Was 2024 the year of India’s regional hip hop movement?

Bandra’s iconic Mehboob Studio is packed with a largely Hindi-speaking crowd. But when Tamil rapper Pal Dabba runs onto the stage – popping, locking et al – to his recent track ‘Kaathu Mela’ in the background, the crowd goes wild. Some fast verses, hands raised in the air, and fast, folky, distinct Tamil tunes enthrall the audience. Shortly afterwards, East India Cypher, a group of five rappers from the Northeast, delivered some powerful bars in Oriya, Bengali and even Mizo, with some English thrown in, before the dancing crowd. Here, language takes a back seat as the lead of the beats and rhythm.

Pal Dabba and East India Cypher were among over 40 Indian rappers from different languages ​​who took to the stage at Spotify’s Rap91 concert in Mumbai recently, a testament to the country’s rapidly growing regional hip hop movement. Indian hip hop has now gone beyond Hindi and Punjabi.

Over the years, India’s linguistic diversity has also been reflected in its growing hip hop culture. While Hindi and Punjabi held firm during the budding years of Indian hip hop, the last few years have seen a clear shift towards regional lyrics and music. In fact, Malayalam and Haryanvi are among the languages ​​that have seen the highest growth in hip hop on Spotify in India in 2023-24. And, based on 2023 Wrapped (a year-long collection of listener data), nearly 30% of the top 50 tracks of 2023 on Spotify in India were hip hop.

language as identity

“Hip hop is inherently a genre that speaks first and foremost about the community in which it originated. For example, in languages ​​like Malayalam and Haryanvi, we have seen artists like Baby Jean and Dhanda Nyoliwala gain popularity beyond their home states. Artists are pushing the boundaries of Indian hip hop with their local sound, dialect and style. So, while listeners may not understand the language or directly connect with the language, the authentic expression of experiences contributes to building the fan base we see,” said Dhruvank, Head of Music and Podcasts, Spotify India. Vaidya says.

Rapper Baby Jean | Photo Credit: Special Arrangement

Regional language rap has started reaching the masses in the last few years, with breakout songs like ‘Up To You’ by Haryanvi artiste Dhanda Nyoliwala, ‘Malabari Banger’ by Malayalam rapper Dabji and ‘Tambadi Chambdi’ by Marathi artistes Shreyas and Kratex. Their specific audience.

Rapping in your mother tongue is the most authentic form of expression. For rapper Big Deal, who was born in Puri to an Odia father and a Japanese mother, and was raised by his Odia uncle and aunt in Darjeeling, the language soon became a gateway to understanding the world.

Although he started his hip hop journey in English, his first EP was full of Odia (few words actually), which created a listener base in Odisha for the first time. That’s when Big Deal realized this could be a way he could speak directly to his people. She wrote extensively about her parents’ meet-cute love story, years of bullying because of the way she looked, and identity politics.

East India Cypher in display

“I have been rapping in Odia for seven years. I talk to the youth. It’s all about the pulse of the public,” he says. While he raps in the dialect he grew up with, Big Deal points to the Sambalpuri dialect of Oriya, which is now extremely popular among rappers.

So, do artistes have to fine-tune their vocabulary to keep up with the times and connect with the emerging audiences? “When it comes to rapping, you have to have a grasp on the language. Reading and listening is very important to improve your vocabulary so that you can express yourself better. that goes without saying. I have an English-to-Oriya dictionary that I use a lot,” Big Deal says with a laugh.

Rapper Baby Jean, a resident of Ponnani, a seaside town in Malappuram, Kerala, found solace only when he started writing Malayalam. He says that coming into the mainstream is a victory, but it should not come at the cost of remaining independent. Now, a household name in the Malayalam film industry, which has embraced hip hop with much pomp and show in the last year, Baby Jean’s distinctive baritone and lyrics that are very heavy on slang are what set him apart. His track ‘Kayi’ has received 1.1 million views on YouTube Music at the time of writing and has reached a global audience through Instagram Reels.

All eyes are on the south

While rapping in Hindi and English is largely considered easy due to the many permutations and combinations of rhymes, rapping in languages ​​like Oriya is difficult.

MC Cooper says, “People think it’s very hard to rap in Malayalam. I think that’s probably true for a lot of people, but that perspective is redundant. There is a large amount of colloquialism in mainstream Malayalam music. Wasn’t invented. Now we’re going through this phase where it feels like a kind of cultural explosion because people are taking the medium and running with it.

Baby Jean adds, “At a time when Punjabi rap was dominant, many of our songs gained recognition not only pan India, but across the world. The South is definitely getting more powerful! The genre is global, and even labels are now looking at it as a worldwide market,” he adds.

He mainly credits social media for this spread, especially because most of his audience discovers music there. This, he says, is true for mainstream film music as well. It’s true, Dhruvank says, that core hip hop fans are highly engaged, not only through streaming their favorite artists’ music, but also through connecting with artists on social media, creating content, and showing support for live performances. Live.

Pal Dabba started writing verses on YouTube beats in 2020 during the pandemic. “I posted them on Instagram, and they went viral. That’s when things really started moving,” the rapper recalls. By then he remembers retreating to the last line during college lectures to experiment with changing the verses of existing Tamil songs.

sail box

“Independent rap artists are delivering hit after hit, and this has opened up a lot of potential for regional hip hop. It’s gotten huge, and I think it’s only going to get bigger from here,” he says. Like Kerala, the Tamil film industry has also actively adopted hip hop music.

“Marathi hip-hop has just started going mainstream. With its rich cultural roots and growing popularity, I believe Marathi music has the potential to become the next big trend like Punjabi music,” says Pune-based Marathi rapper MC Gavathi. His track ‘Nambarakari’ topped the charts in both Mumbai and Pune upon its release. “Rapping in Marathi gives me the freedom to explore its rich cultural depth and diverse expressions, allowing me to experiment with words and intonations.” He believes that its blend with Western hip-hop elements makes his style unique. Outside Maharashtra, the top cities for their listeners in India are Bengaluru and Hyderabad. Jamshedpur-based Bhojpuri rapper Rajmusic has listeners from Mumbai, Delhi, Pune and Bengaluru.

New year, new verse

So what can we expect in the coming year? Will listening trends tilt towards hip hop in 2025? While Indian hip hop is skewed towards a young, predominantly male audience, there is hope for a change in this. “As genres become more mainstream, the average listener becomes less niche,” he says.

Additionally, Marathi, Gujarati and Urdu are some of the Indian languages ​​that have shown promising growth, says Dhruvank.

“English hip hop artists from India also have the potential to grow. With the global success of Indian artists like Hanumankind and Karan Aujla, there are likely to be more Indian-international artist collaborations in the coming years,” says Dhruvank. A$AP Rocky has already announced his appearance on the remix of ‘Big Dogs’ with Hanumankind.

While Indian hip hop has already made a place for itself on the global stage, the spread of region and language-specific rap beyond its niche audience looks promising. Well, independent rap is here to stay.

As MC Cooper says, “Every street here has different stories and this country, whether good or bad, is a place that has all the ingredients to create artists who can blow people’s minds.”