The Perfect Blend: When Chai Met Toast and the Art of Happy, Infectious Music
When Chai Met Toast. Photo: Athul Prasad
Kochi-based multilingual pop-folk band When Chai Met Toast discusses their first Hindi track, upcoming album and connecting with fans amid the pandemic.
Every so often there comes along a track that makes you feel cosy, like a snug blanket in the winter, like hot tea in the rains, and like the cool touch of aloe vera in summer. “Kahaani”, the latest single by Kerala-based band When Chai Met Toast, is one such song released last month. The song’s video, that followed soon after its release, felt just as homely as that combo of chai and toast.
A song about two lovers that were never meant to be, supported by soothing piano and drums in the background, and vocals that break free from the usual loud filmi songs, “Kahaani” is one to listen on loop. What also makes “Kahaani” particularly special is that it is the first, full-length Hindi language track by When Chai Met Toast since the band burst into the indie music scene four years ago.
For the uninitiated, When Chai Met Toast are a multi-lingual pop-folk band from Kochi who have drawn comparisons with rock bands like Mumford and Sons and The Lumineers or singers like John Mayer. In the Indian context, I would liken their feel-good songs and instrumentation to that of Prateek Kuhad and The Local Train. This year, they were also named on Spotify Radar's 'Rising Artists' and YouTube's 'Indian Indie Hotlist'.
Back to “Kahaani”. The quartet has made use of Malayalee, Tamil and English in their songs in the past, also throwing in Hindi sparingly. So, what got them to go all out with a Hindi number? Was it a conscious attempt to tap into the Hindi market?
According to WCMT’s vocalist Ashwin Gopakumar, it wasn't a business strategy. “We have never restricted ourselves to a language,” said Gopakumar. “In ‘Kahaani's’ case, it so happened that the lyrics were first written in English but we all felt that the tune would suit a Hindi song more.”
However, since none of the band members are native Hindi speakers, they roped in singer-songwriter Ankur Tewari of the Hindi rock project Ankur & The Ghalat Family for the lyrics. As for the antecedents of the band, drummer Sailesh G Pai is a Konkani living in Kerala for four generations, keyboard player Palee Francis is a “proper” Keralite, guitarist Achyuth Jaigopal is part-Tulu and part-Tamilian and Gopakumar has Tamil and Malayalee roots.
“Among the four of us, Palee struggles with Hindi.” Said Gopakumar. “He once asked an auto driver to ‘go over’ another auto than ‘go ahead’ in Hindi. That was three years ago! He's improved now.” Gopakumar, who's a polyglot of sorts. He can speak and understand Malayalee, Tamil, Punjabi and Hindi to different degrees.
The collaboration with Tewari has paid off, as fans confess that the song have brought back the bittersweet memories of lost love while also offering them closure. “We used to have a small base on Gaana.com, which has a large listenership for regional music. But since ‘Kahaani’ came out, it’s grown!” said Jaigopal.
Expected to be out by December, When We Feel Young is an autobiographical album of the emotions experienced while growing up. Gopakumar added, “We have all fought with parents, had great time with friends, fallen in love, have her heart broken and made big plans for our future. Listening to these eight songs will make even a 70-year-old feel young again.”
“You won't believe—but Ankur wrote the lyrics on a tissue paper while he was on a flight and sent us a snapshot later,” Gopakumar said. He admitted that he still has that tissue paper somewhere.
WCMT have made more worthy output in their time in lockdown beyond “Kahaani”. The band has been dropping singles off their upcoming debut album When We Feel Young for several months, starting with the peppy dance rock “Maybe I Can Fly”, their nostalgic title track “When We Feel Young”, and “Kahaani”, a ballad.
“Being full-time musicians, we were going from one gig to another, one tour to another,” said Gopakumar. “We were always in a hurry. In that sense, the lockdown came as a blessing. We finally found the time to revisit tunes we had ideated but left half-done slightly more than a year ago, tweak them and release in the best possible manner.”
Expected to be out by December, When We Feel Young is an autobiographical album of the emotions experienced while growing up. Gopakumar added, “We have all fought with parents, had great time with friends, fallen in love, have her heart broken and made big plans for our future. Listening to these eight songs will make even a 70-year-old feel young again.”
While the upbeat vibe of their EPs Joy of Little Things (2017) and Believe (2018) is evident in this album too, there are newer, added elements, too, which are hard to miss. In reference to their first-time use of the electric guitar Charango (the Spanish guitar's little South-American brother), and analogue synthesiser, Jaigopal said that it had all been a part of the band's evolution, “Earlier, our soundscapes were inclined towards folk but When We Feel Young's got more of a pop flourish," he added.
When Chai Met Toast at a past live performance. Photo: Pranav Phogat
According to Jaigopal, the track “Oceantide” was the toughest to put together. “We weren't able to zero in on the musical arrangement,” he said. “We thought this song will never make it but now it's ready to be out in a few weeks.”
“Oceantide” is a light-hearted take on a complicated relationship and was penned down by Jaigopal in English. It also differs a little from “Kahaani” in its mood. “‘Kahaani’ is about acceptance in a mature relationship while Oceantide talks of young love," explained Jaigopal. At 24 years, he is the youngest in the band by six-seven years. “Yes, there is a mini generation gap between me and the rest,” he added with a laugh.
For WCMT, the plan for 2020 was to launch this album and go on promotional tours—but like so many ambitions affected by the pandemic, these plans are out of the cards. The band has instead floated a video series called ‘Nature Tapes’. “The idea is to make an acoustic version of each song, for people who don't like studio sounds,” explained Jaigopal. Take the video for the acoustic version of the track “When We Feel Young,”: shot in the hills of Vagamon in Kerala, amid drizzle and coffee, the boys jam to the song, thumping their chest, snapping their fingers, and imploring you to sing along.
Gopakumar emphasised how fun this session was. “All four of us love petrichor and how beautiful rains in Kerala are. ‘Nature Tapes’ became our way of enjoying harmonies and rains together. Also, it was our first time jamming together since the lockdown. We had done a few online gigs but not in person.”
The experiment has been a hit. The 'Nature Tapes' version of “When We Feel Young” has gathered as many views as the original video—a little short of seven lakhs—and a tweet of appreciation by the music maestro AR Rahman himself. A fan commented: “Leave the world to the chords of a musician, and you've solved so many of the crises!”
“I don't know what we are doing right, to be honest,” said Jaigopal, responding to the overwhelming emotions their songs evoke. “We are simple, happy folks and I think that positivity reflects in our work and connects with our listeners.”
And yet, like any indie music venture in India, it hasn’t all been a smooth rise to fame for WCMT.
“Indie artists don't have the backing of mainstream media such as TV and radio,” said Jaigopal. “We don't have a funding agency. Almost all the money we make from concerts and streaming platforms, we put it back to produce videos. And after doing this, if a song doesn't do well, it's upsetting. But thankfully, the word-of-mouth has kept us going strong.”
Yes, while there are perks of being a multilingual band, there's one little disadvantage too. “It's difficult to break into music shows that are either fully English or Hindi,” said Gopakumar.
Gopakumar, Jaigopal, Pai and Francis' undying pursuit to produce “happy, infectious music” towers over everything else. “As creative artists, we are as different as four corners of the world,” he said. “We fight, we argue but at the end we do what is best for a song. For instance, we had so much disagreement over the sound of “Khoj” (from Believe) but when we finally agreed on the tune, it went on to garner 4.5 million views!”
Gopakumar handles a bit of video production and creative marketing for the band, while Achyuth and Palee oversee the audio production, and Pai takes care of merchandising. Their group dynamics and variety of inspirations have been a key to the band’s longevity. Pai likes prog metal band Tesseract, and Francis looks up to electronic artist Jonathan Hopkins. Together the band shares a likeability for Dhruv Vishwanath, Parvaaz, The 1975, Kodaline, Coldplay, John Mayer and more, diverse sets of artists.
“I am the trouble maker, also the short-tempered one,” said Gopakumar. “Achuyth is the calm, diplomatic, cute-faced boy. He also drives eco-friendly initiatives in the group, such as insisting on the use of reusable, steel water-bottles and straws while touring. Sailesh is a bit like me but methodical and tech-savvy. Palee is a sweet, family guy, who likes to broker peace among us.”
Before the novel coronavirus hit the world, the band were looking to do 60-70 shows in 2020 and make their first international appearance—at the Singapore Grand Prix. Since that did not happen, Achyuth has been using the time-off to do an online degree in Performance Arts from the Berklee College of Music. Palee has been programming music. Sailesh’s been practising a lot of drums while also finishing playing PS4 games and reading up about the space fervently, his twin hobbies. Gopakumar has been studying the creative ways to distribute music and make videos as well as cook and bake.
So far, the band say that they have managed to keep themselves busy—and yet, they are itching to hit the stage soon. “Doing a small concert with a crowd of 50 is not economically viable for us,” said Jaigopal. “So, we will wait. If not this year, then next year.”
No matter when they return, one thing is for certain: there will be a fresh arsenal of new songs from the latest album. Like the band’s latest hit, their fan-base will be hoping for When Chai Met Toast’s kahaani to continue, too.
***
Barkha Kumari is a freelance journalist and a lucid dream blogger from Bangalore. You can follow her on Twitter: @Barkha2803 and Instagram: @rainsnroses.
