Ereimang set to perform at Bengaluru
Source: The Sangai Express / Waari Singbul Network

Imphal, January 10 2026: Some bands are born in garages.

Ereimang rose from the ground.

Their sound doesn't feel produced so much as unearthed - dragged up from soil, smoke, memory, and ritual.

It belongs to an older order, where music wasn't meant to soothe or decorate, but to summon.

Ereimang stands firmly in that lineage.

On January 18, at BLR Hubba in Bengaluru, the Manipuri contemporary folk-experimental band will step outside Manipur for the first time.

Introduced simply as "From Manipur with love - Ereimang," the performance will mark more than a geographic shift.

It will be the band's first offering to the world beyond home.

Labels bounce off Ereimang without sticking.

Folk, metal, experimental, ritual - each brush past the truth without touching it.

What they actually create is collision: Manipuri performative traditions smashing into heavy, distorted soundscapes drawn from rock and metal.

At the heart of that impact is the Pena, the indigenous Meitei string instrument whose melody carries centuries of memory.

In Ereimang's hands, the Pena doesn't soften the music - it slices through it, ancient and unyielding.

Onstage, Ereimang feels less like a band and more like a rite in progress.

A female vocalist stands in ceremonial white, crowned with a distinct headgear, her face veiled behind a translucent cloth.

From behind that gauze, folklore erupts - not whispered, but driven through the force of heavy metal.

Beside her, another female performer moves like a Meitei Maibi or shaman in trance, her body translating sound into invocation.

This isn't choreography.

It's possession.

Threaded through the sonic storm, the Pena anchors everything to the land.

Though Ereimang formed as early as 2015, they chose silence over premature exposure.

The band surfaced publicly only in 2025 - and when they did, it was without noise or apology.

Their first release, Kwakta Lamjel (The Race at Kwakta), arrived stripped of excess yet heavy with intent.

Built around the Pena and carried by grounded male vocals, the song adapts a Meitei folk ballad about an undefeated figure undone by his own injustice.

The message is blunt and old as memory: power without ethics doesn't last.

Heirangkhoi followed - and the response was immediate.

The track crossed 400,000 views and likes on YouTube, not through algorithms but instinct.

Drawn from a cherished folk song reflecting on life's cyclical nature - loss, remembrance, fate - it reimagines a quiet dialogue between a fallen wildflower and the wind through folk-noise rock and metal.

It wasn't revision.

It was resurrection.

Then came Ching (The Hill), where the band dug even deeper.

Hills emerge not as landscape, but as witnesses - silent keepers of history, conflict, and continuity.

The female voice here sounds less like singing and more like prophecy, channelled through a shamanic register that blurs time.

Ereimang's first live appearance at the 2nd Eikhoigi Imphal International Film Festival in February 2025 came in the aftermath of Manipur's prolonged unrest.

The room didn't watch.

It listened.

Ereimang didn't perform - they testified.

Their Bengaluru set carries added weight.

They will play earlier on the same stage that night where Megadeth's former lead guitarist Marty Friedman headlines - placing a young band from Manipur in quiet, improbable conversation with global metal history.

"BLR Hubba is a massive cultural space," says percussionist and manager Heisnam Shantanu.

"Stepping into it brings excitement, nervous energy, and responsibilit" .

Founder L Kamal Singh explains the long wait before going public with clarity.

"Everything was ready ten years ago.

But we knew we would be misunderstood.

Some of us were too young.

The timing wasn't right.

So, we waited" .

That patience shows.

Ereimang doesn't explain itself.

It doesn't dilute tradition for easy listening or apologise for heaviness.

This is music that refuses permission.

The world music industry loves to talk about the "authentic." Ereimang offers something rarer - the alive.

And the living is never tidy.

It crackles.

It roars.

It unsettles.

From Manipur, with love - but also with fire.

Ereimang comprises L Kamal Singh and Gajendra Laipubam on guitars, Kamlesh Khundrakpam on bass, Thoichanba on Pena and male vocals, Heisnam Shantanu on percussion, Nongshaba Okram on drums, Minerva Laipubam on female vocals, and Vandana Wahengbam as performer.

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