Indian-Western Pop Fusion Period
Sheila Chandra first came to public attention as an actress, playing Sudhamani Patel in the BBC school drama Grange Hill from 1979 to 1981.
As a teenager she formed the band Monsoon with Steve Coe (who became the band's producer), and bassist Martin Smith. Monsoon created a fusion of Western and Indian pop styles. They recorded their lone album Third Eye in 1982 from which they had a surprise hit single Ever So Lonely, which peaked at #12 in the UK. They followed-up with the single, "Shakti", which peaked at #41, but this was to be the band's final charting single. The album also includes a cover of The Beatles' "Tomorrow Never Knows", featuring the distinctive EBow guitar sound of Bill Nelson.
Resenting pressure from their record company over musical direction, Monsoon dissolved in 1982 and Coe and Smith set about promoting Chandra as a solo artist on independent Indipop Records. Phonogram "posthumously" released Third Eye in 1983.
Chandra went on to release a number of albums in the 1980s, at times experimenting with her voice as an instrument through a range of techniques. In the 1990s she released three albums on Peter Gabriel's Real World label, although Martin Smith was no longer actively involved by this time.
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