Name: Keshavara
Members: Keshav Purushotham, Niklas Schneider, Benedikt Filleböck, Christopher Martin
Interviewee: Keshav Purushotham, Niklas Schneider
Current release: Keshavara's new album Moondram Sevi is out October 9th 2026 via Papercup.
Current event: Keshavara will be touring in support of the new album. Catch them live at one of the following dates:

16.10.26 Stuttgart, Merlin
17.10.26 Aarau, KIFF (CH)
24.10.26 Luxemburg, DGW (LUX)
25.10.26 Breda, Mezz (NL)
29.10.26 Düsseldorf, Schleuse Zwei
01.11.26 Hamburg, Nachtasyl
02.11.26 Kopenhagen, Ideal Bar (DK)
03.11.26 Hannover, Cafe Glocksee  
06.11.26 Mainz, schon schön
07.11.26 Dresden, Super Fest Ostpol
08.11.26 Potsdam, Waschhaus
17.02.27 Nürnberg, Z-Bau
18.02.27 München, Milla
19.02.27 Wien Arena (AT)
20.02.27 Erfurt, Franz Mehlhose

Recommendations on the topic of Sound: K: We really like A Book of Noises: Notes on the Auraculous by Caspar Henderson. It moves from cosmic and natural sounds to human-made noises and keeps asking what happens when we pay closer attention to the world with our ears.
We recommended Ocean of Sound by David Toop in our last interview, and we would still put it on the list. It feels less like a book you read from A to B and more like tuning an old radio: ambient music, distant places, strange histories and unexpected connections keep drifting in and out of range.
We would also recommend UbuWeb at ubu.com. There is so much there: sound art, experimental music, interviews, films, recordings of performances and installations, and then things you did not even know you were looking for. It is easy to get lost there for hours.

[Read our David Toop interview]

If you enjoyed this Keshavara interview and would like to know more about the band and their music, visit their official homepage. They are also on Instagram, bandcamp, and Facebook.

For a deeper dive, read our earlier Keshavara interview. 



When I listen to music, I see shapes, objects and colours. What happens in your body when you're listening? Do you listen with your eyes open or closed?

K: I love listening with my eyes closed, but if I am honest, I rarely do it. Most of the time my eyes are open and something else is happening around me. When I do close them, I start hearing the sounds between the sounds, all the small things that usually disappear while the visible world is still competing for my attention.

What hits me most is when a melody, or even just the atmosphere of a song, brings back a feeling from much earlier in my life. Sometimes I didn't even know that memory was still there. Then the music comes on and the whole situation returns for a moment, including the feeling around it.

Like opening a drawer I had forgotten existed.

How do listening with headphones and listening through a stereo system change your experience of sound and music?

K: Both are interesting for opposite reasons. Through speakers, the room joins in. The acoustics, people talking in another corner, traffic outside, all of it mixes with the music before it reaches my ears. That version exists only in that moment.

Headphones are more direct. With noise-cancelling headphones you can almost remove the world acoustically, but if I'm walking down the street, the images still enter the music. I don't hear the street, but I see it, so the music becomes a soundtrack.

N: I would say both are great and have their own unique vibe. I often listen with headphones—when I'm out on my bike or walking the dog—allowing me to move through the world while being completely immersed in music.

However, I also really enjoy listening on our studio monitors, and I noticed while mixing that acoustics make a huge difference; even the shape of one’s head affects how the music is perceived. Feeling the bass through floor vibrations is a completely different experience.

On the other hand, headphones sometimes allow you to hear much finer details and discover amazing elements in the stereo field that artists love to play with.

Tell me about some of the albums or artists that you love specifically for their sound, please.

K: A big inspiration for Moondram Sevi, our new record, came from old Bollywood and especially Kollywood soundtracks. Kollywood is Tamil cinema, centred in Chennai, where I lived for a while as a child. I watched those films on TV even though I never properly learned Tamil.

When I hear soundtracks from the 1980s now, they take me straight back. Their sound is also very special. A song might be extremely cheesy and then, in the middle of it, there is a tiny diamond: a strange synth, unexpected percussion, some bizarre arrangement idea. Sometimes we have no idea how they made it. That mixture was very inspiring for us.

My dad's music is another big influence. Ramesh Shotham is a percussionist and also a collector of sounds. He is always looking for an unusual instrument or an everyday object he can play. When he came home from touring, he often had some strange thing he had found in a street shop, at a flea market or simply lying around somewhere, ready to be added to his percussion universe. I grew up with that way of listening.



N: We listen to music across all genres without putting labels on it. But what recurs is an affinity for the organic, and perhaps the slightly raw or unfinished, which resonates with both of us.

There are so many artists we admire for this. It's often older stuff, but nowadays there is also a lot of music where you can't even tell if it's from today or from the past and that's the approach we try to take as well.

Do you experience strong emotional responses towards certain sounds? If so, what kind of sounds are these and do you have an explanation about the reasons for these responses?

K: I am most interested in sounds that affect me before I understand why.

Indian classical music does that. I grew up with a lot of it through my family, and it is tied to my own time in India. A particular raga or voice can hit me immediately. Memory arrives first, and then I start missing India.

The nadaswaram is a good example. It is this fiercely loud South Indian wind instrument played at temples and weddings. As soon as I hear it, I am back in a South Indian temple.

There can be sounds which feel highly irritating to us and then there are others we could gladly listen to for hours. Do you have examples for either one or both of these?

K: In India we once had a borewell being drilled next to the house. It went on for hours, always the same mechanical rhythm: duku-duku-duku-duku-duku. Sitting on the veranda, it was really annoying.

At some point I was there with our bass player, Molto. We put on a tanpura drone and he started playing bass against the drilling. Suddenly all three sounds locked together. We recorded it for one of our radio shows on dublab, Kabinett der Phantasie.

The drilling hadn't changed, but it had become music.

Are there everyday places, spaces, or devices which intrigue you by the way they sound? Which are these?

K: The sound of an Indian kitchen in the early morning intrigues me. It has a very specific rhythm. You wake up early before it gets too hot, and almost immediately there is the pressure cooker hissing, stainless-steel plates clattering, things falling, onions and chillies being chopped.

I love that it all happens so early. While people here might still be thinking about coffee and bread, there is already garlic, chilli and coconut being chopped for chutney, dosa or idli. I would like to properly capture that morning rhythm on tape one day.

N: I was recently on vacation in the Alps at a small cabin with a well that had fresh spring water flowing all day. You could hear it even with the bedroom window open, and it was so calming. Other than that, it was completely quiet, except for the occasional sound from birds or nature. It put me in a totally different state of mind.

A flowing water source or the ocean has a very special effect on you. I wish I could live in a place like that someday.

Have you ever been in spaces with extreme sonic characteristics, such as anechoic chambers or caves? What was the experience like?

K: During a video shoot with Keshavara, we once got lost in a cave. At one point I briefly lost consciousness and found my way out much later than the others.

What I remember most is the sound. I had this strange feeling that I could hear the sound of the whole world echoing somewhere deep inside my body.

We all came out with slightly different impressions. One of the others mainly remembered an intense pressure on the ears, like when you are very high up or very deep underground.

What are among your favourite spaces to record and play your music?

K: My favourite place to write is our bungalow in Auroville, India. Being away from everyday life already changes something, but the climate does, too. The heat slows my thoughts down in a way I like. India often feels almost like the opposite of Germany, and my usual routines stop making much sense.

Everything around me sounds different there: the traffic, the animals, temple sounds, the sea, even the wind. These sounds do not always enter the music literally, but they still find their way into the compositions. They change the tempo at which I listen and write, and leave their traces in the sound.

One of our favourite places we have played was a secret psychedelic festival in Sardinia in 2024, right on the beach. We played while the sun was going down with the ocean behind us. At some point I jumped into the sea and went for a swim while the band kept playing. That was pretty hard to beat.

Our favourite place to record is Satori Sound, our studio in Cologne. Over the years, we have filled it with an analogue mixing desk, obscure percussion instruments, a Farfisa, a Rhodes and a piano, plus good coffee from the moka pot.

It is not just where we record. It is our home, and all these things have slowly become part of the band's sound.

How important is sound for our overall well-being and in how far do you feel the "acoustic health" of a society or environment is reflective of its overall health?

K: We do not think acoustic health is the same as quietness. A forest or the sea can be very loud without exhausting us. A faint high tone from an electronic device can be much harder to bear, because it occupies one spot in your attention and refuses to leave.

For us, it is less about decibels than whether a sound leaves room for the listener. In the city, our ears are constantly defending themselves. After a few days away, we notice that defence dropping.

N: General well-being is crucial, but we often don't look after ourselves enough or listen inwards. Meditation can help here - it’s like a muscle you can train to bring awareness and mindfulness into daily life. Through this reflection, you can look at yourself and see what is actually good for you. In meditation, sound is often used alongside breathing.

People frequently live mindlessly and don't notice how loud their environment is. Being exposed to unnatural loud noise for extended periods can definitely cause stress, unlike natural sounds like ocean waves.

Many animals communicate through sound. Based either on experience or intuition, do you feel as though interspecies communication is possible and important? Is there a creative element to it, would you say?

K: Definitely. Our drummer Nick and I both have dogs, so this is not an abstract question for us.

One of the most striking examples happens with my dog, Scusi. If one of us hiccups, even just once, she becomes genuinely frightened. I still have no idea what she thinks has happened. Maybe that is also part of interspecies communication: a tiny sound can carry enormous meaning for the other species, while you remain completely unsure what that meaning is.

Scusi has made me listen differently to the smallest human noises, because something that feels insignificant to me can be a dramatic event for her.

N: Communication between humans and animals definitely exists. With dogs, for instance, it's very clear: while they understand few actual words, they immediately pick up on the way we speak.

I've also felt like I communicated with other animals in nature. Animals are very observant, so if you remain calm, they are more likely to engage with you. Sometimes I try to imitate bird calls, though I don't think I'm quite getting through to them yet!

Tinnitus and developing hyperacusis are very real risks for anyone working with sound. Do you take precautions in this regard and if you're suffering from these or similar issues, how do you cope with them?

K: I actually hear fewer frequencies in my right ear. The brain seems to even it out quite well, so most of the time I do not notice it. There was a period when I focused on it a lot, and somehow that made it feel much worse. Nowadays I try not to think about it too much.

Sometimes, when I listen to music very quietly on headphones, I notice that something seems to be missing on one side. Then I turn the headphones around and it is still missing, so I know it is my ear and not the mix.

It does not affect me too much, but of course I worry about it getting worse. I used to DJ very loud, and I played a lot of shows standing next to loud cymbals in small rooms with low ceilings. I was less careful then. Now I use protection and take it much more seriously.

N:The hardest part is not letting it stress you out, though that's easier said than done. I ignored it for a long time—the classic mistake—and I believe I even have a slight dip in my hearing around cymbal frequencies in my right ear.

It's important not to constantly flood your ears with sound and to keep them fresh, especially before making music. My advice would be: don't overwork your ears constantly, and make sure to allow for quiet rest periods.

We can surround us with sound every second of the day. The great pianist Glenn Gould even considered this the ultimate delight. How do you see that yourself and what importance does silence hold?

K: We do not really experience silence as the opposite of sound. Sometimes we spend eight hours in the studio searching for the perfect sound, the right melody or just a few notes that finally make sense. Eventually we give up, switch everything off and go home.

Then, although it is actually quiet, the music keeps playing in our heads. Quite often, that is exactly when the solution appears. Apparently, silence is sometimes the fastest way to hear what a piece needs. We just tend to remember that eight hours too late.

N: I believe silence is essential. Being comfortable in total silence with another person can be a meaningful test of a relationship; when it works, you know there is a deep connection.

I sometimes think about doing a silent retreat or making a deal with friends to hang out in complete silence just to see what happens. I think it could lead to an interesting experience.