- Vidushaan on his music, band and more
Vidushaan told Brunch that in 2020, when he founded Est4Lyf, he created this band with the intention of creating a platform for all rappers/artists within the eastern part of the province. “Through Est4Lyf, I invested in creating music with these artists and marketing it on digital platforms to help create a Tamil hip hop culture in Sri Lanka that is non-existent at the moment,” he shared.
He is also the first Srilankan Tamil music composer to release a single under Sony Music South in 2012 along with IBP studios, Malaysia. He’s currently working on his new album under Jaya Records, Serandip music group.
In conversation with Brunch, he told us that music has always been a part of his life: “From a very young age, watching my mom and uncle sing for the church choir grew my interest in music and I started singing along with them.” He added that this continued into his school career, when his idols and teachers Sangeetha Poosanam Jeeva Joseph and Latha Jayakumar, helped him discover his musical talent and encouraged him to participate in school events such as Tamil Day and English Day in order to hone his skills further. He also participated in an islandwide singing competition and was awarded first place three times: “Through participating in these competitions, I gained more musical exposure and an interest in continuing music as a full-time career as a full-time career.”
In 2012, he composed the song Oneside with playback singer Sathya Pragash and later in 2015, he collaborated with playback singer Santhosh Hariharan and composed the song Lucky Anthem. That same year, combining with Malaysian artist, Ramnath rnb, he released three songs in the album Vanthuvidu, under Sony Music South.
Vidushaan also performed at Malaysian Moksha, MMU events in 2014. Aside from that, he has also performed at Singapore Sense Club in 2015. In the years 2016, 2018, and 2019, he told us he performed at the Revolution show which is conducted by Redbull India.
Challenges
When asked if he ever had to face any challenges and how he overcame them, he explained that one of the main challenges he faced in the music industry was the lack of musical exposure in Sri Lanka, specifically Batticaloa at the time.
He told us that even though being the first ever rapper in Batticaloa was an honour, it also came with more challenges than he anticipated, because no one before him knew what mixing and mastering, producing or any aspect of music that further the quality of the sound. “Because we didn’t know how to up the quality of music, despite having good lyrics and melody, when I sent the samples of the songs to media agencies they rejected it because it lacked quality,” he shared. As a beginner in the independent music stream, it was exceedingly difficult to get local radio stations and music channels to play the songs, so it was a struggle to gain credit as well as an audience for his songs.
Working from scratch, Vidushaan told us that he struggled with creating a name for himself, creating an audience, and gaining exposure to develop his talent. “After 10 years of constant struggles and challenges, I have finally been able to create an audience for myself as well as create a lot more music,” he commented, adding that his two recent releases, Kassu and Naan Oru Muttalunga, have both crossed 100,000 views.
What’s next?
Taking a quick glance at his social media, he has over 35,000 followers on Instagram filled with a worldwide audience from Sri Lanka, India, Malaysia, Singapore, and Europe.
He now has over 9,000 followers on his Facebook page and he informed us that Jaya Records is currently working on handling the verification process for it. On YouTube, his two recent songs Kassu and Naan Oru Muttalunga have hit 155,000 and 102,000 views, respectively. Apart from Facebook and Instagram, he has songs with over 100,000 listens on SoundCloud.
In recent times, more platforms have been introduced in Sri Lanka that have definitely helped in growing the reach of his songs, such as Spotify. However, what continues to be a struggle for someone who chooses music as a full-time career is the financial aspect, as it is very difficult to find producers and gain royalties/revenues from songs that get broadcast on TV or the radio.
Currently, he is working under the music label of Jaya Records to release many of his songs on several digital streaming platforms such as Apple Music and Spotify. Within the next 10 years, he hopes to have established a Tamil hip hop culture in Sri Lanka, hosted several live-in concerts, and had approximately 100 rappers represent the country with millions of views and streams.
Instagram: @vidushaanofficial