The Return of Adam and the Fish Eyed Poets

Photo: Monisha Ajgaonkar

When Chennai alternative rock band Adam and the Fish Eyed Poets released their third album Songs from an Island in September 2012, frontman and project leader Kishore Krishna promised a second part to the album called More Songs from an Island slated for December that year. It’s now coming around to nearly three years, but Krishna finally released his fourth album without much fanfare last month. He says, “Nothing is ever easy in this home recording business. However, the hardest thing to do was to stop, clear my head and take a look at what I’d been doing wrong.”

One of the main reasons for Adam and the Fish Eyed Poets’ ”˜disappearance’ was Krishna’s insistence on putting the right sound quality down on the now 15-track album. He didn’t want to put out material that sounded similar so he scrapped many songs and started from scratch. Says Krishna, “I wrote a new bunch closer to what was in my head.” He was recording live drums for the first time and ended up using programmed horn sections [“Tangle Untangle,” “Barbed Wire Cocoon”] and gave More Songs from an Island an upbeat alt rock that occasionally has dark electronic music undertones [“Medea,” “Wet Feet”] laced with characteristic cynicism. Thematically, More Songs from an Island follows the original album’s plot of an arranged marriage between “a lesbian in denial and a software professional.” Krishna adds, “The characters are a little older and have mellowed down a little but are only slightly more mature.” On “We could be Friends,” Krishna regrets the relationship between the protagonists; “I fucking hate you,” he sings dejectedly. On the whole, the musician divides the album’s sound into two main tropes ”“ “deadpan electronic and guitar-clutterpop.”

Album art for ‘More Songs From an Island.’

With a new, reworked set of songs ready by 2013, Krishna also took serious steps towards turning his room into a more professional home studio setup in mid-2014. He treated the space acoustically and added homemade bass traps for dampening low frequencies. Says Krishna, “It was the longest spell I’d gone through without being able to work on music, and I hated every minute of it but that pretty much changed the game. But it was a strange new experience; it really felt like the album was written and recorded by one person and then mixed and produced by an older, more experienced person.”

Although he’s still unsure of getting back on stage with a new setup for Adam and the Fish Eyed Poets, Krishna jokes, “I hear there’s money in making people dance.” After all, it’s about time all that work has some kind of payoff. Says Krishna, “The most important lesson is that producing an entire album is not a one-man job. But if you’ve got no choice, pace yourself and when you can, work smart, not hard. ”

Listen to More Songs from an Island here.