FAKEER's 'Chapter One' is a track built around Punjabi poetry

Mumbai duo FAKEER opens its discography not with a hook, but with a poem.

'Chapter One', the debut single and music video from producers Ajitesh and Kritik, begins with a verse by Shiv Kumar Batalvi, the Punjabi poet known as Birha Da Sultan; the Sultan of Longing.

Batalvi, the youngest-ever recipient of the Sahitya Akademi Award (India’s premier literary honour), died at 36, leaving behind a body of work built around loss and yearning. FAKEER did not sample his recordings, but rather composed original electronic production around his words, layering dark, textured synth work with Punjabi folk instrumentation.

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The accompanying video was shot entirely in Jaipur's old city, directed and produced by FAKEER themselves. They take South Asian poetry, language and memory as its starting point rather than Western electronic music traditions, and asks what the genre can sound like from there.

Fun fact: the elderly man in the barber shop even picked up the KORG keyboard mid-shoot and began playing, unprompted.

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'Chapter One' is billed as the opening piece of a longer project, with future instalments expected to build on its visual and sonic language.

Watch the entire video below.

Amira Waworuntu is Mixmag Asia’s Managing Editor, follow her on Instagram.

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