Indian duo faintface made a splendid return to SOL earlier this year with the lush ‘Dreamers / Houseplants’ EP. The release provided a blissful, meditative follow-up to their debut release on the imprint ‘In Threes’. With their stock quickly rising, we caught up with the promising pair to uncover the key tracks and artists, which have inspired their journey so far. It’s all below!

Keaton Henson – Six Lethargies

We both have adored Keaton’s music. But, never in our wildest dreams we could have imagined him releasing a modern classical album. We were blown away listening to ’Six Lethargies’ for the first time. This album made us realise the beauty in tension. Another thing that resonated with us was the capacity of the music to portray deep and complex feelings such as anxiety. After listening to it so many times, there is always something new to learn from this piece of art.

Caretaker – Everywhere at the End of Time

I (Nishit) remember coming across this album as a Youtube recommendation. Instantly, I was blown away by the album and shared it with Yajan. We had a long discussion on both the ideas and the sound of the album. To portray stages of dementia through sound takes a lot of creativity. Both ‘Six Lethargies’ and ‘Everywhere at the End of Time’ have majorly influenced one of our upcoming albums. If it weren’t for these two albums, our album won’t even exist.

Radiohead – Kid A

We think that this album has not only inspired us but a lot of artists all over the world. For us, this album drives us to take risks and always try something new. Nothing more to say on this one, the sound on it is just timeless.

Olafur Arnalds – re:member

When it was released, Nishit was excited and he shared it with me as soon as he could. I (Yajan) was not aware of such works before but after being introduced to it, I was very inspired. Even planned to work in such directions and to me it was a whole new dimension. I had the opportunity to go towards the more organic side of music. Especially Pianos, the warm sounds of analog synths, ambiences and foley.

Nils Frahm & Olafur Arnalds – Trance Frendz

This album is a journey. The cohesiveness in this is impeccable, The story it recites and to watch them perform each song on Youtube is something out of this world. Just two amazing minds working as one and delivering this album is a blessing. Where my (Yajan) favourite track being “01:41” and Nishit’s “23:52” , we both aim to make such masterpieces someday together in a studio like Nils and Olafur did.

Last but not the least

RY X’s live recording from Royal Albert Hall

RY X’s music has made a vital impact on our sounds. We had been listening to him for a while now but when he uploaded the Live Recording from Royal Albert Hall I(Yajan) was shook. The way the whole set was performed and orchestrated was unimaginable. While listening to it in a group session with a friend they happen to mention that it almost sounded like a prayer. The music, the vocals and the performance is so pure, gentle and welcoming with all the emotions flowing towards the centre. Hence, the orchestrated form of RY X’s songs like “Sweat”, “Bound”, “Clasp”, “Shortline” and “Water” are inspiration behind the future tracks that we will be releasing this year.

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