Mumbai: Delhi-based band plays songs that take you on psychedelia

Peter Cat Recording Co performs at a gig; (right) the current members of the band

We had once been on a psychedelic journey of the mind without the use of any substance known to orchestrate such an experience. The vehicle for our trip had been a song called Love Demons by Peter Cat Recording Co (PCRC), a Delhi-based outfit. The video for it begins with a Bedouin traversing a desert with his camel, under a sky that has had a surrealistic makeover. Then, as the lilting, almost hypnotic vocals lull the listener's senses into a state of reverie, this nomad suddenly falls into a whirlpool, with the screen blacking out immediately after.

When the video resurfaces, the scene has changed direction to a cinema hall swathed in a shade of red. A portly man in a black suit with hair that seems as if he's just been given an electric shock has taken over the visuals, with a bunch of nubile women in revealing sarees dancing seductively around him, looking like they are all in a collective trance of some sort. And the softer melody that the song started with gives way to a loopy keyboard-based structure that is the sonic equivalent of one of those screensavers where a visual pattern keeps moving further into itself, creating an optical illusion.

The current members of the band

Mumbaikars, too, can embark on a similar journey when PCRC plays a gig in the city this weekend. They have spent the past few months polishing material for a new album that will be launched later this year. "We will be playing some material from it, and also some of the older tracks we have," says Suryakant Sawhney, the front man. But will the set list also include Love Demons? "Yes," he tells us, meaning that we will be ready to buckle our mental seatbelts once again when they take the stage at BKC.

ON May 18, 6.30 pm
AT High Street Phoenix, Lower Parel. LOG ON TO insider.in

Catch up on all the latest Crime, National, International and Hatke news here. Also, download the new mid-day Android and iOS apps to get latest updates.