VIVAN is a Music Producer, Composer, Singer & Songwriter from New Delhi, India. His main genres are EDM, Bedroom Pop / Hip Hop, Chillwave and Ambient. He lives his musical journey with one motto “Music will either MAKE me or BREAK me, but I LOVE MUSIC and that makes it OK.”

Q: What first inspired you to pursue music and how has that inspiration evolved over time?

A: I was a shy kid in high school and did not have much confidence in myself. Being a kid I felt a bit lost in my new school! However I loved singing and I loved the drums and all types of percussion instruments, so being from India and being in a Indian boarding school, I had a lot of time on my hands to try some new instruments and I immediately took to the Indian an Indian percussion instrument known as the Tabla. I also sang some Indian classical songs for my school choir and that gave me an extremely strong foundation for Indian composition and Indian music. 

Every Saturday night, we would have a movie night in School and I remember “that thing you do” which is a movie starring Tom Hanks just came out. It was really popular internationally and in my school, and I loved the song in the movie, which is also called that thing you do. I found the drummer in the movie really cool! The way he was playing the drums and the song was so catchy and cool to me!  So I wanted to play some drums as well, since I was already learning the tabla at the time. 

At the same time my school Western band were looking for a drummer and they wanted to do the same song and they didn’t have a drummer so I volunteered and that’s how I played my first song. I bought some shades 😎 like the drummer had in the movie and it was a defining moment for me because I still remember when we started the track for everybody during a performance, I was really nervous and I was playing the song too fast and my Western band leader at the time told me to calm down and we started it again, and it was such a success! The crowd went crazy, and I remember this feeling in my stomach. It was like butterflies and I felt like I was flying! 

I told myself that I never wanna lose this feeling, and I fell in love with Music right there, and then, during that performance.

Q: Can you walk us through your creative process when writing, or composing a new piece?

A: My creative process for making a song is always emotion and a feeling that I’m going through at that point of time that I want to express. There is no formula for it in my mind. When I feel a certain way, I try to put it into a song in my head and that’s where it all begins. I then try to remember the tune that I’m thinking about, I try to channel the feeling and make sure to record it on a piece of paper. Nowadays, I just record it on my phone as a voice note and that becomes the main foundation for the idea because all musicians will tell you that these ideas disappear after you lose your train of thought. So I always prioritise trying to record or write down the emotion in the song idea at the time because I know it’ll go away and then later on when I’m in the studio, I go through those notes and capture that emotion again, and then I start putting it into notes on a synthesiser, into some vocals and that’s the beginning of my process.

I have no hard and fast rule about how to do it. I just let the music take me wherever it goes. It’s like I’m on a journey as well while making a song, and I have no idea where I’m going to end up, but I normally end up somewhere and with something that I like!

Q: Which artists, or genres have had the biggest influence on your sound and why?

A: My high school was in the late 90s, you know where daft punk had come out with their album with amazing  tracks like “around the world”, Fatboy Slim had come out with an album called “You’ve Come A Long Way, Baby” and  “the fat of the land” by Prodigy.  I’m sure high school kids from the 90s will know what I’m talking about! These artists were the pioneers of dubstep,  EDM, house and dance music which are so popular today.

Also hip-hop music at the time was really coming into its own own with artists like Dr. Dre and Snoop Dogg, so in my formative years, it was trance music, hip-hop, house music, Fatboy Slim and Daft punk with the foundation of EDM!  

These artists really inspired my Music preferences and genres which I now work in along with my background in Indian classical music and Indian percussion. I visualised a fusion of sorts where I use these international Sounds and add beautiful Indian elements into it to make a whole new kind of sound, which nowadays would identify as LoFi EDM and lo-fi hip-hop music. 

I also like to sing more than rap, so I basically ended up with this mixed genres of hip-hop, EDM Indian R&B music. Sounds like a kind of Mixed Curry Stew! 😆 

But it’s a tasty musical stew I assure you. 😎

Q: What has been the most challenging moment in your musical journey so far and how did you overcome it?

A: I think there hasn’t been a single challenging moment with Music, but what has been challenging with it is the expectation I had from Music as a career. 

Earlier on with Music I thought I would get signed by label as a professional, have money and fame, a kids dream for music. I have grown older and visor now! I have realised that the chance of that Dream is like finding a needle in a haystack, and that is not a realistic expectation to have with Music. 

Music is a journey where you get to know yourself,  a lot like when you age and you learn about life. Music is like a friend that teaches you those hard lessons in life, and with that pain and disappointment, with that hardship, your music also changes. It evolves with you and in my opinion becomes better. Having said that, my expectation with Music now isn’t so much the fame of becoming a big superstar. Of course, that would be great if it happens, but that’s like winning the lottery. 

Music is like the second love of my life. The first one of course, is my beautiful wife, my first great love!❤️ 

Music is an expression of yourself, and if in the process of being able to make good Music, it makes you happy, that in itself is a beautiful thing. It is an art form now that is very easily accessible for you to make people listen to; with all the many multiple streaming platforms there are and with all the provisions that are there now to be an independent artist, the goal of releasing music is very real for everyone! 

These is a very promising thing. You can actually make Music a living for yourself , which is something you couldn’t do back then maybe 10-15 years ago. Now you can actually make a decent and very comfortable living with Music, but make sure that you do Music for the right reasons, and when I understood this, I overcame a lot of disappointment that I faced earlier on in my Musical journey and my career. 

Low and behold when you start thinking about this in the right way, good things start happening, which has been happening for me in the last few years with Music and it’s just the beginning for me and I’m not a kid anymore. I’m not even a young adult anymore, but I am a musician, music producer and making good music makes me happy. 

I think that’s the biggest takeaway for my Music and this journey, which is getting to know myself and having a healthier and more understanding relationship with Music. 

Q: What message, or emotion do you hope listeners take away from your music?

A: If my Music brings listeners happiness, if it makes them think, and feel inspired and hopeful for the future and for their lives, then I’m doing something right with my Music.

I want my Music to make listeners channel an emotion that they want to keep feeling or take them away from a painful emotion that’s bringing them down. 

I want my music to make them happy to spend time with themselves because in this life, you come into it alone, and you will go alone, but maybe my Music can help you have the right mindset for that part of your journey, which is the same for all of us in this beautiful world. 

Thank you for your time. Thank you for reading about my musical journey! 

I will end this with a phrase that I say for all musicians that feel the way I feel about music which is – “music will make me or break me. But I love Music and that makes it okay”.

Follow VIVAN: https://push.fm/fl/vivan