Instrumental ambience: John Martyn meets Nick Drake for the 21st Century

Padma hails from a small suburban town near Sheffield in the North of England. He has been a practising Buddhist for over 10 years and at one time intended to spend his life as part of a Buddhist Order. In the end it was his inability to cope with that exact thing - order - that led to him going his own way, choosing instead the path of the artist.

Eschewing obvious quotes or cliched references, the minimalist chamberfolk trio from Oslo blend the brittle, drily poetic string stirrings of Norwegian tradition with the nocturnal eroticism of Jazz, the rhythmical patterns of Steve Reich and the sparse canvases of Morton Feldman.