Sheherazaad: Khudgarzi review | Ammar Kalia's global album of the month

<p><strong>(Erased Tapes)<br></strong>Dreamy, reverb-laden arrangements, virtuosic vocals and echoes of PJ Harvey and Massive Attack make this disarming debut a one-of-a-kind creation</p><p>Since the release of her debut EP, <a href="https://sheherazaad.bandcamp.com/album/qasr">Qasr</a>, in 2024, south Asian-American vocalist and composer Sheherazaad has developed a distinctive take on the classical singing of her heritage. While her contemporaries such as the singers <a href="https://www.theguardian.com/music/2024/mar/22/ganavya-like-the-sky-ive-been-too-quiet-review">Ganavya</a> and Manizeh draw on spiritual vocal traditions, and <a href="https://www.theguardian.com/music/article/2024/may/17/arooj-aftab-night-reign-album-review">Arooj Aftab</a> on jazz and folk instrumentation, Sheherazaad’s work is darker and far more introspective, using sparse acoustic arrangements to create a style of Urdu-language noir.</p><p>On this debut album, she delivers her most disarmingly eerie and mournful work yet. A heavy layer of reverb coats the record’s spare and often evocative arrangements, making undulating tabla hits echo beneath Sheherazaad’s keening vocals on Qatil, while on <a href="https://youtu.be/E6bI3OawpS8?list=OLAK5uy_mYB88p0Pktfzu0pi0Lwr4zVgxQ15YoIKY">Registaan</a> it lends an unnervingly distorted quality to a simple guitar refrain and on Mard it subsumes melody in a haze of resonance. The resulting atmosphere sits somewhere between PJ Harvey’s late-90s eerie grunge and the trip-hop qawwali of Massive Attack’s work with singer Nusrat Fateh Ali Khan – an ambience that is as unsettlingly gloomy as it is engaging.</p> <a href="https://www.theguardian.com/music/2026/nov/13/sheherazaad-khudgarzi-review">Continue reading...</a>