YATIN DAWRA

Harsha Iyer's new album, When It’s Time (Part One), could very well qualify as a soundtrack to a movie or play. The orchestral setting of the album gives it many a colorful mood, and painting a picture with them in the head is essential. With no recollection of plots and characters to count on while listening, if you are not creating your own story, the album will most definitely find you in a state of confusion regarding its scattered musical inclinations and ideas, and this confusion more often that not will end up in rejection.

Shimmering with classical symphonies, drum atmospherics and some ambient electronica squeezed in, the album stands bold in challenging the listener. While Harsha’s distinctive standalone voice could require some getting used to, the self-harmonized harmonies ensure the vocal support of the record.

The album opens with ‘Better Prospects’ which shifts into a two-minute ambient outro just before the established guitar riff preceding it treads into monotony. The theatrics across the album are well placed with ‘Never Enough’, attacking the materialistic leanings of the man with melancholy before culminating into a chaotic silence of acceptance. The album takes a stumble with ‘Awkward Silence’; the improvised drum groove on it sounds nothing less than awkward, making the track something the album could have done without. “Let Me into Your House’, following the awkward silence, manages to soften the air with its jazz influenced arrangement. 

One of the shorter tracks on the record, ‘Like a Fool’, is a song about Harry, who felt like a fool because of some lady trouble; the one-man harmony on the chorus, along with some electronica pouring in over a piano arpeggio, make it one of the finer tracks on the album. Overall, When It’s Time is like a meteor shower. It doesn’t happen everyday. You won’t listen to it everyday. However, like rocks shining and hurling across the sky, this album is worth witnessing.