Music in the mountains
The surreal beauty of Ladakh comes to life in a new musical project by city artiste Sickflip.
Sickflip, aka Sarvesh Shrivastava, ditches his trademark bass heavy dance beats and embraces experimental sounds and field recorded beats in his latest offering, The Ladakh Project. Written, recorded and shot during a twoweek trip to Ladakh, the ambitious audio-visual project comprises an original five track EP and music video, along with a 45 minute visual showcase of the otherworldliness of Ladakh.
The genesis of the project lies in a trip that Shrivastava took in 2013. “It marked a major shift. If we carried all our equipments there and meandered our energies into creating something beautiful, yet inexplicable… it made me think of all the possibilities,” he says. It was the Zen overtone of the landscape that intrigued him. “I was consumed by the thought of capturing its beauty and amalgamate it with beats and sublime sounds,” he adds.
Shrivastava’s favoured brand of music - a mix of high energy and adrenaline pumping beats - fell by the wayside. “We realised that we hadn’t seen or heard anything like this before. We didn’t have a reference at all. For this project, I wanted to be all-out experimental. I didn’t think about what people, clients or corporations would think of the final outcome,” he admits.
And the friends he made along the way have only helped make the project unforgettable. His driver, Mr Dorji doubled up as a porter, transporting supplies to the Indian Army’s Siachen glacier battalion in -50 degrees C, every night, says Shrivastava. “But the ultimate moment was with a group of monks we met at a monastery in Nubra Valley, and ended up discussing the role of the sun, music, creative energies, the Internet, all in a couple of hours.”
Sickflip, aka Sarvesh Shrivastava, ditches his trademark bass heavy dance beats and embraces experimental sounds and field recorded beats in his latest offering, The Ladakh Project. Written, recorded and shot during a twoweek trip to Ladakh, the ambitious audio-visual project comprises an original five track EP and music video, along with a 45 minute visual showcase of the otherworldliness of Ladakh.
The genesis of the project lies in a trip that Shrivastava took in 2013. “It marked a major shift. If we carried all our equipments there and meandered our energies into creating something beautiful, yet inexplicable… it made me think of all the possibilities,” he says. It was the Zen overtone of the landscape that intrigued him. “I was consumed by the thought of capturing its beauty and amalgamate it with beats and sublime sounds,” he adds.
He had help in the visual department from The Outbox Project, a collective that shot every step of the eclectic recording process in the stunning cold desert of Nubra Valley, the clear blue Pangong lake and ancient monasteries. “The good folks at Outbox and I are schoolmates, actually. Having known this bunch of videographers, cinematographers and visual artists for more than 10 years, we were efficient at creation and ideation.”
Shrivastava’s favoured brand of music - a mix of high energy and adrenaline pumping beats - fell by the wayside. “We realised that we hadn’t seen or heard anything like this before. We didn’t have a reference at all. For this project, I wanted to be all-out experimental. I didn’t think about what people, clients or corporations would think of the final outcome,” he admits.
And the friends he made along the way have only helped make the project unforgettable. His driver, Mr Dorji doubled up as a porter, transporting supplies to the Indian Army’s Siachen glacier battalion in -50 degrees C, every night, says Shrivastava. “But the ultimate moment was with a group of monks we met at a monastery in Nubra Valley, and ended up discussing the role of the sun, music, creative energies, the Internet, all in a couple of hours.”
