Tones of sepia

With Khiyo’s new album just around the corner, we had a quick chat with the vocalist, Sohini Alam, to know more! The upcoming album will feature what Khiyo sees as “Bengali heritage music.”
Khiyo focuses on the use of actual instruments in the studio, rather than solely depending on the laptop. Oliver Weeks and Sohini Alam worked on the basic structure and arrangements of the songs to help them strike a chord with the newer generation; arrangements that resonated them as musicians.
“Ben Hillyard then joined us and we would jam the songs out and then change things as and when necessary. We did the same when working with tabla player, Hassan Mohyeddin, who played on the album. Olly wrote out basic drum charts for Derek Scurll and detailed viola parts for Danyal Dhondy, and we eventually properly rehearsed and came up with a more structured arrangement. It was a long process.
We’ve basically been developing this album for over five years,” says Sohini, talking about Khiyo’s first album.
With Khiyo, the band wanted the instruments to not just complement the vocals, but also sound beautiful without. While the vocal lines of many of these Bengali songs are wonderful, Sohini, along with Oliver Weeks had often felt that the instrumentation of the songs were at times treated like some “poor cousin” or largely ignored. With the album, Khiyo not only revamps sepia-toned classics but with this album will probably manage to introduce to the the magic that the golden era classics .
Nabeela M.