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CD
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HMR 022CD
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Seljuk Rustum is a Kochi (Cochin) based arts practitioner originally from Kannur, Kerala. He is a painter, musician, curator, producer, recording engineer, and the founder and current Creative Director of performance space, Forplay Society. As a musician he plays alto saxophone, guitar, percussion, and synthesizer with several bands and an expanding collective of like-minded artists. Being a self-taught musician, his sound work is an extension of his visual work and his music is a mixture of joyful noise and simple naive melodies. Seljuk has performed and recorded with artists such as Otomo Yoshihide, Senyawa, Hada Benedito Mateo, Eiko Ishibashi, Mitsuaki Matsumoto, Pisitakun, Yuen Chee Wai, Dharma, DJ Sniff, Maximilian Glass, Duncan Bruce, Hilary Jeffery, and Hayden Chisholm. He has also worked with many theater practitioners and performance artists in India making music for theater as well as curating shows and workshops with actors and performers from around India. The recordings on Cardboard Castles were made at Seljuk's studio in Kochi between 2016 and 2021 and were mostly instant compositions and single take recordings created in collaboration with a number of fellow travelers who've passed through the studio. At the inception of the album's creation, Seljuk sought to reflect on what freedom means and what the musical limitations of this are, and how his involvement as a free improviser might project fixed ideas onto a listener. He wanted to use an improvisational approach that focused on presenting ideas with a beauty inherent in their sound, coalescing these into song form. Cardboard Castles is the resulting album and application of these concept. These deeply personal and highly idiosyncratic works defy easy description. Ranging from strange and wonky electronic improvisations, gentle acoustic instrumentals such as the lush opener with the input of the Cochin String Orchestra, through experiments in traditional Indian song, this album will keep you guessing. This is Seljuk's first to receive a physical release. Gatefold card digisleeve; edition of 250.
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