#HauteSounds: Hip-Hop Beats From The Streets Of Mumbai
From dancing to the tunes of Temperature, without understanding a word of what was being said, to inspiring the plot of a film, Naved Shaikh, aka Naezy, has come a long way. The Kurla boy started rapping when he was fed up of living the low life. After getting involved with friends who took him down the wrong path, his words snapped him out of his trance. He is living proof of how some hard work, with a sense of uniqueness and determination to do something big, can actually make your dreams a reality.
Living in the narrow bylanes of Kurla West taught him a lot. He took his childhood hardships, immediate surroundings, and every problem faced by Mumbaikars, and turned them into lyrics for his songs. And he was an instant hit. He raps in Hindi and Urdu. Naved’s words are raw, unrefined, crass, and uber local, but that’s what resonates with the people, connects them to him — because he talks to them in their own language. We might find it to be noise, it is not your usual upbeat kind of a music, it is something that is natural and echoes from the interiors of Mumbai.
When he first began this hip-hop journey, he was called crazy. Taking that criticism positively, he came up with his stage name Naezy. Every song that he composes is for the people and their daily woes. Whether it was Haq Hai or Mere Gully Mein, they all spoke the lingo of the heart of this metropolitan. In fact, this guy has become so famous that Zoya Akhtar is all set to direct a film called Gully Boy inspired by his life, and none other than Ranveer Singh is going to play the lead. If that is not making it, I don’t know what is!
Listen to his latest track Tehelka above and watch an award-winning short film on him, Bombay 70 (which is Kurla’s Pincode), below and realise how you can do so much without actually having anything. At least this way, we may actually complaining and start appreciating the little stuff in life.
