Release: 2008-2009
Info:"It BURNS-uh, BURNS-uh, BURNS-uh!” guests would yell whenever gobbling up one of “Ramesh B’s.” hot Sri Lankan specialties. In this case Ramesh B.’s Ring of Fire, a spicy dish I often gleefully served to the adventurous. Similarly the recording and video production of my version of Johnny Cash’s classic was a project cooked up with a generous portion of encouragement from friends and acquaintances who always magically appear when needed, like ingredients for a Sri Lankan rice and curry. Ummm!

One evening out of the cosmic chaos my friend Ron Randolf called to say he was hosting a Johnny Cash tribute show. “Ya wanna play something”? he inquired. „Sure, isn’t that what every Sri Lankan world music musician lives to do?“ Strange as it may sound to you until then Johnny Cash had never played a part in my musical development. As the heavens would have it, however, I had recently immersed myself in Mr. Cash’s farewell CD. I liked it. “OK! I replied. “I’ve got the song and I can already hear the tabla.” HUH?.
"It BURNS-uh, BURNS-uh, BURNS-uh!”

I could not have imagined that a Bollywood rendition of Ring of Fire would go over like a glass of ice water on a singed tongue. Everybody was sweating, the Greek tabla player, Christian Wasdaris, was on fire and, until now, there have been no reports of Johnny rolling over. It was hot. The next thing I knew my friends were demanding a studio version.

I cut Ring Of Fire for fun, unaware that it would ignite a mini-international incident involving diplomacy from participants across Asia, Europe and the U.S. Well? OK! Maybe I’m exaggerating a bit but that’s the way it looked to me...