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Innately Indian, but globally accessible, the latest album from Emmy award-winning musician and producer Aakash Ravi Krishnan is unlike anything the Indian Hip Hop scene has heard of late. As a multi-instrumentalist and a talented sound producer, the sixteen song album was completely produced, recorded, mixed and mastered by AAKASH and features the most iconic rappers and MCs of Mumbai. Featuring various languages, music styles and inspirations, Over Seas is a fresh take for Indian Hip-Hop featuring songs that range from chill lounge mixes to heavy anthems.
A life lived in music
Growing up in a musical family where he listened to music across all genres. Through his shaping years, he listened to music that ranged from Backstreet Boys to Megadeath and as he started to enjoy and appreciate the art of music, he taught himself how to create music, in addition to appreciating it. Learning drums and guitar during his adolescence, he became part of many a cover bands and slowly started to create his own beats and compositions.
The real turning point for Aakash happened when he went to Indiana for his college. While he initially started studying mechanical engineering, he found his true calling in Sound Design. During his time in college, he discovered jazz as both a lifestyle and genre. Listening and learning from the greats of the genre such as Miles Davis and Herbie Hancock, Aakash started to learn keys and was soon playing shows around his college and surrounding states.
EMMY and life afterward
A major turning point in Aakash’s music career was being part of ‘Finding Home: Indiana at 200’. Bringing together 30 writers who traced the history of the state on the occasion of its bicentennial celebration, the project was The Indian Repertory Theatre’s gift to the state. As one of the sound engineers of this project, Aakash worked with the production and post-production and received an EMMY for this work.
After the EMMY, Aakash moved to Mumbai with the intent of making a name for himself internationally. His initial months in Mumbai were spent practicing his instruments and creating new beats. Fortuitously, he watched the movie Gully Boy around the same time and was introduced to the world of Mumbai Hip-Hop, something that he was unaware of till then. After experiencing Gully Boy, Aakash reached out to MC Altaf via Instagram and introducing himself, his music and wondering if he would like to collaborate and Aakash recounted, “Within a week he and D’Evil had come over to my home studio with a finished song ready to record. However, I played them a beat that I had made when they were on the way to the session. They ended up tracking it on the spot and the hit song Wazan Hai was born. After that session, I thought of reaching out to the dopest MCs and artists that were on my kind of vibe in order to make an album.”
Reaching out to the rest of the Nation’s best MCs through Instagram and creating more beats, Aakash got down to work creating the album after this. While he already had a bunch of beats he wanted to put out, if the artist wanted something from scratch, he created new ones with their intent in mind. In the duration of 5 months, Aakash had made 16 full songs, completely recorded, produced, mixed and mastered by him. The subsequent after that was spent learning Graphic Design and 3D Animations on Youtube for the purpose of creating his own promo videos and album art that matched his vision for the project.
While it was hard to top the incident of winning an EMMY, Aakash had set out to drop the album before turning 26 in September and with Over Seas that released on September 1, he realized this dream. He went on to say, “It’s a blessing to have created a new genre of Indian Hip-Hop and to see it being loved and responded very well to is the cherry on top. I didn’t expect the album to relate to people the way it does, but I’m super grateful for it all. I hope it inspires other producers and artists to take a more melodic, musical and global approach to make Hip-Hop beats.”
When asked about his favorite work, Aakash mentioned that it is one of the many unreleased works that he has. But from the released album, the song ‘Guzarish’ that features his friend and talented vocalist Sahir Nawab would be his pick. Mixing folk/fingerstyle guitar with R&B/Trap, he created a beat that is dreamy and is complemented by the rap by Sahir.
Following up with the album, Aakash hopes to do a live performance of the album at The Habitat in Mumbai. Featuring the most iconic Mumbai Hip hop artists and doing a full show with live drums will be his first step into planning an all India tour of the album. While he has realized two very big dreams before hitting the age of 26, Aakash hopes to continue connecting with game-changing artists with new school sounds in order to deliver his sound to bigger audiences. In this regard, he hopes to work with Bollywood giants such as AR Rahman, Amit Trivedi, or Shankar- Ehsaan- Loy and do something more than hip hop, perhaps create Bollywood ballads and hits. Outside of India, the musician hopes to head back to Indiana and finish some of his unfinished projects as well as dive deeper into the Los Angeles music industry game.
You can find the debut album ‘Over Seas’ by Aakash on Spotify and stay tuned to Aakash and his musical endeavors through his Instagram.
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