India, April 24 -- At 41, Thundercat is one of those musicians whose name, or rather whose work, we encounter more often than we realise.

Stephen Lee Bruner, to use his given name, is a bassist, producer, composer and sessions musician from Los Angeles whose prolific collaborations can be hard to keep track of. One may come across him on Kendrick Lamar's landmark To Pimp a Butterfly (2015), one of the defining albums of the last decade. Or through his long association with the producer Flying Lotus, his most constant creative partner.

One may stumble upon his bass line without immediately realising it, as I did when I heard him laying down that striking groove on the title track of Gorillaz's 2023 album, Cracker Island. Or encounter him...