Sunday Driver are a Cambridge and London based band that fuses English folk and classical Indian influences. In 2009 they became popular within the UK
steampunk
Steampunk is a subgenre of science fiction that incorporates retrofuturistic technology and aesthetics inspired by 19th-century industrial steam-powered machinery. Steampunk works are often set in an alternative history of the Victorian era or ...
scene.
History
"Sunday Driver" are named after a gene (SYD) originally found in fruit flies.
Sunday Driver were formed in the summer of 2000, though lead singer Chandrika "Chandy" Nath had earlier composed some of the songs whilst monitoring
ice floe
An ice floe () is a large pack of floating ice often defined as a flat piece at least 20 m across at its widest point, and up to more than 10 km across. Drift ice is a floating field of sea ice composed of several ice floes. They may caus ...
s near the South Pole, during a field trip in Antarctica, collecting data for the
British Antarctic Survey
The British Antarctic Survey (BAS) is the United Kingdom's national polar research institute. It has a dual purpose, to conduct polar science, enabling better understanding of global issues, and to provide an active presence in the Antarctic on ...
.
An
Arts Council grant back in 2004 paid for training workshops with renowned
sitar
The sitar ( or ; ) is a plucked stringed instrument, originating from the Indian subcontinent, used in Hindustani classical music. The instrument was invented in medieval India, flourished in the 18th century, and arrived at its present form in ...
ist
Baluji Shrivastav
Dhanoday Shrivastav OBE (born 21 June 1959), known professionally as Baluji Shrivastav, is an Indian/British musician and instrumentalist who plays a variety of traditional Indian instruments including the sitar, dilruba, surbahar, pakhavaj and ...
.
In 2009, Sunday Driver were the opening band at the first
Asylum Steampunk Festival, held at
The Lawn Asylum,
Lincoln
Lincoln most commonly refers to:
* Abraham Lincoln (1809–1865), the sixteenth president of the United States
* Lincoln, England, cathedral city and county town of Lincolnshire, England
* Lincoln, Nebraska, the capital of Nebraska, U.S.
* Lincoln ...
, the same year they opened the
Cambridge Folk Festival
The Cambridge Folk Festival is an annual music festival, established in 1965, held on the site of Cherry Hinton Hall in Cherry Hinton, one of the villages subsumed by the city of Cambridge, England. The festival is known for its eclectic mix of ...
. They also played the steampunk festival in 2010 and headlined the main Ball there in 2011.
Discography
Albums
* ''Sacred Cow'' / ''The Man from Bombay'' (2001) (Demo Compilation)
* ''More than Flies'' (2002) (EP)
* ''Underground'' (2003) (EP)
* ''In the City of Dreadful Night'' (2008) (Debut Full Length Album)
* ''The Mutiny'' (2012)
* Flo (2014) (EP)
* ''Sun God'' (2022)
See also
*
List of steampunk works: Steampunk musicians
References
External links
Sunday Driver websiteSunday Driver Myspace siteSunday Driver Facebook fan page
{{DEFAULTSORT:Sunday Driver
Steampunk music