sunneversetsonmusic | monthly music blog

ALBUM OF THE DAY

11 MAY 2026

Ranjha

SHYE BEN TZUR, JONNY GREENWOOD AND THE RAJHASTAN EXPRESS

Released 8 May 2026

Junun / World Circuit

****-

A rich, devotional cross-cultural work that combines qawwali, brass band and cinematic arrangement - expansive, spiritual and shaped by remarkable collective generosity.

The collaboration between Shye Ben Tzur, Jonny Greenwood and The Rajasthan Express has always felt less like a side project than a distinct musical world. First introduced through 2015’s Junun, recorded at Mehrangarh Fort in Jodhpur and later documented by Paul Thomas Anderson, the project brought together Ben Tzur’s Hebrew- and Urdu-language devotional compositions, Greenwood’s textural sensitivity and the extraordinary brass, percussion and vocal traditions of Rajasthan’s local musicians.

Rather than presenting East-West fusion as a spectacle, the music thrived on shared purpose and spiritual openness. Ranjha, their second full-length statement, deepens that language, less ecstatic in surface energy perhaps, but even richer in emotional and compositional depth.

Ranjha succeeds on slightly shifted grounds, as there is no longer any sense of separate traditions being carefully stitched together for effect; instead, the album moves with the confidence of a language already shared. Brass fanfares, hand percussion, harmonium drones, devotional vocals and Greenwood’s subtle harmonic architecture all exist inside the same emotional frame, each element serving the song rather than the concept.

Where Junun gravitated around axes of communal celebration and rhythmic immediacy, Ranjha leans into deeper territory. The title track is emblematic of this shift - spacious, patient and emotionally suspended, allowing Ben Tzur’s vocal lines to carry a sense of spiritual longing without forcing resolution.

The Rajasthan Express remains extraordinary throughout, especially in the brass arrangements, where exuberance and precision coexist without stiffness. Their playing gives the music its physical joy, even in quieter moments.

Greenwood’s role is characteristically understated, but essential to the contemporaneous whole. Rather than dominating arrangements, he shapes atmosphere: guitar textures, harmonic framing and the instinct to leave space for others to fill. This restraint makes the album work. This is not a Jonny Greenwood project featuring world music; it is an ensemble record, built on attentiveness within the ensemble.

However, alongside the musical expression, it is the devotional dimension that gives Ranjha its true centre. These songs are not performed as aesthetic exercises, but as acts of belief and shared attention. The result is music that feels intimate and communal - expansive without becoming grandiose: a rare record where beauty arrives through humility.