Every artist is different and there’s a sense of uniqueness in all of them. But having said that what we do believe is unique in our songs is that not only does the music complements the lyrics but also completes it. There’s a sense of story building in every song. Special addition we are not saying that we are making unique stuff, the sound itself is very underground to the world and in that sense you may put the word ‘unique’ to us as you haven’t heard this sound with Bengali lyrics previously in Bengal...
RK : Introduce your band and band members to us. How was the band formed? Why have you chosen such a unique name “A DOT IN THE SKY” ?
ADTS : First of all, thanks for having us here. We started off our journey in the year 2016 at Kasol, Himachal. Sudipto Paul, Abhishek Banerjee and RanaBiswas were the founder members of this band ‘A Dot in The Sky’. They were attending the festival called ‘Parvati’ and gave it a thought of forming a new band with a new sound.
Our band has five members Anny Ahmed on vocals, Sudipto Paul onkeyboard, SubhajitGoswami plays guitar, Soutrik Banerjee is on bass and Udatta M.Bhattacharya on drums. Though this is a bit new line up. The ex-members are PrasunBhattacharya(guitar), Abhishek Banerjee(drums) and PradyumnaLaskar(bass)
In this vast universe we all exist as dots. So, if you look for us out there we’ll always exist as a dotted note up there from the sky.
RK : What inspired you to attempt English singles? How long have you been working
on it? Who writes the song lyrics and who composes the music?
ADTS : Yet we haven’t really released any song that has been penned down solely in English. Most of our songs are bilingual with the use of both English and Bengali in the lyrics. But we definitely have been looking forward to strengthen the impact of the use of Bengali in our songs. Firstly, because it’s our mother tongue and secondly, there haven’t really been a lot of artists who have worked on this sound with Bengali lyrics onboard. Anny Ahmed and Sudipto Paul have been the primary
song writers of the band as of now and yes Sudipto Paul is the man behind the sound and the basic arrangements till date ,but in our debut album which is about to come out in a few months’ time, the rest of the members will also be coming up with something new to the mix.
RK : What kind of ideas appeal to you when you are looking for inspiration?
ADTS : Most of the songs that we’ve written thus far have been associated with human psychology, life, love, what is happening in the world and self-experiences.
RK : So, A Dot in The Sky is a post-rock ambient band from Kolkata? Is that something new (about the genre) in Kolkata? Tell us about any new elements that you have introduced here in your released originals
ADTS : Well it is. We are a post-rock ambient band from India, Kolkata definitely. Well the genre itself is not new but yet we don’t witness any bands from Kolkata who are working with that particular sound. There is one band from Pune who are experimenting with this sound/genre and ‘AWKS’ is absolutely doing good.
See every artist is different and there’s a sense of uniqueness in all of them. But having said that what we do believe is unique in our songs is that not only does the music complements the lyrics but also completes it. There’s a sense of story building in every song. Special addition we are not saying that we are making unique stuff, the sound itself is very underground to the world and in that sense you may put the word ‘unique’ to us as you haven’t heard this sound with Bengali lyrics previously in Bengal...
RK : Have you experimented with instrumental music in this album?
ADTS : There will be an instrumental track or two in the album surely.
RK : What has been the high point for the band so far?
ADTS : Musical forums like Post Rock Community and Where Post Rock Dwells have been sharing our works regularly. These are two of the most prominent global musical forums who dedicatedly promote Post Rock.
RK : What is post-rock community?
ADTS : Post Rock Community is one community from USA who is deliberately working for this sound and keeping all the post rock bands around the globe under one roof. And we are so privileged that they have taken us in their banner too in spite of working with our own language. In that note let me add we do have many foreigner listeners too. ’Music has no language bar’-Anny said.
RK : Where do you place your album in the canon of Bangla rock? How would you define your role as an artiste on a global platform?
ADTS : We don’t really see ourselves as a Bangla Rock band. We have never thought of limiting ourselves by linguistic barriers and have always focused on the bigger picture. Since we are from Bengal it’s obvious that we find a sense of comfort when it comes to write in Bengali but we have written in English as well and would look forward to writing in other languages as well. Music is what we want to convey and the language is just a medium. And as far as the global platform is concerned, we are just focusing on writing more songs and putting them out so that people can listen to them and get to know us more.
RK : Which bands or musicians from India or the international music scene do you like or follow? Do you have any dream collaborators in mind?
ADTS : As far as influences are concerned, we all have different influences and we all have different tastes as far as genres or styles are concerned. But as a whole, when we assemble as A Dot In The Sky our inspirations revolve around SigurRos, Mogwai, Hammock, God Is An Astronaut etc.
We have collaborated with two great musicians from our city. GaurabChatterjee (drummer for Lakkhichhara, Kendraka, Rigmob etc.) played drums with us on our single Jotsna which had been featured on the second season of the YouTube series Aprokashito 2. And Pralay, a very talented aspiring songwriter from the city has written the lyrics and designed the album art for an upcoming single of ours. It will be
releasing in October 2019. And yes, our dream collaboration will be many. Will talk about in other special interview.
RK : Tell us about your previous work and details so that the post rock, people can get to u easily.
ADTS : Surely. We have our YouTube channels called ‘A dot in the sky’,with the same name we do have our Facebook,Instagram and Twitter profiles. We are in SoundCloud and BandCamp as well. Google us with ‘A Dot in The Sky’ one can get all our four originals along with few cover songs.
RK : Do you have any plans to go on a multi-city tour in India anytime soon?
ADTS : Yes, who doesn’t think of these things? Of course, we have such plans if circumstances favours. But as of now the first and foremost priority to us is our debut album and it’s launch gig. We are working on it.
RK : Tell us about your future projects?
ADTS : Well, we are not really looking way beyond what we are focusing on right now. Tunnel vision as they call it. So again, our album is our first and foremost priority for now.
