A year after Leather & Brass came out, its sharpest song is still doing discovery work. "Do I Know" sits at No. 11 on Spotify's Fresh Finds India playlist as of 15 October 2026, long after the first-Indian-on-Björk's-label headlines have cooled. That is the editorial fact worth holding onto. New Delhi producer Sijya did not make a playlist bait EP. She made a six-song study in decay, density and refusal, and the playlist has not finished with it.

Leather & Brass at a glance

  • Artist: Sijya (Sijya Gupta), New Delhi; composer, producer, vocalist and graphic artist
  • Release: Leather & Brass, six-track EP, 12 September 2025; ℗ 2025 One Little Independent Records
  • Tracklist: "I Only Want to Crash" (2:49), "Rust" (3:02), "Do I Know" (2:46), "Safe" (3:27), "Why Do You Fight Me" (2:49), "Tabla" (3:17); about 18 minutes 13 seconds
  • Lead singles: "Tabla" (29 May 2025), "Do I Know" (3 July 2025), "I Only Want to Crash" (7 August 2025)
  • Fresh Finds India: "Do I Know" No. 11 (checked 15 October 2026, ~10:30 AM IST); Spotify monthly listeners about 10.7K on the same morning

Who Sijya is, and what the label deal actually bought

Sijya came to music through design. Trained in graphic design at the National Institute of Design, Ahmedabad, she told The Indian Express she entered Delhi's electronic community while making album art for other people, then realised the same software fluency could build songs. Her debut EP Young Hate arrived in December 2022 on London's Accidental Records. Leather & Brass is the second EP, and the first on One Little Independent Records, the UK independent known for Björk, Glasser and Laura Misch. The Hindu reported she is the first Indian musician signed to that label, after pitching the unfinished record in London in early 2025.

The origin story is almost too neat, which is why the music has to carry it. British musician Talvin Singh reached out on Instagram, Rolling Stone India and The Hindu both reported; his ties to One Little Independent, including work on Björk's Debut, opened the door. Sijya invited label staff to a sold-out Café Oto show in London in autumn 2024, played them the unfinished EP two days later, and signed in January 2025 after Accidental, she told Rolling Stone India, gave her "the blessing" to move.

What she bought was not a pop makeover. In a DJ Mag statement she said many producers, "mostly men," wanted to "effectively [make] an artist of the pop model" out of her, and that mentors Matthew Herbert and Hugh Jones (Crewdson) instead "always saw me as a producer." That sentence is the thesis of the record: keep the laptop, the pedals and the imperfect vocal, and make the infrastructure serve that choice.

Why Do I Know is still on Fresh Finds India

Fresh Finds India is hand-curated, as we argued in Spotify's Indian indie gatekeepers. A year-old track at No. 11 is not nostalgia. It is a curator decision that the song still does the job of introducing a listener to a sound. As of this morning Sijya had about 10.7K monthly listeners on Spotify. That is the same scale of breakthrough we hear on the playlist's current top end, including Galat Admi & Sakré at No. 1 and Salt Rock at No. 6.

"Do I Know" earns the slot the hard way. Under the Radar premiered its live video in November 2025: a single unbroken shot in an abandoned factory outside Delhi that Sijya called her father's defunct works, "a museum of his ruins." At 2:46 it is short enough for a playlist and strange enough to stop a scroll. Distorted bass and rattling percussion push forward; the vocal floats without a chorus victory lap. It is the EP's most outward-facing track without becoming its most conventional one. (Fresh Finds currently serves the cut packaged with the September 2026 Rachika Nayar Edit single, track ID 71vVx436mXJPpSybU1hrML; duration still matches the original 2:46 master.)

Track by track: density with a pulse

"I Only Want to Crash" opens on a line Rolling Stone India flagged as one of Sijya's own favourites: "Am I too much." The Indian Express reported the song began life as a skit before growing into a full track. It is the right opener because it announces the record's method: fragments that refuse to stay fragments.

"Rust" is where the decay theme stops being a press note and becomes a feel. Downtempo, surreal, vocal used more as instrument than diary. "Safe" is the slap. Sijya told The Indian Express she asked mix engineer Seth Manchester for a bass kick she could "feel… like a slap in the face" after a long intro. The sequencing is deliberate: after two inward tracks, the low end arrives as an argument.

"Why Do You Fight Me" was also first planned as an interlude, The Indian Express reported, before drums turned it into a song. Then "Tabla" closes on a joke that became a statement. Rolling Stone India reported the working title stuck because of a single tabla sample, a laugh at pressure on South Asian artists "to commodify our identity and culture." More seriously, she said it is about "forcing yourself to go through the ordeal of believing in yourself" and not letting other people, "especially men," take the hard parts: "This work is all mine. It's imperfect, but I wouldn't have anyone else make it theirs."

What leather and brass are doing here

The title is not metaphor shopping. Sijya told The Hindu and The Indian Express that leather and brass were materials from her father's work, and that the EP is drawn to deterioration rather than soft nostalgia: old machines, dusty factories, things that still weigh something after they stop working. She ran digital synths through abused guitar pedals; Rolling Stone India named a Big Muff, a Seymour Duncan Twin Tube and a Moog Minifooger among the chain before the signal returned to the DAW with engineer Jay Panelia at Labrat Studios in Delhi. The label then sent the EP to Seth Manchester at Machines with Magnets in Rhode Island for further analogue processing. Bandcamp credits Heba Kadry on mastering.

That chain explains the record's stubborn midrange. Leather & Brass does not sparkle for loudness wars. It scrapes. On "Do I Know" and "Safe," the abrasion is the emotion; on the quieter stretch of "Rust," it can tip into monotony if you are impatient. That is a choice of material, not a mix accident. The cover drives the point home: a childhood photograph from the Jaipur highway that Sijya once "corrected" with whitener, now glow-printed on a 500-copy vinyl she oversaw from Delhi sleeves to a Polish press, The Hindu reported, at ₹2,500 before tax and shipping.

What the UK deal changes, and what it does not

In our ledger of who owns Indian indie music masters, the ℗ line is the plot. Leather & Brass reads ℗ 2025 One Little Independent Records: not DistroKid placeholder ownership, not a major-label licence dressed as independence. A real independent with decades of catalogue took the sound recording copyright on a New Delhi producer's second EP. The deal did not Indianise Björk. It internationalised Sijya's refusal to be produced into someone else.

Compare that with the self-released ℗ lines dominating Fresh Finds India this month, from Calcutta Cowboy to Galat Admi. Sijya's path is rarer. The playlist still files her next to bedroom-scale singles because the song, not the letterhead, is what Fresh Finds India is for.

Verdict

Leather & Brass is the rare Indian indie electronic EP whose press story is smaller than its sound. The Björk-label signing was real and deserved; the lasting document is six tracks of industrial intimacy that still put "Do I Know" on a discovery playlist thirteen months later. It is not flawless: inward tracks ask for patience, and the lyrics stay sparse on purpose. But the producer stayed the producer. In a year when Fresh Finds India is crowded with new names learning to be outward, Sijya's stubborn inwardness keeps earning its slot. That is the review, and the compliment.

FAQ

Who is Sijya?

Sijya is a New Delhi composer, producer, vocalist and graphic artist. She released Young Hate in 2022 on Accidental Records and Leather & Brass in 2025 on One Little Independent Records. The Hindu reported she is the first Indian musician signed to that UK label.

When was Leather & Brass released?

Leather & Brass was released on 12 September 2025 as a six-track EP, ℗ 2025 One Little Independent Records. Singles "Tabla," "Do I Know" and "I Only Want to Crash" preceded it on 29 May, 3 July and 7 August 2025.

Where is Do I Know on Fresh Finds India?

"Do I Know" was No. 11 on Spotify's Fresh Finds India as of 15 October 2026 at about 10:30 AM IST. Positions change often.

What does the title Leather & Brass mean?

Sijya has said leather and brass are materials from her father's professions, and that the EP is drawn to decay, old machines and industrial weight rather than soft nostalgia. The sound design runs digital synths through analogue guitar pedals to match that idea.

Sources

Cover: Sijya, official cover artwork of the Leather & Brass EP (℗ 2025 One Little Independent Records), via Apple Music. Shown in full on a blurred extension of the same artwork at 1200×630; metadata stripped. Source: https://music.apple.com/in/album/leather-brass-ep/6786611739.

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