Susmit Sen
Early life and career
Susmit Sen’s first guitar was one bought by his father for his elder brother in Mumbai. He had been influenced by his brother’s ability to attract attention by playing the guitar.
He did his schooling at St. Xavier’s School, Delhi in 1981, and graduated from Hansraj College.
Career
A self-taught musician, Sen started the band, Indian Ocean, with Late Asheem Chakravarty in 1990. They were joined by Rahul Ram in 1991, and in 1991 by multi-instrumentalist Amit Kilam completing the quartet. Using Indian rhythms, melodies, and folk music influences the band created a unique sound and soon achieved success; in the following decades produced five studio albums, and a live album, Desert Rain. Besides this, a concert DVD, Indian Ocean Live In Concert of their two-hour live concert at the Garden of Five Senses in Delhi was released in 2008. Leaving Home – the Life & Music of Indian Ocean (2010) directed by Jaideep Varma, became the first band ever in India to be the subject of a documentary. At the 58th National Film Awards, the documentary went on to win the award for Best Arts/Cultural Film.
Founder member, Chakravarty died suddenly in 2009, due to a heart attack. Sen released his first solo debut album Depths of the Ocean in 2011, an album which had been in the making for the last ten years. Featuring a collaboration with Shubha Mudgal, Nitin Malik, Papon, and Asheem Chakravarty. In 2012, he started touring with a new setup of artists, called The Susmit Sen Chronicles, which included drummer Nikhil Vasudevan, bassist Anirban Ghosh, tabla player Varun Gupta and vocalists Amit Sharma and Sudhir Rikhari. Thereafter Sen left the Indian Ocean in June 2013, to pursue his solo career. However, he joined the Indian Ocean for a farewell tour in end 2013, thereafter he was replaced by guitarist Nikhil Rao.
Early, 2014 saw the release of an eponymously titled coffee table photography book on the group’s history. As a tribute, the Dehradun Guitar Company has created the SS Series of Guitars named after Susmit Sen. He started work on his second solo album in October 2013 and completed it in the following March. In July 2014, the album Ocean to Ocean was released, which also featured a collaborative track with Bernie Marsden, the former Whitesnake guitarist. Later in the year, he released his memoir, Ocean to Ocean: A Memoir co-written with Sehba Imam. In its 2014 listing of “25 Greatest Indian Rock Songs of the last 25 Years”, “Rolling Stone India” featured two songs, Ma Rewa and Kandisa from the album, Kandisa (2000).
Discography
Indian Ocean
- Indian Ocean (1993)
- Desert Rain (1997)
- Kandisa (2000)
- Jhini (2004)
- Black Friday (2005)
- 16/330 Khajoor Road (2010)
- Footballwaaliyan (2019)
Susmit Sen Chronicles
- Depths of the Ocean (2011)
- Ocean to Ocean (2014)
Filmography
- Swaraj: The Little Republic (2003)
- Black Friday (2004)
- Peepli Live (2010)
- Footballwaaliyan (2019)
Works
- Ocean to Ocean: A Memoir (with Sehba Imam), HarperCollins, 2014. ISBN 9351362019.
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