Singer- composer Vishal Dadlani of the Bollywood composer duo Vishal-Shekhar has had a great year. Not only did he launch his own label VLT which stands for Vishal Likes This, he also added a Bollywood blockbuster, Salman Khan’s Sultan to his kitty. In this interview with SpotboyE, Vishal Dadlani speaks about his label, artist development, his experience of working with Salman and a lot more.
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You have recently signed Hriday Gattani under your label. What is the kind of artiste that you are looking for?
For me the key to signing an artiste is that he or she can perform his/her own song with honesty, sincerity and entertain the audiences at the same time. Another important factor is that they should be more than singers. To me an artiste is someone who can write, compose and produce his own songs.
Amit Trivedi had once said that Bollywood music won’t move forward, until the development of indie music labels. How far do you agree with this statement?
He is right. Till the time musicians won’t be known for their music, until then the scene will never head anywhere. If you see the UK, US or even our neighbours Pakistan, there the musicians are really big stars unlike in India where they remain behind the scene. But I am very glad that in the last few years, people have started recognising musicians and are giving them a lot of love. I firmly believe that artists need to put out their music to contribute to the independent scene.
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However big a name you are in the indie scene, an artist is considered influential only when he or she delivers a hit song in Bollywood. What would you say about this?
It is what it is. Bollywood is wonderful and it has a massive reach and has given us the best of voices. Right now the scene is such that a musician is considered successful only when he/ she achieve some degree of success in Bollywood. But in the 90s, people like Daler Mehndi, Alisha Chinai, Silk Route were putting out their music and were known for their songs and people would know them by their faces. I believe this scene has changed because the music labels decided to change it. Now we have the labels deciding what is good and what is not. Music shouldn’t be about three layers of people deciding what will work.
How do you handle the situation when three layers of people are deciding if your music is good or not?
It’s never happened to us because there has been a degree of respect we command. Also we have been around for a while now so people trust our judgement. In our case it’s more of a collaboration that happens than anyone trying to tell us what to do. But there are a lot of young ones who get told what to do and I feel that’s a bit unfortunate.
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Arijit Singh had said that due to lower shelf life of singers, even his career would be over in a year or so. What do you think is the reason for this?
At one point in time there were a very few singers, then came a generation where the number increased with Shaan, Sonu, KK etc. Then came the time wherein we had reality shows and this got fresh voices and there were a few singers from Pakistan who entered the market. Suddenly people wanted fresh voices. Also we have singers all over India so obviously the shelf life will go down.
Sultan was your first project with Salman. What was your first reaction when you got news that you have bagged the film?
We were very happy that we got the film. We had never worked with him before so yes it was great.
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How was it working with Salman?
We never met Salman even once when we were making music for Sultan. A lot has been said about him that he is interfering but no once the song was made we would send it to Ali and Aditya. They would approve the song and that would be sent to Salman. Salman would then send us a text saying that the song is kickass and trust me he is the easiest one to work with.
Lastly it is also said that you will be working with Salman once again for Tiger Zinda Hai. Is it true?
If we get to know about this we will tell you.
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