Premiere: Yatin Srivastava Project and Friends Call to Break Free in ‘Breathe’ Video

While the Yatin Srivastava Project was plotting out a second album — the follow up to 2018’s Chaos // Despair — the New Delhi guitarist, producer and leader understood that the coronavirus pandemic would put a spanner in the wheel. Always one who’s keen to collaborate, he kicked off YSP and Friends earlier this year, which has a new single out called “Breathe,” featuring Mumbai-based vocalist Shagun Trisal aka Trisalien and drummer Aritra Basu.

While Trisal is formerly of New Delhi rock band Kraken, Basu has so far been part of heavy acts like Kolkata’s Yonsample and prog band Letterz. Srivastava says, “‘Breathe’ arose out of one of these sessions of me trying to specifically experiment with different sounds, something I would lean to but be too afraid to maybe have it be on a full fledged YSP release.” Trisal brings in an impassioned plea as vocalist, singing angstily about the present situation of “political disdain” in India. Over that, Basu adds galloping and roomy drum blasts for Srivastava’s chunky, sprawling riffage that he says was inspired by American metallers Deftones.

Whether it’s his previous release “Ikigai” or “Breathe,” the guitarist says the point is to never treat it as ‘work’. He adds, “I think the biggest difference with this song was that I didn’t have a microscopic eye on everything. Through each phase, everybody involved spent probably the least amount of time actually working on constructing something as opposed to just playing and having fun.”

The video brings together stock footage sourced online as well as old shots from a film project that Srivastava worked on in London. He says that the video began taking shape once he received the vocals and lyrics from Trisal. “The lyrics really drove me to a unique perspective of what his words tried to say, and in turn I used that to find that stuff that would fit. It was difficult in terms of firstly trying to find footage that would match the vibe of the song and what it was trying to portray, and also trying to make it match to the footage I already had. Coloring definitely helped all of that come together,” Srivastava adds.

Watch the video for “Breathe” below. Stream on Spotify, Bandcamp and Apple Music.