‘Bollywood needs Hindi rap songs’

Singer-rapper Baba Sehgal is making news for his latest musical offering — Mumbai City — a song that he insists, is a musical rendition of the city’s trademark style. “It’s a dark, hip hop track — the kind of genre I specialise in,” says Sehgal. With lyrics like Mumbai city hai, khoka peti hai… Sehgal says that the song puts in words, the essence of the city — traffic, hard work, fast life, travelling, street food, party and nightlife culture, glamour, etc.

The song Mumbai City comes after a long hiatus during which Sehgal was busy making music down South. “I prefer working in the South. It’s more professional there… like you decide a song and it’s done and out in the next two months… the coordination is good,” says Sehgal who has done playback singing for several Kannada and Tamil films. “Bollywood, however, is difficult. But yes, now that I’ve established myself as a playback singer in the South, I’m getting more of Bollywood offers,” he adds.

Sehgal, who has been tagged as the man who popularised hip hop in India, feels, “We need to make space for Hindi rap in Bollywood. It’s so odd that we are embracing hip hop and rap from the west.. even film songs now have these segments of rap, but then it’s all English. Why can’t we have total desi rap songs!”

Taking his passion for hip hop further, the singer is now all set to open a hip hop academy in Hyderabad in the next two months. “It will be called Baba Sehgal Academy of Hip Hop, affiliated to a New York-based rap school. I want to cover all four aspects of hip hop — graffiti, B-boying, DJing and rapping,” says Sehgal. And why did he choose Hyderabad over Mumbai? “I have a set up in Hyderabad. Moreover, finding a place in Mumbai is difficult and expensive. I want to promote desi rap. People need to know that rapping is not all about dressing up in baggy clothes and going ‘yo yo..everybody put your hands up in the air…’ it is a serious art form in itself,” he concludes.