192. Ananda Shankar - Ananda Shankar (1970)




















Track Listing

1. Jumpin' Jack Flash
2. Snow Flower
3. Light my Fire
4. Mamata (Affection)
5. Metamorphosis
6. Sagar (The Ocean)
7. Dance Indra
8. Raghupati

Review

Here's an album which tread a very fine line between good and kitsch. Fortunately it falls in the category of good, although you'd never be able to tell from the cover of Light My Fire. It would have probably have been a great album if Ananda would have stayed well away from covers, although the Jumpin' Jack Flash one is sublime.

This is an album which could have existed in no other time but the late 60's or early 70's. It's an Indianised Hippie's wet dream, "rock with sitars?" "Awesome!". Well it is quite good in a number of tracks, and particularly Metamorphosis, with it's grand finale and Raghupati, the only track with vocals and litlle sitar.

This album is a product of its time and that is no bad thing, it is definitely a trip to Indian psychadelia with profuse use of synths and an attempt to appeal to the rock audience, which it surely did. But the same use of synths is sometimes pretty cheesy and the songs sound very kitsch. At least it's fun. So buy it at Amazon UK or US.

Track Highlights

1. Metamorphosis
2. Raghupati
3. Jumpin' Jack Flash
4. Sagar (The Ocean)

Final Grade

7/10

Trivia

From Wikipedia:

In the late 1990s Shankar worked and toured in the United Kingdom with London DJ State Of Bengal and others, a collaboration that would result in the Walking On album, featuring Shankar's trademark sitar soundscapes mixed with breakbeat and hip hop. Walking On was released in 2000 after Shankar's sudden death from heart failure the year before.

In 2005, his song Raghupati would be featured on the soundtrack of Grand Theft Auto: Liberty City Stories.

Raghupati, by some guy or girl (?) on youtube... for those of you who don't understand Hindi this is a devotional song to Lord Rama, one of the Avatars of Vishnu and a mythical Indian King. There: