SOHM, born and raised in Nepal, speaks flat, accentless Midwestern American English.
SOHM, born and raised in Nepal, speaks flat, accentless Midwestern American English.
His first music as an artist (age about 16, 17) was playing thrash metal and hard rock (“Metallica, Pantera, some British heavy metal, Iron Maiden, bands like that,” he says) in tourist bars in Kathmandu.
Then, at 18, he came to America, got his bachelor’s and an MBA (Miami University, Oxford, Ohio; hence, the Midwest flavored English), gave up music for 13, 14 years while he built a career in commercial real estate in Denver.
Four months ago, he released his first album, the self-titled SOHM.
“I like to tell people my album is a mix of Pink Floyd meets Bob Dylan meets Jethro Tull,” he said.
He first learned English where he first played music, in the bars of the Thamel district of Kathmandu, where Australian and European tourists congregated.
“There was a time in my life when I sang ‘Paranoid’ by Ozzy Osbourne, and I would sing it, but I didn't know what it meant.”
Kathmandu had no age limit to being in bars, and “Me and a couple of my friends, at around grade eight, grade nine, were like, ‘Hey, can we start playing here?’ And the owner, of course, who wanted to not pay real adult musicians, was like, ‘Oh, this is a great idea.’ He paid us pennies, but it was great for me.”
Music became a big part of his life through high school and even into college, before he gave it up to focus on his degrees and real estate. Fast forward 13 years or so, the pandemic hits, and SOHM, like so many others, began rethinking life.
“I was like, ‘Man, I used to be very musical.’ This was a very serious endeavor that I was in. I wondered, maybe it was time to go after this goal.”
He sold off all his commercial real estate and became the musical artist SOHM. His stage name is the name of a hallucinogenic concoction used in Vedic, Nepali-Indian culture to achieve spiritual enlightenment.
His album has been on Spotify for only two months and is up to almost 45,000 monthly listeners and, he says, he is “doing essentially a 1,500-percent increase every week on stream.”
“So it's rolling, man,” he said.
The folk influence is obvious in the music. But the balladic guitar rhythms of folk are infused with elements from thrash, metal and what he calls the “weird folk Americana“ he found when he came here, artists like Joanna Newsom and Devendra Banhart.
Blend in a xylophone, Nepali instruments, a kind of southern Asian drum, Greek instruments, a horn the name of which he can’t bring to tongue right off. “The album everywhere has little mixes of ethnic instruments thrown in,” he said.
So when he says “Pink Floyd meets Bob Dylan meets Jethro Tull,” that’s really just for starters.
SOHM has thought out the move from metal to folk.
“Yes yes yes, without a doubt,” he said, when asked about that transition. “The jump from metal to folk actually is way more clear cut than the jump from metal to pop, you know? Because you're still playing and there's a slight focus on instruments, but you're trying to have some kind of meaningful lyrics as opposed to just drumbeat dancing music.”
He writes his music on yet a different instrument, a ukulele. The lyrics, he says, “are basically general observations” and “trying to form an attachment between our observed realities.”
His favorite song on SOHM is “Die Young,” a whimsical meditation on life and death featuring banjo, harmonica and ukulele, among other instruments:
See, you’ve got my point all wrong
Cause there is nothing to die or live
When stars explode and destroy galaxies
Tell me, whose counting your sins?
It’s a paradox of sorts to even sing
“I need to have one experimental song in the album, right? Yes. And that is ‘Die Young.’ It's a real hit-or-miss. People absolutely loathe it or they're like, ‘Wow! This is incredible.’ ”
He likes it for that reason and because it is distinct. “I guarantee you right now, right here, there's definitely no music coming out like ‘Die Young.’ ”
The music tracks are laid down by SOHM and his Greek producer, Tolis. They are in the process of interviewing musicians to form a band so that they can begin public performances and tours. The task is complicated by the wild variety of instruments SOHM puts in his music.
His next release is in the works, a song called “Holding,” tentatively set for release around Christmas.
Artistically, his goal is to “go into different places.”
“Peak musician artistry would look something like going from country to country and trying to bring the folk music of that place, combine it with some kind of rock, and then try to see how those people are living or how they are experiencing reality.”
Practically, “My next step is touring and pumping out new music every six months and see where we go from there.”
Follow SOHM’s musical journey by staying connected on all platforms for new music, videos, and social posts.
Websites:
S-ohm-music
Amazon Music
Apple Music
Linktree
Spotify
YouTube
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