly define as "urban" - but very rarely do you hear anything with that British Asian sound. That's presumably because soul, hip hop etc are popular in the States, whereas bhangra/desi is as much of a niche concern there as here, but USians should correct me if I'm wrong with that assumption!
Asian Dub Foundation
I don’t where else I could start other than with ADF, a highly politicised group of musicians and rappers who have been hugely influential on the scene as well as more or less introducing me to it with the album Community Music in 1995. They operate as something of a loose collective, like the Wu Tang Clan, and their music is a mixture of everything including the kitchen sink. They have a commitment to activism in British Asian causes, from the campaign to free Satpal Ram to the establishment of their educational wing to the newly announced Beat Back the BNP tour. (The BNP is an extreme right wing racist political party who seem to be gaining a horrifying amount of ground here at the moment.)
Bags more info available at their website, which also streams their music - having a surf around whilst listening to whatever happens to stream while you're there is probably the best way to get a taste for all the different things they do.
MIA
I got brown skin but I'm a west Londoner, educated but a refugee still.
If you've heard of anyone this list before it will be MIA, thanks to the music she wrote for the film Slumdog Millionaire. (Paper Planes might sound familiar even if you didn’t know her name.) Born in Sri Lanka and brought up in India and then England, Mathangi Arulpragasam is one British Asian artist who probably has crossed into the mainstream at least here, with two full albums both (quite rightly) adored by the music press and her singles played on BBC Radio One (the "youth" music channel, which I probably should not still be listening to.) She has spoken often and eloquently about the difficulty of being a Tamil in the UK (and the West more generally) when that word is immediately associated with the Tamil Tigers and terrorism and she has repeatedly denounced the violence in her home country. She's also an artist and has made some short films. I might be a bit sort of in love with her.
More info plus music again at her website.
Tigerstyle
I wanted to include Tigerstyle partly because they're constantly tipped as the next Asian act destined to break through into the mainstream, and partly because they're from my home town! They are two Scottish Punjabi brothers who started out in music with the specific remit of trying to re-energise the Asian music scene in Glasgow which was considerably less alive than in London. They organised a series of club nights (which were regarded as painfully hip, as I recall - naturally I was not cool enough to actually be at any of them) before going on to record music of their own and remix tracks for huge rap artists like Busta Rhymes and Eminem. Their latest album - Mystics, Martyrs and Maharajas - came out last year.
You can hear a bunch of their most recent stuff on their youtube channel: Son of a Sardar is a good example of their politics, and Balle! Shava! is probably the biggest hit they've had to date. More info is available on their myspace or on their official website (although it's a bit out of date.)
Niraj Chag
Niraj is a new artist to me. I wanted to include him because he is at the more melodic end of the musical spectrum I'm discussing, and his music is really beautiful. However, I don't know much more about him that. Google tells me he was born in Southampton and lives in London. The songs are all sung in Punjabi, which I don't speak, so I can't even tell you what they're about. I think all I can do is let the music speak for itself as an explanation of the experience of an Asian man outside of Asia. More info on his website.
(The links are all to youtube.)
Bangles
Ur Jaa
The Offering
Sushil K Dade
To finish with something a wee bit different, here's another Glasgow artist. Of Indian descent, Sushil Dade records mostly under the name of Future Pilot AKA. He is particularly interesting to me as a Scottish person since he puts Asian sounds together with Celtic folk instruments and ideas to come up with something really unique and really gorgeous. The Glasgow music scene in general has a very DIY aesthetic with people collaborating all over the place and setting up their own labels/clubs/collectives, and you can usually tell when Sushil has been involved in something because his sound is so distinctive. He curated the first (and maybe only) Burns Mela last year.
I can't seem to find anywhere online you can hear his music so I've uploaded one of his albums from a few years back, Salute Your Soul (sendspace link to a zipped mp3 file.) All his stuff can be downloaded pretty cheaply from www.bleep.com.
I've tried to include a mixture of stuff so hopefully there might be something in there everyone can enjoy. There's so much more music out there - if you find anything that you love, please do rec it to me!