New EP by rapper Yashraj merges disco and hip-hop

Yashraj Mehra performs at the pre-launch party of his new EP, Meri Jaan Pehle Naach, in Mumbai

When 24-year-old rapper Yashraj Mehra spotted a shiny cheetah-print shirt in his father's collection while looking for hand-me-downs last year, it naturally called for a moment of mutual banter. "Papa later told me about how Mumbai once had disco haunts where you could wear these to, and dance your heart out. I wondered what that would've felt like," the rapper recalls. After a glitzy '80-themed pre-launch party of his new disco-rap EP, Meri Jaan Pehle Naach, last weekend in the city, we're sure Mehra would've finally found out.

"The EP is a time capsule to the peak of disco music in the '80s. Everything from the sound selection, to the compositions and vocal style is a throwback. People showed up in the best costumes, danced along, sang my verses and just had a great time overall," the artiste tells us over a call after his performance; a phase that he calls ‘a mix of post-show blues and pre-release excitement'.

A moment from a previous performance. Pics Courtesy/Instagram

Mehra's concerts weren't always these larger-than-life, extravagant affairs. If you stepped into Churchgate's Jai Hind College in the late 2010s, you'd see a young, chirpy collegian take stage at annual cultural fests as a theatre actor, rapper, and more often than not, the host of choice for the evening. "Anything that got me on stage really," he laughs, adding, "The stage time that I got in annual college fests as a teenager paved the way for my career in music. Stage fright became non-existent and I could express myself without inhibitions."

While Mehra is a true-blue Mumbaikar who continues to pen verses on his local train commute, a peek into his lyricism hardly gives it away. We nudge him about his refined Hindi in the new EP, sans the typical Bambaiya tone and slang. "Funnily enough, I failed my Hindi exams in school. But I grew up listening to Bollywood melodies from the '50s at home. Hindi was always the language that I formed my thoughts in. And when I sat down to write, I realised that translating them or diluting them would do them great injustice," the Ghatkopar resident explains.

Leading up to the EP however, Mehra reveals that he turned to a different era for inspiration. "The research was extensive. My playlist went from American hip-hop, to classics by RD Burman and Bappi Lahiri, and Western artistes like Tame Impala. The challenge was to recreate the soundscape without sounding gimmicky," Mehra remarks. To see this through, the artiste dons the co-producer's cap on multiple tracks in the 23-minute-long seven-track EP.

One of these tracks is Custom fabric. The two-minute-long track is a complex arrangement of dreamy synths drenched in signature sound effects like flanger and reverb, sprinkled with vocal chops, and what seems to take the backseat here, the artiste's vocals. "That was the idea. The album is more about the compositions and less about rapping. I had to shed my ‘rapper's ego' to let the music take space and step down for a while," he reveals.

With such a drastic change in his style, we ask the artiste if he's ever concerned about committing the cardinal sin of upsetting one's followers in today's age. "I started rapping from my friends' homes, from autorickshaws, and from the humble stages in my college. That's how I got noticed and made it this far. The true fans know that I'm on a journey that doesn't stop at one style or genre," he states.

We wouldn't question the rapper's belief in his plans. In the past three years, the artiste has appeared alongside established names such as Lost Stories, Ritviz, and world #15 American DJ KSHMR. "I looked up to these artistes. I still do. The only difference is that now they're a call away. I haven't had the time to sit and take it all in. With bigger plans on the way and more experiments in the pipeline, I'm not sure when I'll be able to,"
Mehra signs off.

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