I listen to Ayush Sayalkar’s “till i see you” in the rain. In the midst of being plagued by the making of a documentary that is not going to turn out very great, on my university campus’ functional courtyard titled quadrangle at dawn. It is only trickling, the downpour, not the accosting kind — which is gracious of Mumbai to grant. It is sort of perfect, the setting – with the corridors of our institute so empty you can hear someone humming a song from at least 20 feet away. The EP is a 7 minute, 3 song long rumination of sorts – textured in a way that it envelopes you almost completely, in a kind of fog that is perhaps alpine in my head, but not really.
Sayalkar is a Mumbai-based filmmaker and sound artist. He is also one half of Centre Penguin Effect , a collaborative audiovisual project with musician Owl Vibration. Released with Kolkata based label Onno Collective, the record is described as “a three-track ambient EP, where the pieces unfold like half-remembered dreams, tracing the shape of longing with delicate restraint. Beginning in the hush before arrival and ending in the ache of holding on, till i see you moves with the quiet weight of memory, longing, and all that lingers in between.”
The project stitches together memories, and it almost feels like clouds and rain slipping through fingers along with the grasp of someone you loved a lot. The first track “where it all ends” begins with horn sounds that remind you of perhaps the passing of a train, begrudgingly passing you by, almost like a steam engine – and the artist places you somewhere. Maybe at the juncture between the present and the past. Maybe at some place between waking up and letting go of some dream soft enough to grant you more tenacity for some time. The track seamlessly transitions to “heaven surrounds us”, and the music almost flows out in concentric circles. At some point, you feel like Sayalkar is placing you in front of a window and making you watch the curtains, projecting home movies onto them, without context. You watch, either way, put your own meaning and conjure something that may not be there at all.
The last track, “if you could stay”, is gorgeous. On the surface, it does not disrupt. When one does listen to ambient music there is a standard set of expectations they arrive with – and Sayalkar does not want to subvert them, and it works for this, because the gentleness of it all is all pervasive. There are keys and echoes of voices speaking far into the distance, and perhaps a distant tabla. It almost feels like standing in a room unable to move or speak, only grieve for something you do not really know.
“till i see you” is 7 minutes of brilliance. All I would say, is listen.
