Looking for a Break From the Noise
This article is from the archive of The New York Sun before the launch of its new website in 2022. The Sun has neither altered nor updated such articles but will seek to correct any errors, mis-categorizations or other problems introduced during transfer.
“I wanted a peaceful image for my music,” Brooklyn musician and artist Hisham Bharoocha said, explaining the name of his one-man band, Soft Circle. “I think of it as a morphing circle with soft edges, like what you see when you squint at the sun.” To match that ethereal moniker, Bharoocha creates enchanting sounds using multiple instruments, sometimes all at once. “I strap on a guitar, play drums with my feet, and sing through a headset mic,” he said. “The music can be tribal or it can be ambient. Some people think it sounds religious because I do a lot of drones with my voice.”
Soft Circle represents a new direction for Bharoocha, whose previous group, Black Dice, began as a noisy, confrontational outfit. “In Black Dice, it was about making people somewhat uncomfortable,” Bharoocha, who left the group in 2004, said. “Now I think more about entrancing the audience. I imagine it like a voodoo ceremony where you get a really peaceful, joyous feeling.”
Black Dice’s sound eventually included bubbling electronics and ambient drones. But Bharoocha has taken that evolution further, adding spiritual overtones to his new, trance-inducing style.
A background in Eastern culture fuels his hypnotic music. Born in Japan, Bharoocha lived in Canada and California, then returned to Tokyo for high school. “I’m half Japanese and half Burmese,” Bharoocha said. “I sang Hindi songs growing up and saw people play all types of instruments. Playing by myself now, I can appropriate elements from all of that.” Going solo has also given him more freedom with improvisation. “When I feel the audience’s energy shift, I can change on the spot, without worrying about what someone else is playing,” he said.
Bharoocha also improvises frequently in another medium: visual art. His mixed-media work, which utilizes photography, painting, and collage, has appeared in magazines and galleries around the world. “The ways I create art and music are pretty similar,” Bharoocha said. “[At the recent Art Basel fair in Miami] I did an installation, and I had it mostly worked out beforehand, but there were elements I didn’t know I was going to add.”
His dual interest in music and art flowered after high school, when Bharoocha returned to America to attend the Rhode Island School of Design. In Providence, he played briefly with noise punks Lightning Bolt before joining Black Dice and moving to Brooklyn with the band after graduation. Since then, Bharoocha has connected with a seemingly infinite number of New York musicians and his Japanese ties have led to even more activity.
He recently worked with drummer Yoshimi of Japan’s Boredoms (along with Sonic Youth’s Kim Gordon) to create soundtracks for the Japanese fashion label Cosmic Wonder. In addition, Gatax, his duo with Boredoms leader Eye Yamataka, played its first New York show in November. “I grew up as a huge Boredoms fan,” Bharoocha said. “My dream was to collaborate with them, so it’s been incredible.”
No Soft Circle recordings have been released, but an album recorded by Chris Coady (who previously worked with the Yeah Yeah Yeahs) should emerge in 2006. Until then, Bharoocha is intent on playing as much as possible. “My goal is to play bigger shows, and try to make a ton of people dance and move around,” Bharoocha said. “I just want to get out there. That’s what I’ve learned from playing: that I just need to keep doing it.”
December 9 at Tonic (107 Norfolk Street, 212-358-7501).