My fascination towards music began around the age of 7 or 8. Around that time my brother had gifted me my first Paul Van Dyk CD, “Seven Ways”. Then on began a endless journey and a thirst for sound that could never be quenched. My fascination for electronic music was something that I can’t explain. In times where people were stuck on U2, Coldplay, and Sting, or probably stay true to the classics from Led Zeppelin and Oasis, I was stuck to Schiller, Sasha, Deep-Dish, Ferry Corsten and Paul Oakenfold.
A few years later people club culture started peaking in India. I was excited about this even at the age of 14-15, expecting house music from Way-out-west and probably end the night with a couple of tracks from Tiesto, only to be met with disappointment. The 2000’s were hit by Hip-Hop culture. Hip-Hop (not to be confused with Rap, if you know what I mean). Yes not the club-culture I was hoping for. In fact clubs turned into something of an american inspired culture with 16 year olds managing their way in and attempting to swing to some Ne-Yo and 50-cent wearing their baseball hats and pretending to dawn swagger. I reverted back to staying at home and checking out videos from events in Ibiza and Miami featuring Luciano, Carl Cox, Armin Van Buuren and praying that one day I could be a part of something that big.
Fast forward to 2014. India is now one of the biggest markets for electronic dance music. We have over 4-5 festivals around the festive season with a ton of variety. From the big commercially popular names appearing for Sunburn, to the musical purists that turn up for Vh1 Supersonic & Nh7 weekender. We even have a festival for underground deep/tech music called “Krank”. Things have certainly changed. I have myself been to Goa in december 4 times in the last 3 years just to attend a festival by day and go out and explore music in different parts of the city by night. Goa is certainly a hot-spot for electronic music being the birthplace for psychedellic trance and harbouring talent from progressive and deep genres of dance music. Be it the clubs you hit here or the beach parties around Anjuna and Vagator. Things had changed.
Infact even in cities like mumbai and delhi, where clubs had hip-hop and R&B to which 16-17 year olds got pretentious and swayed too, now these clubs blast progressive & electro house music, maintaing a crowd control. Not that I have anything against other genres of music, in fact i am a rock and rap enthusiast. It is just that electronic music creates a sense of euphoria and generates and energy that helps people let loose and break free for a few years.
Being a Mumbai resident, travelling to major cities like Delhi, Pune, Jaipur, Hyderabad and Banglore (a personal favourite cause of it’s musical taste), even heading to Bangkok, and KaulaLampur on the occasional holiday or on business, i realise Asia has been in transition. A complete evolution in the music scene with the world craving for artists like Eric Prydz, Avicii, Deadmau5 and many more. I still do hope to head to Ibiza and Miami in the near future, but at the moment I am satisfied as things have evolved and i don’t have to go miles away for the music I love, it is now convenient do to the number of facilities and firms involved in the production of such festivals, events and live acts.
Certainly a welcome change, something that i have been yearning for, when I was barely standing at 3 feet and could only fantasise about the amazing world of music beyond the horizons.