Music of the Honey Gatherers

Paban Das Baul is the foremost ambassador of Baul, the roots music from Indian Bengal and Bangladesh. Baul musicians sing of a vagabond lifestyle that disregards bourgeois conformities in being able to connect the individual to the divine through a vernacular spirituality. This is a philosophy expressed through a musical form and style in dynamic tension with South Asian classical music. While sharing the latter's rhythm cycles and melodic phrases, Baul music is more teasing and maverick. It stretches out, strips back and improvises while challenging the listener to embark on his or her own journey towards self-discovery.

This album, supported by informative but unfussy liner notes, successfully conveys that melding of spirituality and music. The ten songs, all traditional arrangements, are offered ‘unplugged’: it's a studied minimalism quite different from Paban Das’ earlier crossover experimentations as heard on Real Sugar, his Real World collaboration with Sam Mills. His voice soars and dips with a profound yet playful energy and mellow richness above meditative arrangements of Baul folk instruments such as the dubki (tambourine) and dotara (a five-stringed lute). Synergies across Indian folk musics are in evidence, with tracks using Rajasthani instruments and melodies from the Bengal-Bihar border. A tiny element of sameness creeps into the second half, but ‘Guru to Dayal’, with its syncopated and off-beat rhythms and minor tonalities, and the little gem, ‘Shobure Mewa Pholeyj really stand out. Reflecting Paban Das’ technical and vocal mastery, this high quality album tempers exuberance with an innate funkiness that characterises Baul music at its most effective.