The inspiration for this collection came from the movie Drift, where a scene was played to the strains of Kulashaker's Govinda. Over the last 20 years, new music has been created by mashing up old songs like Walk This Way by Aerosmith and Run DMC. In the 1960's, the Beatles and the Rolling Stones started incoporating the sitar in their rock and roll. Here are a few of my favourite sitar based rock/jazz/hard-to-classify tunes.

The song: Govinda

The players: Kula Shaker

According to Wikipedia, this is the only British top ten hit to be entirely in Sanskrit¹. While the album reached double platinum in the UK², it didn't  do so well in Australia. I recall the late night TV advertisements, between infomercials, for the album. While I originally bought for a copy of their cover of Hush - a subject for a future collection of Random Gems - I grew to like Kula Shaker and their follow up, Peasants, Pigs, & Astronauts.

Where to buy:  or  amazon.com

Where to stream:

The song: Mathar

The players: The Dave Pike Set

This track was originally released in the 1969 album Noisy Silence, Gentle Noise by The Dave Pike Set³.

It was re-released as part of The Original Indian Vibes and reached #35 in the 1995 Triple J Hottest 100. It has since been featured in several 'chill-out' albums such as The No.1 Ibiza Chillout Album and From Latin to Jazz Volume 1.

Where to buy:  or  amazon.com

Where to listen:

The song: The Inner Light

The players: The Beatles

George Harrison is generally credited with introducing the sitar to popular western music⁴ when it featured in The Beatles Norwegian Wood. When the sitar features in several tacks in their Revolver and Sgt. Pepper's Lonely Heart Club Band albums, my opnion is that it only forms the melody. The Inner Light which is the B-Side to Lady Madonna is different.

In my opnion, George Harrison uses the sitar and tablas to drive both the rhythm and melody of the Inner Light. Having recorded the backing track in Mumbai with Indian musicians⁵ may have helped.

This video is from the Concert for George and is performed by Anoushka Shankar and Jeff Lynne.

Where to buy:

Finally a little tribute to Ray Manzarek - the man whose dexterous hands and nimble feet powered The Doors. Movies set in the Vietnam War are incomplete without Manzarek magic in the soundtrack.

Break On Through (to the other side) was the first Doors track I recall hearing. 

Where to buy:  or amazon.com

Where to stream:

References

1. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Govinda_(Kula_Shaker_song)
2. http://www.jango.com/music/Kula+Shaker/_full_bio?l=0
3. http://musicbrainz.org/release/b756dbd4-2b75-4311-9d8d-78660a6b4a27
4. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sitar_in_popular_music
5. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sitar_in_popular_music