Where are you currently based?
Hey! I’m originally from a city called Pune in India, but am currently based in Los Angeles.
How did you first start playing music?
The first time I really got into Western music in general was when I was 14 (Having grown up in India, I wasn’t exposed to western music initially). My dad played me Smoke on the water by Deep Purple and I was hooked right from the first time I heard the main riff. From there onwards, I got my parents to buy me a guitar and kept exploring the world of classic rock music, learning songs by Led Zeppelin, Pink Floyd, Eric Clapton and all the other legendary bands and musicians of that era. That’s what help set and build my strong foundation in music. I then started playing in bands locally, writing original music and started experimenting with electronic music production. I found that by applying all the musical concepts I had learnt through classic rock music to my new production skills and writing originals on them, I was really onto finding my sound. I decided to then move to Los Angeles in 2016 to test the waters in the global music scene. Ever since then I’ve been constantly writing, releasing and performing my music and have been growing constantly both as a musician and an artist. Can’t wait to see what’s in store for the future.
What’s been happening recently and how has your Covid experience been so far?
Initially when Covid hit and the world went into a lockdown, I too panicked like the rest of the world and was uncertain as to how long it would last and how I would cope with everything. However, as time passed, I realized that since I was home all day, I could really focus on creating and finishing my existing songs. It also challenged me and got me to push myself into really getting creative. In order to still stay proactive as a music artist, I had to figure out ways to make quality content (both audio and video) right from my home. This is when I started experimenting with vlogging, making loop music videos from my home, using green screen and animation videos. I learnt a lot in the past year and developed a lot of new skills and 2020 turned out to be one of the more successful years for me as an artist in terms of growing my fan base, social media and streaming numbers. But I really hope the world goes back to normal especially with all the vaccines coming in as I have a lot of new music and videos dropping that I want to test out in live crowds.
Your new single ‘Olivia’ is out now, what influenced the sound and songwriting?
Olivia is about a girl (not named Olivia) I met a couple years ago and immediately fell for her. There was just some intense sense of familiarity I felt with her and was absolutely hooked onto her. It was too soon to communicate exactly how I felt about her as we had only just met a week prior so I decided to put all feelings down in a song and the result was the song ‘Olivia’. Me and her only lasted about a month and a half but the song has helped me with courting a lot of other women haha.
How did you go about writing Olivia?
The goal was pretty clear to me. I wanted to pour all my feelings for the girl out in the song but more importantly accurately convey why I felt so strongly about her. I wanted to bring forth the instant sense of familiarity I felt with her. She never felt like a stranger even though we had only recently met which is what made me keep exploring with chords until I came up with the warm and pretty progression that I wrote the song over. Then came the time to write the lyrics down. I wanted to put forth my feelings softly, subtly yet effectively and had to make sure I wasn’t coming on to strong with my words and phrasing choices as I had to create a warm and light vibe rather than a powerful one which took me a while of going back and forth on the lyrics till I had the finals words penned down. I also made sure I sang the song in a soft falsetto once again to make sure the aura I was trying to set and the feelings I was trying to convey were brought out accurately.
Where and when did you record/produce/master and who with?
I write, perform, produce, record, mix and master my songs all by myself. The whole goal I have with my music is for the listeners to hear my songs exactly how I intend them to. I feel in today’s world, renting a professional studio, hiring producers, engineers isn’t necessary. It could be beneficial but isn’t necessary. I make all my songs in my home studio setup and see them all the way through; from the initial idea and inspiration to the final product. I feel the lesser people involved in the process of creating a song the more the song stays true to its creator’s original vision.
How did you approach the recording/production process?
Once I had the song written down and the chords finalized and laid down. I brought the project onto my loop station setup in my home studio and just started experimenting with adding and subtracting elements to and from the song. I started building layers, adding synths, drums and percussion and the song process was pretty straightforward. The coolest part was creating the little catchy hook that really drives the song. I was exploring a lot of vocal formant change effects and came up with a really nice melody to use with the effects and create sort of a mellow, positive drop section and I’m really proud of it haha.
Who are you listening to at the moment?
Honestly, thanks to Spotify, I have been discovering a lot of indie underground artists that I’ve really enjoyed listening to. Most recently, I got exposed to Josh Fudge, Julyan amongst several others. I’ve been straying away from all the popular music and have been really into exploring new artists and finding inspiration in their music and talent. I feel these underground independent artists have more soul and originality in their music that most of the major artists have been lacking.
What do you like to do away from music?
When not making music, I love to read books, I like to drink beer and play pool with my friends, I have really gotten into cooking recently, but most of all I love playing with my dog.
What’s planned for 2021?
I’ve got a bunch of new songs and music videos coming out this year that I’m super stoked for. The next one to watch out for would be my song ‘Lead Me On’ that’s dropping on the 7th of May. I’m really excited to see what feedback I get on that. Other than releasing music, I plan to play a bunch of live shows and pop up events locally with my band once all the venues start opening up and the live music scene hopefully gets back to how it was before the pandemic hit.
Favourite food and place to hangout?
My favourite food place in Los Angeles has to be Dave’s Hot Chicken. There are so many good food places and restaurants to explore in LA but I freakin love Dave’s and could eat it every day if I wanted haha. Other than that, I love hanging out with my friends at this low-key pub called ‘The Brickyard’. We go there every weekend to kick it with a few beers and play pool.
Instagram – www.instagram.com/
Youtube – https://www.youtube.
Official Website – www.flyghtclubmusic.
Facebook – https://www.
Twitter – https://twitter.com/
TikTok – https://vm.tiktok.com/
Spotify – https://open.spotify.com/
Apple Music – https://music.apple.com/us/
