Ravi Shankar's sitar drone entered Western pop via the Beatles' 'Revolver' in 1966

Indian classical drone crossed directly into Western pop through the sitar. Ravi Shankar had been releasing sitar-based ragas — built over the tambura drone — in the global North since the 1950s, and in 1966 the Beatles featured heavily-droning sitars on ‘Revolver.’ This is a distinct transmission line for drone into pop, separate from the avant-garde feedback lineage of Young and the Velvet Underground: where feedback drone came out of Western experimental composition, this route imported the sustained-tone aesthetic from Indian classical practice itself. It marks the moment the Indian drone became audible to a mass Western pop audience.

Examples

Beatles ‘Revolver’ (1966): ‘a set of heavily-droning sitars… courtesy of Indian musician Ravi Shankar, who had been releasing sitar-based ragas in the global North since the ‘50s.‘

Assessment

Identify how Indian classical drone reached mainstream Western pop, and contrast this transmission route with the guitar-feedback lineage.