The Sanskrit in ARTBAT's Tabu

Not one single canonical mantra, but a weaving of mantra fragments with a clear gravitational center.

The core: Dvadasakshara Mantra

ॐ नमो भगवते वासुदेवाय Om Namo Bhagavate Vasudevaya

A famous 12-syllable (dvadasha-akshara) Vaishnava mantra, one of the most important in the tradition, associated with Vishnu/Krishna liberation practice. It appears in the Bhagavata Purana and is still widely chanted today.

The song uses this as its spine, then expands it with additional epithets:

Nandagopa Kumaraya (son of Nanda the cowherd)
Govindaya (one who gives joy to the cows/earth/senses)
Krishnaya (Krishna)
Devaki Nandanaya (joy of Devaki)

So it functions more like a stuti, a devotional hymn built around the core mantra, layering on names the way you'd garland a deity.

Line by line

ॐ नमो (Om Namo) Om, I bow / I surrender.

ॐ नमो भगवते (Om Namo Bhagavate) Om, I bow to the Divine One. Opening of the Dvadasakshara mantra.

नन्दगोप कुमाराय गोविन्दाय नमो नमः (Nandagopa Kumaraya Govindaya Namo Namah) Salutations again and again to the son of Nanda the cowherd, to Govinda.

कृष्णाय वासुदेवाय देवकी नन्दनाय च (Krishnaya Vasudevaya Devaki Nandanaya cha) To Krishna, son of Vasudeva, and to the one who brought joy to Devaki.

The relational thread

It's a cascade of names and relationships. Krishna is identified through his bonds: son of this father, joy of this mother, foster child of this cowherd. Identity rooted in love and lineage rather than abstract theology.

Sacred sound in a club context

ARTBAT placing this in an electronic music context is a modern instance of sacred sound as vibration, where the meaning becomes almost secondary to the resonance. This is philosophically consistent with how mantras are understood in the tradition itself: the sound carries the energy, not just the semantic content.

The core: Dvadasakshara Mantra

Line by line

The relational thread

Sacred sound in a club context

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