Jwala Shine On

How a young collective of bedroom music producers are providing a platform for India’s growing electronic music scene

- Anurag Tagat

BEYOND MEMES AND PORNOGRAPHY, turns out young kids would like to get on the Internet to find a way to make music. With digital audio workstations ripped and cracked, hundreds of hours of YouTube tutorials and sometimes, access to free samples and beats, bedroom producers have infused a much-needed quality in alternative/electronic music that was dangerously close to becoming generic.

Part of the pack and among the most prolific are Jwala, comprising seven artists from Pune, Mumbai and New Delhi. What brings them all together? Mumbai-based Brij Dalvi aka zzz and part of Three Oscillators, says, “Memes? Rants? The fact that we all get little to no sleep? Somewhere in between all this lies the answer.” Nikunj Patel aka Moebius also adds, “A healthy dose of not giving a fuck for the most part.” Jwala did seem to take root due to what they saw around them. New Delhi-based Ayush Jajoria says, “The first thing that bounded us together to make a collective together that and our cohesive distress of the way the scene works.”