Tankbund Release Debut EP ‘Inside’
The Delhi electronica group gets more upbeat on their new release
Tankbund. Photo: Ranjan De
After releasing a 15-track album last year, Delhi electronica group’s Tankbund’s frontman Ritwik De has been working like a man possessed and is ready with a new EP.
Says De about Tankbund’s new EP, Inside, “There are not that many gigs happening anyway, so I have been paying more attention to production this year.” Apart from releasing Inside on March 9th, De, who runs the Delhi-based Ghar Ka Studios is also releasing a full-length album with psychedelic rock band Mindflew and an EP with acoustic project The Yellow Bucket, which comprises De and fellow Tankbund vocalist Subhadra Kamath.
De composed most of the five-track Inside. He says, “It was just me jamming and messing around with my keyboards.” Unlike the self-titled album, which released in June last year, De says that the EP has no hidden tracks or bonus tracks. Tracks such as “Don’t Stop,” featuring Delhi vocalist and friend of the band Samson Ezekiel and the instrumental jam “Outside” mark a more upbeat sound for the band, compared to the melancholic trip hop-influenced first album. Says De, “Doing something simpler is more difficult, but also more rewarding.” For electronica, “simpler” is going the analog way ”“ drummer Ujjwal Kumar recorded live drums and De chanced upon a 1984 model of a Casio keyboard in Old Delhi’s markets. De adds, “All the synth is from the keyboards, running into amps. There are no MIDI tracks.” For their opening track “Prelude,” De even tried to record violins to experiment with an orchestral sound. Says De, “But then I’d lost touch, so I wasn’t very good at it and gave up the violin and recorded it like an orchestra piece on the keyboard.”
Inside will be released online for free and later in physical CDs. A launch gig in Delhi is in the works this month, according to De, who adds, “Now that we have enough songs, we want to make sure we play festivals and get a tour in place, so that we can gig as much as possible.”
Stream “Inside,” the title track off Tankbund’s new EP
