Sunny Jain releases “Ujala” recorded with his Wild Wild East band

In an epic journey in the making for 10 years, Sunny Jain was the first in his family to return to their ancestral land, Sialkot, Punjab, since the 1947 independence and partition of the Indian subcontinent. Jain walked the streets his elders traversed, received an overwhelming “welcome home” and even found the house his father had to flee over 75 years ago. As his Wild Wild East ensemble was on tour in Pakistan during this trip, the band decided to go into the studio that very night after the remarkable finding. Recording engineers, Asad Ali Khan and Amr Kashmiri, captured the palpable emotions in the air during the session at Art Club Sugar Records in Lahore. The cover art for the singles are from a temple in Sialkot where Jain’s ancestors would worship. It’s one of the last few standing Jain Temples in Pakistan and was opened up specifically for him.

On “Ujala," meaning radiant light in Punjabi, Jain infuses Punjabi folk motifs, drum & bass, and jazz, to create a groove-driven anthem that is infectious. Vocalist Ben Parag recalls lines from Subh-e-Azadi (Dawn of Freedom), written by the famous poet, Faiz Ahmed Faiz, before he launches into a soaring Hindustani gamaka. Alto saxophonist Alison Shearer takes an electrifying solo supported by the driving rhythm section (Ryan Dugre on guitar, Almog Sharvit on bass, Jain on drum set). The resulting song is both soul-stirring and intellectually stimulating as it captures the feeling Jain and band felt visiting his ancestral home in Sialkot, Pakistan.