Sijya, the South Asian composer, producer, and graphic artist, releases her new EP Leather & Brass via her new label One Little Independent Records on September 12th.“A bold, visceral dive into raw textures and unfiltered emotion, it marks a new bold chapter in her sonic evolution.”
‘Do I Know’ was a spontaneous innovation that thrives and grows fully formed. Ripe with a primal beat, housing a snaking “guitar riff”, within this shuddering synth track. “Funnily enough, people have often referred to parts in my music as guitar sounds and riffs. I guess I’ve always been drawn to electric guitars and I’m maybe always trying to make that sound with my synths.” She says.
With a tapestry that is compelling and fascinating it echoes of the likes of early Bjork and Fever Ray, yet woven with influences of the East. Sijya clambers from the undergrowth with a magnetic vocal of reverberating depth, as she craves comfort and being actualised in the flesh, being recognised as an artist.
Its striking accompanying video explores “the idea of ineffective armour”. Both in terms of brass as physical object, ornamental, adaptable, as well as metaphorically; Sijya’s relationship to the illusion of safety, being seen, and performing or creating publicly.
Sukanya Baskar, who conceptualised the film, writes; “Forged and worn over time – a brass armour glistens on a figure standing in the doorway. In the act of donning an armour, the artist considers her own relationship with visibility and invisibility as a performer, but also as an individual in the public eye. The material history of brass as a malleable yet sometimes ineffectual metal for matters of strength and protection, sparked a point of departure for this narrative. Performing an auto fictional, absurd, oneiric piece, the artist navigates a Delhi reframed through its heterotopias, disturbed yet empowered in her presentation of otherness.”
Leather & Brass is a testament to pushing boundaries, both musically and personally, and meticulously crafted through a blend of digital synthesis and analogue grit. From distorted synths run through abused guitar pedals to lyrics that linger in ambiguity, ‘Leather & Brass’ is an exploration of weight, density, and contrast, in sound and in sentiment. It was shaped with the guidance of Accidental Records’ Matthew Herbert and Hugh Jones (aka Crewdson).
Of the EP, Sijya explains; “Finishing this was a long process. Painful. Not just in the way that it is painful to make anything, because it is. Ideas are exciting, but you get over them very fast. Then you trudge along until there’s another spark. Before this EP, I feel like I was messing about. I didn’t think a career in music was possible. I had been circling around music for a long time and making album art as a graphic designer, but ‘Young Hate’ was my first attempt of ‘doing’ any music at all. Now, with this second EP, I feel like I have become a musician. I am now doing this with intention. This EP feels like beginning of me trying to find a sound.”
