The debut album from Santa Cruz-based drummer Keshav Batish, 2021's dynamic Binaries in Cycle, is a cohesive blend of hard-driving post-bop and Indian Classical Traditions. As the son of sitar virtuoso Pandit Ashwin Batish and grandson of singer Shiv Dayal Batish, Batish grew up surrounded by Hindustani and North Indian Classical music. He played sitar and tabla from a young age, eventually discovering jazz and settling on the drum set as his main instrument. A graduate of the University of California Santa Cruz, Batish brings all of his varied experience to bear in his quartet, which features pianist Lucas Hahn, bassist Aron Caceres, and Israeli-born alto saxophonist Shay Salhov. The album was recorded during the height of the COVID-19 pandemic at Santa Cruz's Kuumbwa Jazz Center as part of their virtual performance series. Consequently, there's an urgency and raw intensity to the group's playing that feels as if they are reaching out to their audience and trying to make an emotional connection. Batish plays with a deft, often light touch that recalls the work of veterans like Paul Motian as much as contemporary luminaries like Brian Blade. Similarly, both Salhov and Hahn are adventurous improvisers whose playing nicely brings to mind the work of artists like Kenny Garrett and Geri Allen. Batish's originals are propulsive and harmonically nuanced, displaying the edgy tonalities and motivic influence of John Coltrane. There's also a sense that as a queer artist of color, Batish is pulling together the disparate threads that make up his identity. It's a vibrant combination best represented on his original pieces like "Count Me In" and "Wingspan," dazzling modal songs that crash and shatter like glass tidal waves on a rocky shore. He also reveals his deep sense of the jazz tradition, dipping into Thelonious Monk's rambling "We See" and transforming Ornette Coleman's "Police People" into a buoyant raga dance party anchored by his and Caceres' thick droning interplay. With Binaries in Cycle, Batish impressively balances his jazz and Indian Classicial influences, crafting an intensely colorful aural world view.