Parikrama to relaunch video of old hit to honour late guitarist Sherpa

A full version of Sonam's guitar solo will be featured for the first time on the video, which will be out on the popular guitarist's birth anniversary, October 8. Sonam passed away earlier this year.

New Delhi: Indian rock band Parikrama will relaunch the video of their classic hit, But it rained, to celebrate the life of their late guitarist and founder-member Sonam Sherpa.

A full version of Sonam’s guitar solo will be featured for the first time on the video, which will be out on the popular guitarist’s birth anniversary, October 8. Sonam passed away earlier this year.

“The video was originally shot and released in 2001, and was played on all top music channels of the day. The song was composed in 1996 and studio recorded in 2000. The video was made without any assistance from any agency, the band tied up with a director — Dhiraj Bannerjee — and between him and the band we did everything in-house,” Subir Malik, founder member and keyboardist of Parikrama, told IANS.

Malik added: “It was probably the first ever film shot in Kaza (in Himachal Pradesh) and nearby areas of Spiti Valley.”

On why they picked this song, Subir said: “‘But it rained’ was one of Sonam’s favourite songs, it also has an iconic guitar solo, that loads of people still record and keep sending us. During the telecast of the video, we had to cut short the solo because of TV broadcast restrictions (in terms of length of song back then). This is the first time we are releasing his full solo on video.”

“The video remains mostly the same, just the added 22 seconds of old grainy handycam footage (length of the added solo), as we didnt have any footage with us of the main shoot,” he added.

Remembering Sonam, Subir said: “He was one of the most hardworking and sincere people we ever got to know. Twenty-nine years of being together, yet it felt like yesterday. That’s probably the biggest quality of the man. An ace musician, he just loved to pass on his knowledge to the kids around, and like us everyone really loved and admired him. Sonam was always the heart of the band and will forever remain so.”