Foundation and initial line-up ("Temple Head", Dream of 100 Nations, International Times, Psychic Karaoke) Musical collaborators since their schooldays, Tim Whelan and Hamilton Lee were previously both founding members of British pop band
Furniture and had played with the experimental psychedelic art-punk group
The Transmitters. While with Furniture, both musicians had already demonstrated an interest in
world music by bringing in more culturally-diverse instrumentation to what was originally a fairly conventional rock band line up (Lee had played
tongue drums and other percussion in addition to his standard drumkit, while Whelan had supplemented his guitar playing with extensive use of the Chinese
yangqin zither). Following the break-up of Furniture, Whelan and Lee worked together as part of the Flavel Bambi Septet (an Ealing-based world music band with a shifting line-up including other Transmitters members and future TGU member
Natacha Atlas). Transglobal Underground was first formed when Whelan and Lee teamed up with a third musician, Nick Page. All three took on pseudonyms for the project, which they have determinedly maintained (albeit with variations) up until the present day. Whelan became "Alex Kasiek", Lee "Hamid Mantu" and Page "Count Dubulah". which eventually saw the light of day on the Nation label in 1994 as
Dream of 100 Nations. Entitled 'In Transit' this project still continues in London, although, as often with Transglobal Underground, under a number of aliases. In 2012, Transglobal Underground released their first record for a label other than Mule Satellite since 2005, a collaboration with Albanian brass band Fanfara Tirana. The album, entitled 'Kabatronics' was put out on the World Village label, a subsidiary of Harmonia Mundi. The tour acts toured extensively for two years. In 2017, Natacha Atlas, although still primarily a solo artist, returned to performing regularly with the group. This led to other earlier members rejoining for a tour of France, notably Page and original tabla player Inder Goldfinger. A compilation of Transglobal Underground's best known work with Atlas was released under the name
Destination Overground, and a further single "The Colours Started to Sing Again" followed in 2019.
Pandemic and post-pandemic The groups most recent album, 'Walls Have Ears' was recorded in 2019 and enjoyed its greatest success on Bandcamp, being released in the middle of the most intense period of lockdowns in 2020. In 2021 they continued their online work with a one-year Bandcamp subscription project, releasing one album and various extra tracks a month available only to subscribers. One of these albums, a re-working of 'A Gathering of Strangers' as a protest against the UK leaving the EU, was released publicly. Transglobal Underground have made some of the other work available on occasions, but most remains unreleased publicly. Some of these sessions include their last work with Page, who died that year. Transglobal Underground made a return to the UK stage in 2022, finally being able to play 'Walls Have Ears' live, and have been touring regularly since then, the lineup being centered around Whelan, Mantu, Mukherjee, Tuup and percussionist Rav Neiyyar, with Natacha Atlas still guesting on occasion. ==Discography==