Kerala Dust | The Bay
Kerala Dust's "The Bay" - Edmund Kenny's post-breakup closing track from An Echo Of Love, recorded across five cities with Tim Gardner and Pascal Karier in 2025.
Story Behind “The Bay”
The Post-Relationship State of Mind
“The Bay” closes Kerala Dust’s third album An Echo Of Love (August 22, 2025) with a hushed meditation on impermanence and movement. The track emerged from what Edmund Kenny described as “that pouring-over frame of mind just after a relationship has ended”—a state that defined the entire album’s creation following the band’s tumultuous 2023 tour. Rather than capturing a specific time or place, “The Bay” exists in the liminal mental space where memory dissolves into seascape imagery, where “whispered words into the seabreeze” attempt to communicate what direct language cannot.
The song’s repetitive structure—three nearly identical verses with minimal variation—mirrors what Kenny learned from London’s club music scene. “I got really into club music and used to go to Fabric and Corsica Studios loads,” he explained. “I got deep into the endless repetition of all of that music, and the way that, as it repeats incessantly, things unfold on you and it almost becomes a weird sort of mantra, leaving you in a clear headspace.” On “The Bay,” this hypnotic quality serves emotional excavation rather than dancefloor functionality, each repetition of “a little death just keeps us moving down” revealing new layers of meaning around loss, motion, and the impossibility of standing still.
Constant Flux: Recording Across Five Cities
An Echo Of Love was written and recorded across Tuscany, Austin, Berlin, Zurich, and finally Rome—a restless creative process that Kenny acknowledges made the album “exist in all those places in some way.” This geographic dispersal wasn’t merely logistical; it embodied the album’s central theme of perpetual motion and transformation. “The Bay” distills this sense of constant flux into three-and-a-half minutes where the narrator remains unmoored, unable to anchor anywhere permanent.
The track also reflects Kerala Dust’s own personnel changes. Tim Gardner (keyboards, organ) and Pascal Karier (drums) joined longstanding members Edmund Kenny (lead vocals, electronics) and Lawrence Howarth (guitar) for An Echo Of Love, bringing new musical perspectives. This shifting lineup parallels the album’s thematic concern with meaning found “in fragments rather than anything fixed or static.” As Kenny noted, the album showcases “a more intimate approach to songwriting” compared to their previous work, stripping away some of the electronic density to reveal vulnerability and directness.
“The Bay” Recording and Production Details
From Bedroom Laptop Productions to Live Instrumentation
Kerala Dust originally formed in 2016 as Edmund Kenny’s solo bedroom project while studying at Goldsmiths, University of London. “I got really into club music,” he explained to Miami New Times in 2018, “and the endless repetition of all of that music, and the way that, as it repeats incessantly, things unfold on you and it almost becomes a sort of mantra, leaving you in a clear headspace.” Early Kerala Dust productions were entirely laptop-based, uploaded to SoundCloud before catching the attention of Cologne label Laut & Luise.
By An Echo Of Love, the production approach had evolved significantly. “The Bay” features live instrumentation alongside electronic elements: Tim Gardner’s organ provides atmospheric swells, Pascal Karier’s drums anchor the 65 BPM tempo, Lawrence Howarth’s guitar adds textural detail, and Edmund Kenny’s vocals float above the mix with backing vocals from Elena Gniss and Julian Pollina. This hybrid approach—combining the hypnotic repetition Kenny learned from techno with the organic warmth of blues and Americana—defines Kerala Dust’s mature sound.
The Bay as Closing Statement
Positioned as track 10 of 10 on An Echo Of Love, “The Bay” serves as the album’s quiet resolution after more propulsive tracks like “Down With The Night (Pt. II)” (150 BPM). At 65 BPM in G minor, the song creates a contemplative space where the album’s themes of loss, memory, and transformation can settle. The production emphasizes space and restraint—elements essential to the track’s hypnotic effect. The Bay becomes both physical location (water, seabreeze, light) and psychological state (dissolution, departure, washing away).
This approach reflects Kenny’s broader artistic philosophy: “With the music, I’m trying to represent those questions of who you are, what you know, and what’s true,” he told Miami New Times. “You’re never quite sure who the narrator is or what they want. Even the lyrics I write in the first person are as much about me as they are about everyone else.” On “The Bay,” this ambiguity allows the song to function as both personal catharsis and universal meditation on letting go.
Notes About “The Bay” by Kerala Dust
Release Date: August 22, 2025
Duration: 3:29 (3:30 on some platforms)
BPM: 65 BPM (Juno Download); 130 BPM (Beatport - different version)
Key: G minor
Genre: Indie Dance / Downtempo / Art Rock / Electronica
Album: An Echo Of Love (3rd studio album, track 10 of 10)
Label: Play It Again Sam (PIAS)
Catalog Number: PIASR1578DA
Composers: Edmund Kenny, Lawrence Howarth, Tim Gardner
Lyrics: Edmund Kenny
Format: Digital (streaming, download), vinyl, CD
Recording Locations: Tuscany, Austin, Berlin, Zurich, Rome
Kerala Dust “The Bay” Era Band Details
Band Background
Formation: London, 2016
Current Base: Berlin and Zurich
Original Concept: Solo bedroom project by Edmund Kenny (Goldsmiths University)
Name Origin: Tribute to Edmund Kenny’s travels to India
Early Releases: Uploaded to SoundCloud, signed by Laut & Luise (Cologne) 2016
Debut EP: Late Sun (2017, Laut & Luise)
Live Evolution: Added musicians for performances 2017+
Touring: 150+ international shows since 2017 (USA, Europe, Mexico, Russia, Turkey, Dominican Republic, India, Australia)
Musical Influences: CAN, The Velvet Underground, Tom Waits, The Doors, Leonard Cohen, Bob Dylan, The Beatles, Talking Heads, Abdulla Rashim
Club Influences: Fabric, Corsica Studios (South London)
Sound Description: “Late night driving sounds” - psych-rock, blues, techno fusion
Personnel on “The Bay”
Edmund Kenny: Lead vocals, electronics
Band founder, primary songwriter
Studied music at Goldsmiths, University of London
Originally from London, now based in Berlin
Lawrence Howarth: Guitar
Longstanding member (replaced Lloyd Calderon-Polson)
Tim Gardner: Organ, keyboards
New addition for An Echo Of Love
Composer credit on “The Bay”
Pascal Karier: Drums
New addition for An Echo Of Love
Elena Gniss: Background vocals
Julian Pollina: Background vocals
Previous Members:
Harvey Grant: Keys (original live member, left before An Echo Of Love)
Lloyd Calderon-Polson: Guitar (original live member, early tours)
Album Context (An Echo Of Love)
Release: August 22, 2025 via Play It Again Sam
Concept: Constant flux, meaning in fragments, post-relationship meditation
Recording: Multi-city sessions (Tuscany, Austin, Berlin, Zurich, Rome)
Thematic Focus: Vulnerability, directness, intimate songwriting
Musical Approach: Art rock meets electronica, Americana, desert blues, “crepuscular drives through neon-lit city”
Description: “Wonderfully shapeshifting record; restless fusion”
Lineup Changes: Addition of Tim Gardner (keys) and Pascal Karier (drums)
Track Listing: 10 tracks, 39 minutes
Echoes Of Grace (3:26)
How The Light Gets In (4:17)
Bell (4:29)
The Orb, TX (5:00)
Eden To Eden (4:46)
Love In The Underground (4:38)
Beyond The Pale (3:05)
I Remember You A Dancer (4:01)
Down With The Night (Pt. II) (4:22)
The Bay (3:29)
Kerala Dust Discography
Late Sun EP (2017, Laut & Luise)
Magdalena EP (2018)
Francesca’s Frames (2019)
Light, West (2020)
Motions EP (2021)
Violet Drive (February 17, 2023, Play It Again Sam) - 2nd album
An Echo Of Love (August 22, 2025, Play It Again Sam) - 3rd album
Interesting Facts About “The Bay”
The Kerala Dust Name: From India to London Bedrooms
The band’s name emerged from Edmund Kenny’s travels to India, where “Kerala dust” refers to the reddish laterite soil that covers much of Kerala state in southwestern India. This naming choice connects to Kenny’s broader artistic philosophy of creating immersive sonic worlds. As he told Miami New Times in 2018: “What I was trying to do was create a little world in the studio, this sort of all-encompassing universe for myself.” The name evokes both exotic geography and the dust of memory—appropriate for a project that Kenny describes as existing “in a state of mind more than a specific time or place.”
This origin story also reflects Kerala Dust’s transformation from solo bedroom project to international touring act. When Kenny first uploaded tracks to SoundCloud in 2016, he worked alone in his London flat, obsessing over sounds and production details. “Moby once said that underneath the cool photos and rock-star clothes, everybody’s a nerd and you should never pretend otherwise,” Kenny admitted. “If you’re producing electronic music, some part of you has spent five years in a bedroom making weird noises until you found something that worked.” By the time “The Bay” was recorded in 2025, Kerala Dust had expanded to a four-piece playing 80+ shows annually, but retained that bedroom-producer attention to sonic detail.
From Nightclubs to Concert Halls: The Tempo Shift
“The Bay” represents Kerala Dust’s deliberate move away from club functionality toward concert-oriented composition. At 65 BPM, the track would never work at 1 AM in a nightclub—and that’s precisely the point. “We’ve almost exclusively decided to play concert shows now and not play nightclubs so much anymore,” Kenny explained to YourStory in 2023. “We were writing songs that you couldn’t play in a nightclub. Some songs like ‘Future Vision’ (which is moody and slow), which is on our last album, you could not be playing something like that at 1 am in a nightclub.”
This shift reflects Kenny’s evolving understanding of what club music taught him. While early Kerala Dust drew heavily on the 4/4 kick drums and fixed tempos of techno, An Echo Of Love retains techno’s hypnotic repetition while abandoning its dancefloor requirements. “The Bay” uses repetition not to maintain groove but to create contemplative space—what SF Weekly called Kerala Dust’s ability to take “the audience on a journey that seamlessly bridged house and downtempo.” The track becomes a meditation on impermanence where the repetition itself embodies the “little death” that “keeps us moving down,” each cycle washing away previous certainties like lullabies dissolved by seawater.
This evolution from club functionality to concert contemplation also connects to Kerala Dust’s influences. Kenny grew up on CAN, The Velvet Underground, and Tom Waits—artists who understood repetition’s hypnotic power without requiring dancefloor utility. “The Bay” channels this lineage: the krautrock patience of CAN, the narcotic drift of The Velvet Underground’s “Ocean,” the existential resignation in Tom Waits’ ballads. At 65 BPM, the song demands listener patience, creating what Tinnitist described as “a dynamic blend of art rock, electronica, and Americana” that finds beauty in fragments and motion rather than resolution.
Common Questions
Q: What is “The Bay” by Kerala Dust about? A: “The Bay” explores the psychological state following a relationship’s end—what Edmund Kenny described as “that pouring-over frame of mind just after a relationship has ended.” The track uses seascape imagery (seabreeze, bay, washing away lullabies) as metaphor for impermanence and movement. The repeated phrase “a little death just keeps us moving down” suggests both loss and the inability to remain static, with the bay representing both physical location and mental dissolution.
Q: Who are Kerala Dust? A: Kerala Dust is a London-formed, Berlin/Zurich-based band founded by Edmund Kenny in 2016. Originally a solo bedroom project, it evolved into a four-piece featuring Kenny (vocals/electronics), Lawrence Howarth (guitar), Tim Gardner (keyboards), and Pascal Karier (drums). They blend psychedelic rock, blues, Americana, and techno influences. The name pays tribute to Kenny’s travels to India and refers to Kerala’s reddish laterite soil.
Q: When was “The Bay” released? A: “The Bay” was released on August 22, 2025 as the closing track (track 10) on Kerala Dust’s third studio album An Echo Of Love, via Play It Again Sam (PIAS) label. The album was recorded across Tuscany, Austin, Berlin, Zurich, and Rome between 2023-2025.
Q: What genre is Kerala Dust? A: Kerala Dust blends multiple genres: indie dance, downtempo electronica, art rock, psychedelic rock, Americana, and techno. Critics describe their sound as “wonderfully shapeshifting” music that combines cerebral and visceral elements. They incorporate the hypnotic repetition of club music (influenced by London venues like Fabric and Corsica Studios) with the songcraft of artists like CAN, The Velvet Underground, and Tom Waits.
Q: What does Kerala Dust mean? A: “Kerala Dust” refers to the reddish laterite soil found in Kerala state in southwestern India. Band founder Edmund Kenny chose the name as tribute to his travels to India. The name evokes both exotic geography and the dust of memory, fitting for a project Kenny describes as creating “a little world in the studio, this sort of all-encompassing universe” that exists “in a state of mind more than a specific time or place.”
Tags: #KeralaDust #TheBay #AnEchoOfLove #EdmundKenny #PlayItAgainSam #IndieDance #Downtempo #ArtRock #PsychedelicRock #BerlinMusic #Electronica #PostBreakup #Americana
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