Shilpa Ray | photo by Paige Walter
Indie Rock Hit Parade Live Session: Shilpa Ray (2021)
Joining us in the studio for this Indie Rock Hit Parade live session is an artist who’s been a longtime friend and favorite of the show. The last time Shilpa Ray visited our studio, it was shortly before the release of 2015’s Last Year’s Savage. Since then, Ray has released another full-length album (2017’s Door Girl) and a series of blistering stand-alone singles. The latest of those singles, Bootlickers of the Patriarchy, came out the day before this session was recorded.
This session begins, fittingly, with the A-side of Ray’s new single. The first half of “Bootlickers of the Patriarchy” is cut from the same dreamy cloth as earlier songs “The Burning Bride” and “After Hours,” but its coda incorporates jittery electronics and Ray’s trademark vocal acrobatics. If you’re sensing a bit of new wave and industrial influence on the new material, you’re not far off: Joining Ray on the Bootlickers B-side (and in this session) is fellow NY artist Heather Elle aka FLOSSING. Elle previously appeared on the Indie Rock Hit Parade in 2018, playing bass in BODEGA. Together, Ray and Elle perform a stark and chilling take on the early Ministry song “I’m Not an Effigy,” which features a guitar solo from Ray herself (picking up the instrument is a recent development for the longtime keyboardist). Finally, just as in 2015 when she gave us a preview of the still in-progress Door Girl, Ray leads her band through a hammering rendition of “Lawsuits and Suicide,” which is slated to appear on her next album.
Listen to Shilpa Ray’s Indie Rock Hit Parade session below, and check out some of Paige Walter’s photos from the studio…
