Like most of the best singer-songwriters, Rashmeet Kaur is first and foremost a storyteller. On her 2026 album PARINDA, she narrates a relatable tale that charts the start and end of a relationship—except here, a break-up doesn’t signify failure but rather a sense of liberation. The LP’s eight tunes are, according to Kaur, “about the different phases of love—not just the love we feel for another person but the journey of finding our way back to ourselves.” She titled the project PARINDA, which means “bird”, because of the avian creatures’ association with flight and exploration. “The album begins with a girl falling in love with a complete stranger,” she says, “and slowly takes us through the vulnerability, excitement, longing, confusion, heartbreak, self-realisation and freedom that follow. By the end [of the record], she has gone from falling for someone else to falling back in love with herself.” Since each song represents a specific emotion, she “wanted every track to have its own sound, personality and energy, because love never feels the same at every stage”. As such, the songs are infused with everything from R&B and jazz to electronic music, rock and the Punjabi folk she’s been modernising over the course of her career. “For me,” she notes, “PARINDA is ultimately a story of becoming free—of experiencing love in all its forms, losing yourself somewhere along the way and then discovering that the most important love you can return to is your own.” Here, she takes Apple Music through the making of each track. “Jogi Naal” “[This] is the beginning—that soft, fresh and vulnerable feeling when you see someone for the first time and something inside you shifts.” “Ve Sajjna” “[It’s about] when that feeling grows into missing someone and you begin to realise that you’re actually falling in love.” “Naal Rehja Mere” “The honeymoon phase—playful, cheeky and full of the excitement of discovering that you’re both on the same frequency.” “Banere” “Where he suddenly disappears. The silence becomes almost eerie. There’s a Punjabi saying, ‘Saade tan banere te kaan vi ni bolda’—‘even the crow doesn’t speak from the edge of the roof.’ In ‘Banere’, the silence is so loud that even the crow has stopped coming.” “Kaise Kahoon” “[This song] follows that restlessness and frustration—she has been waiting, hearing different things from different people, and no longer knows what to believe or where he has gone.” “Sahiba” “With ‘Sahiba’, something changes. For the first time, she begins to recognise her own worth. She realises she cannot keep waiting for someone to return—or keep devaluing herself in the process. It’s the moment where she starts choosing herself again, with a more carefree, almost rebellious energy.” “Malang” “The stage after—when the memories still come and go, but the sadness no longer controls her. She has made peace with it. She has almost become friends with her sadness, finding freedom and a little madness in the process.” “Parinda” “The title track and the final release: She lets go completely, sets herself free and begins to fly again. She is no longer waiting for anyone to complete her. She has found her way back to herself.”