Two decades after the release of the Bengali rock album Proloyer Shomoye, Insomnia has resurfaced with its spiritual and sonic sequel, Proloyer Shomoye 2.0. Released independently via TuneCore in 2025, this contemporary rock album is more than a comeback. Musically, 2.0 draws on an expansive palette. Built on a foundation of contemporary rock, it pulses with the aggression of nu metal, the melancholic textures of Britpop, and the depth of groove metal. Interwoven with these are intricate classical influences — Carnatic rhythms, Hindustani melodies, and the layered structural beauty of art music polyphony. The result is a hybrid soundscape that feels both timeless and immediate, transcending boundaries of genre and geography.

The PS2 album is also a deliberate dialogue with its predecessor. Fans of the original Proloyer Shomoye will encounter musical and lyrical echoes, recurring motifs, unfinished lines, and familiar riffs reimagined for a darker, louder time. The band line-up comprises Bodhisattwa Ghosh (electric and acoustic guitars), Savvy (vocals, keyboards), Prasenjit ‘Pom’ Chakrabutty (bass), Sayantan Neogi (vocals), Rajarshi Barman (vocals, guitars) and Rohit Nandi (drums). A t2 chat...

Why did Insomnia decide to return to the music scene with an album after two decades?

Sayantan: Because the times demanded it. We’ve always been a band deeply tied to the pulse of society — our original Proloyer Shomoye was a reflection of the turbulence of the early 2000s. Two decades later, the world feels even more fractured, volatile, and noisy. As artistes, we felt the urge to respond — not with silence, but with music that engages with this chaos. Coming back wasn’t nostalgia — it was necessity.

Why the title Proloyer Shomoye 2.0 – A Sonic Reckoning of Our Times?

Sayantan: The first Proloyer Shomoye was about rebellion and awakening. 2.0 is about reckoning. It acknowledges that storms — political, social, personal — still swirl around us, but the language of protest and hope has evolved. A Sonic Reckoning of Our Times captures that idea: we’re not just echoing the past, we’re interrogating the present through sound.
Pom: Thematically, the album addresses widespread unrest and the manipulation of global power, the private battles of psycho-social trauma and identity dislocation, deep-rooted spiritual longing born from chaos and collapse, and a voice of rebellion rising with conviction and poetic fire. Some songs are spiritual invocations, others are socio-political dedications, and still others are seething.

Pom

Each track tells its own story— some like mantras, others like manifestos. Together, they form a fractured mosaic of a world in flux. Proloyer Shomoye 2.0 is Insomnia at its most expansive and most evolved. It breaks, it rebuilds, and above all, it remembers. It is not merely an album. It is a document, an invocation, a sonic archive of a time that demands to be felt.

What is the genesis of 2.0?

Bodhisattwa: It started as scattered riffs, unfinished lyrics, and restless thoughts over WhatsApp and late-night jams. Then, when the pandemic stripped life to its essentials, we realised music was still our way of making sense of the world. Those fragments became seeds for the album. Slowly, they grew into full-blown tracks that carried both the weight of our history and the urgency of today.

What was it like fleshing out ideas into full songs for 2.0?

Bodhisattwa: It was equal parts cathartic and maddening. Two decades away from an album cycle means you carry a lot of raw energy, but also a lot of doubt. Some songs came fully formed in a day, others wrestled with us for months. The key was embracing collaboration — letting each member bring their present selves into the sound, rather than trying to recreate who we were 20 years ago.

What message or feeling do you hope listeners take away from the album?

Rajarshi: That anger can coexist with hope. That despair can give birth to beauty. That music can still be a rallying cry when the world feels overwhelming. We want listeners to walk away feeling seen, shaken, but also re-energised to face their own storms.

Tell us about the new music video. What are your thoughts on that?

Savvy: Done by our good friend, the immensely talented Shan Bhattacharya, the video reflects the album’s core idea: fragments of reality colliding with dreamscapes. It uses stark, cinematic imagery — urban decay, protests, intimate faces in the crowd — intercut with surreal visuals that bend time and place. For us, it’s more than a video; it’s a visual extension of our sound. Watching it felt like holding up a mirror to the chaos and calm inside us.

How did Insomnia come together as a band?

Bodhisattwa: We started off as a school band, and others slowly joined in from within a tight-knit community of like-minded musicians. Back then, the scene was small, but our hunger was insatiable. We bonded over the desire to make original music in Bangla that wasn’t afraid to be loud, experimental, or confrontational. That’s how Proloyer Shomoye was born—a collective shout against conformity.

Why take this 20-year break between albums?

Bodhisattwa: Life happened. Careers, responsibilities, personal journeys. But also, perhaps, we needed that distance. We didn’t want to force another album unless we had something urgent to say. Two decades later, when the urgency returned, so did we.

How do you strike a balance between your influences and crafting a sound that feels fresh and modern?

Bodhisattwa: We’re children of many influences — rock, metal, Britpop, Hindustani, Carnatic, electronica, and personally, jazz. The trick isn’t to balance them — it’s to let them collide. 2.0 doesn’t imitate; it absorbs. We’ve embraced new textures, electronic layers, and production techniques, while holding on to the core of what makes us Insomnia: intensity, poetry, and experimentation.

Where do you see the band in the next five years?

Bodhisattwa: Hopefully still restless. Still creating. We don’t want to be a nostalgia act — we want to keep evolving. In five years, we see ourselves playing to new generations who weren’t even born when the first album came out, connecting across borders, and proving that Bangla and Bangla rock are not a relic — it’s a living, breathing force. Special thanks to Sandipan Parial, who played all the drums, and a huge shout-out to Cizzy for writing and doing the rap on the title track.