DETAILS

From the opening, drawn-out synth lines on, "E.T ( Extended Technique)" to the echoing bass fueled finish on "Haku" - Denver-based Ramakhandra's debut "S/T" crackles with otherworldly energy.  

Recorded and mixed by LA-based engineer Bradley Giroux, who worked on Kamasi Washington’s Heaven & Earth, this record was lovingly crafted by four creative minds pooling their imaginations to create visions of another reality with echoes of our own world. These tracks can be compared to Flying Lotus, Little Dragon, or Hiatus Kaiyote, but that would only tell part of the story. This band exists within a world all its own. 

Listening to this record is like voyaging through an undiscovered country filled with creatures from anime, popular culture, and video games. Taken as a whole it feels like the sonic equivalent of a Studio Ghibli film, but you can also get easily lost in their universe by looking at the beauty in every stroke of soundwaves. These songs breathe with life, like on the environmental fable “Kujira,” in which a whale sprouts wings to escape an earth ruined by humanity, or “Andromeda Soup Dumpling,” a dreamland anthem about not losing hope as your loved ones succumb to illness.

Each song digs deep into the internal and external crises facing humanity, but recasts them in magic and hope, remaking sadness and struggle into beauty. Nowhere is this more evident than on the rallying cry of “Haku,” where thunder and lightning crash overhead as singer/harpist Annastezhaa sings a battle mantra of rebirth. 

Ramakhandra is music to wrap yourself in, one moment it's raindrops falling on your face, the next it’s an inter-dimensional storm soaking you to your very essence. But above all, it's breathtaking. 

Track List:

1. E.T. Extended Technique / What Giants Dream Of

2. Andromeda Soup Dumpling

3. Kujira

4. Ronin Ramen Shaman

5. March of the Ents

6. Haku

Credits:

All songs written & performed by Ramakhandra

Recorded and mixed by Bradley Giroux 

Mastered by Keith Gretlein

Album cover by Shintaro Kago

Duration : 44 minutes 10 seconds

Limited Edition Vinyl Pressing \ 100 Copies