Here's why rapper Emiway Bantai remains independent

Emiway Bantai

The genesis of Bilal Shaikh's journey towards becoming Emiway Bantai - arguably the most popular Indian independent hip-hop artiste who isn't signed to a label - lies in an incident that took place when he was in Class 10. This was about nine years ago. The Antop Hill resident hadn't been exposed to any rap music till then.

There was no hip-hop community in his area to speak of, like there was in the gullies of Dharavi or pockets of Goregaon. So, when a few peers sitting behind him in class started singing Eminem's Not Afraid, it was a completely new sound for him. So much so, that his innocent question - "Who's Eminem?" - was met with laughs of derision.

Emiway Bantai at a recording studio when he started his career

Undaunted, the youngster went back home and turned the TV on, switching the channel to VH1. And coincidentally, the first track that played on screen was Not Afraid. "I watched that video and then logged on to YouTube to find out more about Eminem and what he does. Then, I watched one of his live concerts online, where he surfaces in front of the audience from below the stage and the crowd goes absolutely wild. And that's when I thought, 'Apne ko bhi aisa kuchh karneka hai,'" he says, ahead of his debut live tour later this week, spanning Pune, Gurgaon and Mumbai.

The result was that for the next two years, he immersed himself in the music of the Slim Shady hit-maker and that of Li'l Wayne. He was educating himself about the linguistic wordplay of rap poetry in the process. And when the time came for him to choose a stage moniker, it followed that he decided on "Emiway" - a compound name borrowed from those of his two main idols - adding "Bantai", meaning "dude" in Bambaiyya Hindi, to the mix to give himself more street cred. Finally, he felt ready to publish material, releasing a track called Glint Lock in 2014, aged only 18.

This debut offering, though, met with a lukewarm response. The aesthetics of the underlying beats had an unmistakable Eminem influence. But the problem might have lied in the fact that the Mumbai rapper chose to express himself in English, a language that seemed dissonant to the subject matter of his lyrics. It was then that his father suggested that he switch to Hindi. Emiway tells us, "See, Antop Hill never had a hip-hop vibe. Hip-hop, rap - kuchh bhi nahin tha yahan pe. But what I did learn there were slang words I could use in my lyrics. 'Bantai' aur yeh sab, log bohot bolte hai yaha ke roads pe. So, the area gave me knowledge about the language of the streets."

And armed with this new lyrical vocabulary, Emiway dropped Aur Bantai at the turn of 2015, the track that finally brought him out of the margins and gave him public recognition. It has since reached 3.5 million views on YouTube, which is only a fraction of some of his later material (Samajh Mein Aaya Kya, a diss track he released last year about mainstream rapper Raftaar, got a staggering 44 million hits, for instance). It evoked inevitable interest from commercial labels and even the film industry. "But I refused them, because I want to grow independently in India. Paise ke peechhe main kabhi nahin bhaaga hoon. I want to show people that you can make it on your own. You don't need the support of label. Just believe in yourself and your work, and keep doing it consistently," the 23-year-old says, voicing a refreshing sentiment at a time when - with the imminent release of Gully Boy - Indian hip-hop is about to burst into the mainstream.

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