Bollywood rappers play their own role that is different from ours, but neither is less or more than the other. “There’s an audience for everybody and that’s what I love about the game right now. I luckily had a few songs ready to present, and the rest is history.” We had just written the song and it was super rough, but a representative from the label heard it and approached me. It happened when I performed Mere Gully Mein with Naezy at Blue Frog we were the opening act for a Sony artiste. All my friends had moved abroad or were working in good jobs and I hadn’t finished school or done anything with my life. “Getting signed was the highlight of my life because I really needed a win. They were the ones who pushed me because I didn’t have a family to go home to, and they always stood in the background while I was doing my thing.” These are the guys from where I lived and still live, who are in my videos and also behind the camera. “The people who built me are still with me and I’m so grateful for them. I rap in Hindi because that’s what I grew up hearing in the gullies.” I think it’s taking off now because regional languages are being embraced. Now we’re on massive stages playing to audiences of 15,000 people. I remember lining up outside clubs for rare hip-hop nights. “The evolution of the scene has been amazing to watch. Now that they’ve seen it through my eyes, they’re happy.” They saw hip-hop as drugs and bad company. “My family didn’t support me at first because they weren’t here and didn’t know what I was doing. I would write every day for five hours at a time, and I’d spend days trying to perfect one verse, which I can do in minutes now.”
“The main reason I am what I am is because I practically lived alone my mother and brother both worked abroad ever since my dad left. I was writing a lot of devotional rhymes as well, because I was living with my grandmother and she would take me to church every single day and I was an altar boy for mass. It was gospel rap, and it blew me away that he was rapping, but he was talking about God. “Everything changed for me when I heard a song by Lecrae. I listened to that for a year, playing it constantly on my grandmother’s CD player and memorising the words.” My friend told me about him and gave me a CD which had his and Eminem’s music on it. I saw a guy wearing a 50 Cent T-shirt, and I just wanted to know more. “I started rapping for fun in school I was never serious about doing it full-time.
With his knack for writing hit songs, meticulous flow, electrifying stage presence, authentic lyrics and a down-to-earth, approachable persona, the rapper seems to be built for stardom. So much so that he was signed to Sony Music India, became the first Indian artiste to have a single released worldwide by Apple Music, and is now the inspiration behind a Zoya Akhtar film, along with his peer Naezy. That was all it took for people to sit up and take notice. Born and brought up in the slums of Andheri, Fernandez barged into a rap scene that was dominated by lyrics about alcohol, drugs and girls…and told his story. Why: A lot has been said and written about him lately, but the young artiste who founded Gully Gang and popularised phrases like ‘boys from the naka’, ‘ yeh mera Bombay’ and ‘ scene kya hain’ is just getting started.