Taalpatar Shepai, a phrase often used to describe a frail and lanky person in Bengali, is a goofy name indeed for a music band comprising young musicians Pritam Das, Suman Ghosh, and Kritee Roy. The band was formed by chance during a jamming session, where the cover song, Ami Cheye Cheye Dekhi Saradin, was conceived by Pritam and Suman. Later, they met Kritee on social media, who agreed to write lyrics for them.
Those familiar with this band know how they craft songs that are dreamy, comfortable, and goofy. The band members, now working on their debut album, Sahoj Path, share about their journey, upcoming projects, and more. Excerpts:
How do you define Taalpatar Shepai?
Kritee: During tough, unstable times that one might be going through, we felt our music could bring that calm and could soothe souls. I think our main point of focus is the simplicity of our music.
As audiences, we have noticed a constant nostalgic factor that reverberates in your songs, videos, and even lyrics. Do you keep that consciously? What else inspires you?
Kritee: We are ’90s kids, and as we grew up, many little things vanished slowly. Our trio’s name also resonates with this. Taalpatar shepai are little figurines made with palm leaves stuck on wooden sticks that are rare now. So yes, the nostalgic factor definitely plays an important role in our songs.
Pritam: Besides this, we have also made songs on various socio-political issues. Satire/comedy, pop, folk music, and rock are genres that we like exploring. The band was in fact started to experiment with music. We had a song called Premik Practical, and the arrangement was based on the retro synth-pop genre, an apparent love song, but it touches upon a lot of other factor.
How do you plan for your music videos? Who takes care of that?
Pritam: Nothing is fixed; it actually varies from one song to another. For instance, for Ami Sudhu Khujechi Amay, we were supposed to shoot in a location in Shillong, but ended up shooting in another, after the driver took a wrong turn. We thought the light was good, and we shot the first sequence just there, impromptu. The rest of the song couldn’t be shot in the planned way due to weather conditions. In fact, we also shot during the night, which Suman had to edit later and make it day. We do keep a sketchy plan, but many times, not everything falls in place, especially because there always remains a budget constraint for us, independent musicians.
Suman: Basically we brainstorm when we are listening to it, how we are visualising it ourselves, etc. Then we sketch it, and decide upon a video. Pritam is our director, and I edit it. But as we start shooting it, things keep changing.
Taalpatar Shepai is almost a decade old. Tell us about the challenges that you have faced as an independent music group.
Pritam: It took us the longest time to identify what the challenges are, honestly. The biggest is definitely the budget. But we try to believe that these budget constraints are a boon at times. We feel that it probably makes us even more relatable and acceptable.
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