Dreamy filmic tones from Kolkata
Who?
Nim Chimpsky is the sonic costume of Aniket Dutta, an award-winning filmmaker hailing from Kolkata, India. His music career began in earnest after the international tour of his debut feature film (‘Ghost Of The Golden Groves’, witten and directed with Roshni Sen) was catastrophically cut short due to the pandemic. With Dutta housebound for the foreseeable, he found an escape from creative inertia through the discovery of an old Tascam Portastudio. And we are all the better for it.
Why Nim Chimpsky?
Dutta’s music wrestles with the mystical shadow of daily life, and does so with sumptuous feeling. “Exploring dreams and dream-like memories is a way for me to depict this time we are living in,” he divulges. “During the pandemic, perhaps due to complete isolation and an uncanny quiet, I had a very real experience of being part of a lucid dream. This is when I started fiddling around with the tape machine.” The fruits of this musical period arrived at the end of 2022, with Dutta’s haunting debut ‘Feels Like 43°’ providing a heady storm of downbeat electro and ambient environmentalism, nestling somewhere between Boards Of Canada and Angelo Badamenti’s crepuscular ‘Twin Peaks’ soundtrack. ‘Byebike’ is one of the most stunningly beautiful tracks you’ll hear this week – maybe month, perhaps even year – existing in a hazy cross-section between an Andrew Wasylyk dark jazz jaunt and the neon ketamine of vaporwave.
Tell Us More…
‘Ghost Of The Golden Groves’ is a trippy black and white horror sci-fi story about inexplicable malevolent forces occupying the Sonajhuri forest in rural Bengal. It won the top award at the Chicago Underground Film Festival, and Dutta is currently working on a new feature film project. A UK label has already cottoned on to his burgeoning music career, and he’s planning to release more music very soon.
‘Feels Like 43°’ is out on Bandcamp
