Love, memory and continuity: Ramesh Shotham on the themes that make his latest album special

All music, to me, is a journey. Mine has taken me across continents and through countless rhythms, from the electric pulse of rock to the improvisational freedom of jazz and the deep-rooted traditions of Indian music. Looking back, I see not a series of changes but one continuous path, a lifelong search for sound, connection, and meaning.

In the early 1970s, I was the drummer with Human Bondage, one of India’s leading rock bands. We played with the fire of youth: loud, curious, and restless. By the mid-seventies, something shifted. I felt drawn back to the intricate rhythms of my homeland, to the layered beauty of Indian percussion and the melodic cycles that hold both time and timelessness. That pull changed everything. It wasn’t about leaving rock behind but about rediscovering where I truly came from.

That rediscovery became the thread through all my later work, a dialogue between cultures, between rhythm and melody, between the familiar and the unknown. Along the way, I had the privilege of collaborating with extraordinary musicians such as Steve Coleman, Charlie Mariano, Carla Bley, Rabih Abou Khalil, the Karnataka College of Percussion and many more. Each encounter expanded my sense of what was possible.Read more