Discover rock music with Indian fusion
PLEASE INTRODUCE YOURSELF FOR US WHO ARE NOT FAMILIAR WITH YOU AND YOUR MUSIC AND TELL US A BIT ABOUT YOURSELF.
I'm Vijay, I play guitars for InRegalia, a Rock band based in Mumbai, India. Our style of music has its roots in Classic and Alternative Rock primarily but we infuse a bit of ethnicity into our music.
TELL US A LITTLE BIT ABOUT YOUR NEW SINGLE?
The new single is our first instrumental. This, I’m sure, is a little unexpected to our listeners who’ve heard our other songs up until now. It started off as an experiment but then over the course of many jam sessions, this took a life of its own and sounded quite good after all the arrangements were worked out. Maybe this could be a nice showcase piece for our future live shows (smiles).
WHAT INSPIRED THE SINGLE?
It all got inspired by a guitar riff I was experimenting with. At the time, I was contemplating on improvising it over a cover song but when we decided to shelve the cover song idea, I thought it could be interesting to go with an instrumental instead.
CAN YOU SUM UP THE SINGLE IN A FEW WORDS?
A confluence of Rock and a ballad with a dash of ethnicity
WHAT RECORD CHANGED YOUR LIFE AND WHY?
The untitled album of Led Zeppelin (popularly referred to as Led Zeppelin IV). That just gave me the drive I was looking for. I must admit I found the sound a little unusual at first when I first heard it but somehow it got me hooked.
DO YOU HAVE A FAVOURITE MUSIC VIDEO FILMED BY YOUR BAND OR ANOTHER ARTIST?
‘Take On Me’ by A-ha is my all-time favourite music video. There are others I like but somehow I’m fascinated by the animation concept itself here and given that it was made in the mid 80’s makes it all the more remarkable.
WHAT WOULD WE FIND YOU DOING WHEN YOU’RE NOT MAKING MUSIC?
I’m a partner at a Performing and Fine Arts Institution. Apart from teaching, I also get involved with music and drama projects from time to time. In my spare time, I like checking out movies. Occasionally I read a bit of poetry.
DO YOU GET NERVOUS PERFORMING LIVE, IF SO HOW DO YOU DEAL WITH THAT?
The jitters will always be there before any live performance no matter what the size of the audience is. It's just about getting past the first few chords and then getting into the zone.
HOW DID YOU FORM THE BAND?
The band’s roots began in early 2011 when I met the former bass player through a musician who we were rehearsing with at the time. It went through quite a few line-up changes until March of 2012 when Pete auditioned for the singer’s part and joined the band. A year later, Warren joined us after we’d auditioned several drummers. We’ve had a few good keyboard players who played for us during that time but it wasn’t until 2015 that we found Keith. Saurav took over the bass duties by the middle of 2018 after our bass player quit the band.
HOW DO YOU WRITE? - DO YOU HAVE A KEY SONGWRITER, OR DO YOU ALL WORK TOGETHER?
I do the bulk of the songwriting these days. It’s something I’ve always aspired to do. Most of the songs are written over the course of days and months though there have been a few songs which were finished much quicker probably in a session or two. We also put a good amount of effort into the production process…that’s where our minds come together. The song is first tossed around when I play/sing the song in the jam session for the boys to get a feel. Thereafter we go about working on different parts for the song. We revisit the song several times and go over the arrangements, rework them until we start feeling the flow of the song and are satisfied. Our pre-production and production work happen almost in parallel where, after we’ve laid down our parts, we start to think about the little ideas, backing tracks, fillers that will lend even more value to the song.
WHAT INSPIRES YOU?
The inspirations come primarily from my observations, musical improvisational sessions or even from non-musical situations. On occasion, some good ideas are picked up during our rehearsals and I sit down to work on them when I have an appropriate theme to work over. In general, I keep my creative mind open most times and I just wait for the inspiration to happen rather than ‘forcing’ it.
WHAT IS NEXT?
We want to develop a good and loyal fanbase. We’d also like to engage our audience and build a community of sorts. We’ve just had our first instrumental release as a single and we’ve got a string of releases starting early next year. There’s plenty of music to come. Stay tuned!
PLEASE TELL US ANY SOCIAL MEDIA LINKS SO WE CAN SHARE.
You can check us out on these social media platforms:
Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/InRegalia/
Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/inregaliaband
Twitter: https://www.twitter.com/InRegalia
YouTube: https://www.youtube.com/user/inregalia
InRegalia band bio
Based in the city of Mumbai in the western part of India, InRegalia is a band which plays Classic and Alternative Rock with elements of Indian classical music.
The band was founded by guitarist Vijay Fernandes. They were later joined by vocalist Peter Abraham, drummer Warren Swaries and Keith Pereira on keys and Saurav Das on bass. The band has been active on the Indian indie circuit playing at a number of venues in their home city and across the country. InRegalia has released three singles and two EP’s thus far. The band has received positive reviews and coverage in the press and their music has been aired on over 200 indie radio stations and podcasts worldwide. In addition, band’s music has featured on a number of independent playlists on Spotify, Apple Music, Amazon, Deezer, Tidal and Napster.
Their music is available on all the major digital retail outlets and streaming platforms.
InRegalia band line-up
Peter Abraham – Vocals
Vijay Fernandes – Guitars
Keith Pereira – Keyboard
Saurav Das – Bass
Warren - Drums