Puja

This is is the follow-up to Sanders' 2018 release, Java. As with that album, this, his third solo effort, features electro-techno trance music mixed with sounds and samples from fi eld recordings. On Puja, which is a prayer ritual performed at home or at a temple, he delves into sounds from Nepal, Tibet, China and India - some of it taken from field trips to Nepal. Most of the tracks are named after a Hindu god and the tracks that work best tend to include some fi ne singing from street choirs, chanting monks and a singer credited only as ‘Hindu man’. Dhan Bahadur, for instance, not only sings beautifully on the opening track, ‘Murugan’, he also plays a mean sarangi.

Other outstanding tracks include the catchy ‘Santoshi Mata’ and the sweeping, hypnotic ‘Ravana’. Multiinstrumentalist Sanders was joined in the studio by drummer Simon Egers, saxophonist Mattuias De Craene and sitar player Nicolas Mortelmans. Puja certainly sounds more assured than the previous album; despite one or two teeth grinders, there is some good music on this album.