In 2017, producer Hiten turned cringe-pop music “Selfie Maine Leli Aaj” by Dhinchak Pooja right into a breathy, measured music, making it his first hit of kinds. Whereas covers, remixes and reimaginations of viral songs can solely offer you a lot mileage, Hiten went on get his foot within the door with extra mainstream artists like Punjab’s Tarsem Jassar on “Repair Match” in 2020.
That very same 12 months, Hiten linked up with one other megastar – Badshah, producing “Awaara” that includes singer Reet Talwar. Within the 4 years since, Badshah has turn out to be “extra of a information than an artist” to Hiten, main the Batala, Punjab-born engineer-turned-covers-artists-turned-producer to turn out to be one of the crucial streamed artists in India. That distinction was secured after the discharge of Badshah’s new album Ek Tha Raja in March, which Hiten mainly produced, together with hits like “God Rattling” that includes Juno award-winning Punjabi-Canadian artist Karan Aujla, “Daaku” with singer Sharvi Yadav and “Soulmate” with singing star Arijit Singh. Most just lately, Hiten additionally labored with singer Priyanshu on “Hania.”
In an interview with Rolling Stone India, Hiten talks about his journey thus far, how he constructed his affiliation with Badshah and what’s developing subsequent. Excerpts:
Rolling Stone India: What was it like studying music manufacturing the primary time you bought into it? What was an preliminary problem, if any?
Hiten: I began my music manufacturing journey lengthy again, from a software program referred to as Digital DJ, which mixes two songs with each other. It was fairly fascinating and satisfying considerably, it does give kicks. Later, a good friend shared a trial model of FL Studio with me on a pen drive. At the moment, I used to be new to the Web so I simply randomly searched ‘Find out how to make beats in FL Studio.’
That video didn’t point out something about tempo and so on. however fortunately the music I threw into the playlist had the identical tempo because the music I used to be making. Bang, I uploaded my first-ever remix made with FL Studio again then. I stored on studying by tutorials and a few folks used to throw random DMs on Instagram and Fb again in 2014-15 [about production]. These persons are nonetheless linked with me and I’m nonetheless studying day by day.
The difficulties that I confronted have been that I used to be producing in my bed room and clearly, it created numerous noise which used to disturb my mother and father loads and at the moment, there weren’t that many tutorials and accessibility in comparison with the content material right this moment. Plus I had no musical background, so it was fairly powerful to get steerage additionally.
How did the join with Badshah occur and what did he need when it comes to the beat for [Sahdev Dirdo song] “Bachpan Ka Pyaar“?
I’d say assembly with Badshah bhai was future and there are lots of folks concerned within the course of. If I’ve to call a couple of, it might be Uchana Amit and Devinder Singh Sudan – they used to make Badshah bhai take heed to all my work after which he would counsel a few issues that I wanted to work on. Additionally, we sat a few instances earlier than our first launch collectively may happen in order that we may perceive one another’s vibe and clearly there have been numerous issues that I needed to work on and we lastly made ‘Awaara,’ which was my first launch with Badshah bhai.
Within the context of ‘Bachpan Ka Pyaar,’ he despatched me a reel on Instagram and despatched me a voice word, ‘Hiten pattern this and we will have a beat like this with this pattern.’ I instantly despatched that audio inside 30 to 40 minutes after that. We had no additional dialog and the very subsequent day, he uploaded the reel with [singers] Aastha Gill and Rico which initially carried out respectable, however after one night time it simply blew up and each reel on Instagram was [with the hook] ‘Jaane meri jaaneman’ – that was a loopy expertise. Individuals liked it loads.
So sure, Badshah bhai is a information greater than an artist for me.
What does it take for a producer to construct a sort of rapport with an artist that they go to you nearly each time for music?
To begin with, I’d say it’s our work that defines us, so ensure you give your one hundred pc in no matter you’re doing and you might want to perceive the vibe that an artist needs to create or that may swimsuit his catalog or character and that’ll work for the viewers. Additionally, the best way to deal with them is the important thing – the way you converse, the way you work together and the way you take heed to their inputs. In the long run, it’s a crew effort.
How has the artistic course of modified between you and Badshah over time? What did you each wish to do otherwise on Ek Tha Raja?
Sure, the artistic course of has modified loads between us because the sound is evolving quickly, the soundscape is altering with time and we’ve to maintain up with it. So we carry on experimenting with sounds and new genres to get the perfect factor.
For Ek Tha Raja, we experimented loads, like DIVINE is on a romantic monitor – ‘O’Sajna.’ There’s a Nepali verse from [singer] Prajina on ‘Hola At Your Boy,’ which is with KR$NA and everybody killed it.
I assume we’ve executed all of the issues we may do on Ek Tha Raja however sure, music is a large subject, one can by no means get happy about exploring and studying.
You’ve labored with MC Sq. on two of his hit songs. What was that like, figuring out that you simply have been crafting songs that had this potential — on paper at the very least — of turning into hit songs?
To begin with, MC Sq. is a really gifted artist. He is an excellent author and singer and everybody is aware of that. Whereas working, all we wished was to make a superb music that may very well be simply understood by the plenty with Haryanvi as the first language and we did our greatest to realize it, therefore the implementation on these two songs was on level. It’s as much as the folks to make each music that anybody makes a success. It simply wants to succeed in the proper viewers, that’s it.
Is there a signature sound that you simply’d wish to be identified for? Otherwise you’d quite be a various producer who can work with every kind of artists, not simply rappers?
I’d quite select to be a various sort of producer, as a result of I wish to benefit from the technique of creation and I don’t wish to get bored from creating the identical sort of music time and again. Creating music and having classes with totally different artists is a unique sort of studying course of that I wish to do at all times.
What different initiatives are you engaged on proper now which can be developing in 2024?
There are various initiatives with many massive names which can’t be disclosed. I’m planning to offer publicity to new skills who’re succesful sufficient with abilities. A lot of initiatives can be coming in 2024 and I can be releasing my very own singles that can be sung, written and composed by me solely. We just lately launched a music that I created from scratch referred to as ‘Hania’ sung by Priyanshu which is performing fairly nicely, by due blessings.