Kali Puja Archives - The Obelisk

Queen Elephantine Post “Kali Puja” Improvised Outdoor Jam

Posted in Bootleg Theater on March 15th, 2021 by JJ Koczan

If we’re lucky, this is a thing we’ll see much more of in 2021. Band, going to a place, playing music. In the case of oft-traveled drone experimentalists Queen Elephantine, it’s to Mount Moriah Cemetery on the Southwestern edge of Philadelphia, and what they’re doing there is improvising a 26-minute piece titled “Kali Puja” in reference to the Hindu festival of the same name happening around when the video was recorded last November. As one might expect given the scope of Queen Elephantine‘s work, it dives deep into meditative heavy psychedelia is due fashion from the band that offered their latest LP, Gorgon (review here), in 2019 through Argonauta Records and Atypeek Music, and brought a series of EP releases to bear in the Pandemic Year in lieu, of course, of live shows.

Led as always by founding guitarist/sometimes vocalist Indrayudh Shome, Queen Elephantine here operate as a four-piece in organic fashion and they get a solid groove going over which Shome and fellow guitarist Brett Zweiman space out respectively with leads, urgent angularity and various exploratory effects runs. It’s jazz, straight-up, but with the influences it’s working under, still duly heavy in the drums and able to affect an atmosphere in the outdoor setting. The video weaves in footage of Kali, and while I don’t know if the band’s permits were necessarily in order, the music certainly is, even if the ‘order’ is working in its own number system. That’s nothing new for Queen Elephantine, and frankly, anyone who’s ever listened to the band before should expect nothing less.

“Kali Puja” and another jam recorded the same day will be released on cassette through Misophonia Records this summer, and Queen Elephantine also have a collaborative work with Russian throat-singing outfit Phurpa that will be out May 4 through 4iB Records in Singapore, and on tape through Misophonia and DL on Atypeek Music.

Enjoy the clip and the journey:

Queen Elephantine, “Kali Puja” Live at Mount Moriah Cemetery, Nov. 2020

After closing 2019 on a high note with the release of the album Gorgon on Argonauta Records and a supporting tour, all plans for 2020, including a European tour, were brought to a halt by the pandemic, and practice was suspended.

In November 2020, after more than six months apart, QUEEN ELEPHANTINE assembled at Philadelphia’s historic Mount Moriah Cemetery to perform a live free improvisation for the spirits on the auspicious day of Kali Puja.

This and another cut from the session will be given a limited edition cassette release on Misophonia Records (UK) this summer.