It used to be almost 70% India but now it’s more spread out. Right now it’s 50%, maybe a little bit more. What percentage of your fan base is in India? We really like taking folk influences from India and adding that to our own English songs and lyrics. That’s all in English but with influences of hip-hop and electronic music and arrangements of tabla with Indian instrumentation. The EP is six tracks, all in English except for one song, “Be Free” and that’s a South Indian folk song. Lately, we’ve been writing our own English songs to mash it up with an Indian song that already exists. What can we expect from your new EP, Kuthu Fire? The popularity of the song is not important to me. I don’t feel like I have to do the latest cover song or a radio hit. But I’m getting faster at recognizing them. When Shankar and I sit in the studio and do a demo, there have been many mashups that we have come up with that haven’t worked. I look for a song where it’s not super important that the tempo stays the same as the original so it doesn’t change the feeling of the song in any way. You just have to look for the right scale and you have to look if the tempos can be matched up. People think that Indian music and western music aren’t that similar but they actually have quite a lot of common ground. What is the process of creating those like? You’ve really made a name for yourself with your mashups.
It’s very natural for me to sing in English and have a tabla in an arrangement, to have hip-hop beats but sing in Tamil. Music has been my way of expressing what I’ve been feeling. It’s so beautiful and it’s so old and if people can get some exposure to that, I think that would be great. Some of the Indian instruments and that art is so ancient. I think it’s really important to remember where we came from. I joined an Indian dance team there and I got involved in the student organizations that really helped me be more proud of it. The second I went to college, I took a stand. Even thought I really loved Indian music, I always felt like I could never show this to other people and it always used to kill me a little bit inside. Kids would make fun of my lunch and things like that. I always thought if I could bring some of my culture in with modern music that it would be amazing. I always felt the need to find a harmony between the two. But then I’d also be listening to Destiny’s Child and eating pizza. At home, I would be singing Indian music and watching Indian movies and listening to Indian music. It was influenced by how I was brought up. Vidya has been featured in publications such as Billboard, LA Times, Vogue, Elle, NPR, Cosmopolitan, BuzzFeed, The Hindu, Deccan Chronicle and many more.Your music incorporates elements of traditional Indian music into modern electronic and hip-hop. With over 158 million views, one of Vidya’s most successful videos, Be Free, is an original song from Kuthu Fire, mixed with Malayalam folk song 'Pallivaalu Bhadravattakam.' Vidya's mashups have since gained worldwide recognition from the likes of Major Lazer, Diplo & Hrithik Roshan. Vidya has been featured in publications such as Billboard, LA Times, Vogue, Elle, NPR, Cosmopolitan, BuzzFeed, The Hindu, Deccan Chronicle and many more.
Song in vox videos full#
Upon graduation, Vidya took the leap and decided to pursue a music career full time. But it was while she was on a pre-med track at George Washington University that she indulged in her passion for music, and began posting YouTube videos. Vidya’s initial direction was medicine, not music. Since launching her YouTube Channel in 2015 with mashups of Western pop hits and music from her native India, Vidya has amassed over 600 million views and over 6 million subscribers, changing the course of her life in ways she never thought possible. Vidya Vox brings together influences of her Indian-American heritage to create music that is refreshingly unique and contemporary, seamlessly fusing together the intricacies of Indian music with elements of electronic and hip-hop for an undeniably catchy sound.
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