Bengaluru Singer-Songwriter Sanoli Chowdhury Gets Introspective On New EP ‘It’s All a Monotonous Game’
The musician’s latest offering showcases melancholic sounds juxtaposed with her quaint vocals
Bengaluru singer-songwriter/producer Sanoli Chowdhury. Photo: Courtesy of the artist
After the release of her sophomore 2019 EP Impermanent Warmth, Bengaluru singer-songwriter/producer Sanoli Chowdhury didn’t waste much time to work on new material and dove into experimenting with different soundscapes. Those new sonic elements–which include lo-fi music–creep into the musician’s new five-track EP It’s All a Monotonous Game, which released earlier this month.
Chowdhury began work on the new record about a year ago which was to be part of an EP titled Behind This Hemisphere. However, the musician was soon signed by London-based management agency United Sound Entertainment and decided to scrap her original idea. She says, “I thought it would be only fitting to start all over and release it with a few handpicked songs that were at the time my best work.” Chowdhury adds, “Hence the death of Behind This Hemisphere, but the very intriguing birth of It’s All a Monotonous Game.”
The new relaxed and melancholic EP opens with the dreamy “Tormented by Sounds” and moves into the charming “A Lie That We Lived Together.” Mid-EP songs include the ambient “Dear Carol,” and the acoustic guitar leaning “With Him.” The record closer is the lo-fi inspired “Voicenotes Sent to You” which includes audio clips sent by others to Chowdhury. “It’s my very first lo-fi sound,” she says. According to the musician, the EP on a whole is about “people, relationships and loss that I have uncovered through my subconscious.” She adds, “I say subconscious primarily because most times I don’t quite know what I’m singing, for who or why.”
The musician recorded the EP in her bedroom studio and even mixed it herself. Although she admits that the mix could have been a bit different. “I’m gaining more and more mixing knowledge every day,” she says. The EP was mastered at London’s Black Saloon Studios by Martin Korth and Mandy Parnell.
With a music video already out for “Dear Carol,” more clips will follow once a month for each song on the EP. Also in the works is a European tour for Chowdhury as well as collaborations with local and international artists. On what else she has planned for this year, the musician says, “Working more on my sound, mix and production.”
Click here to listen to the EP and watch the video for “Dear Carol,” below:
