Spoof album for the Mumbai’s gully rapper

What started as a fun take on Mumbai’s hip-hop scene has now become an entire album of songs. Tadpatri Talkies, a group of humorous content creators, speak about how rapper Gari-B took a life of his own.

A ridiculous figure that picks up the idea of Mumbai’s poverty-rap and takes it to a whole new level — this is what the group of humorous content creators, Tadpatri Talkies, wanted to create when they thought of the idea of Gari-B. The first spoof video that the group released in the form of a rap was Gari-B Ki Kahani in April 2017. The obnoxious bhel-eating, scooter-riding rapper in his signature torn-up T-shirt, jeans and hoodie became such a hit, that the group realised that one video wouldn’t be enough.

“When we created the video, we showed it to a few rapper friends as well and they all loved it. So, there was already a hype around the song before it released and it was pretty easy for it to go viral,” says Anmol Gawand, who wrote the rap for the song.

Since then, the group, consisting of six content creators coming from diverse backgrounds, created 11 more rap videos, all around the character of Gari-B and his friends. November 2 will see the release of their album Bhook featuring videos, which originated as just another joke.

Anmol Gawand and Sidharth Raveendran

“It was our group member Gaurang Bailoor who came up with the idea of Gari-B. It was meant to be a parody on the existing style of hip-hop, especially its lyrical content, where it’s all about how people have come from the gully and struggle against poverty. But that’s not the only aspect of that we have made a spoof out of — there are digs at Punjabi hip-hop, mumble rap and a whole bouquet of funny videos,” explains Sidharth Raveendran, who is the face of Gari-B in the music videos.

Since Anmol is already a well-known face in the world of desi hip-hop, the group realised that it would be better to go with a less-known face — and here is where Sidharth came in. “If I had been the face of the videos, then they would have become too much of an EMF (Anmol’s stage name) song. So we wanted someone that people wouldn’t immediately associate with rap, while I rapped the song. And Sidharth has done an amazing job. He is Gari-B,” laughs Anmol.

The rapper is quick to clarify that it is not struggle itself that the Tadpatri Talkies set out to make fun of when they started Gari-B. “Everyone has their own problems in life — my point is what are you doing about them? If all you are doing is banking on your poverty to get somewhere in the rap scene, then that’s what I have an issue with,” he explains.

The album launch will highlight not only the Gari-B videos but will also have several Tadpatri Talkies sketches as well. “The songs will be interspersed with humorous sketches, since that’s what Tadpatri Talkies is all about. It will be in the format of a chat show like Saturday Night Live, but with a more desi Doordarshan-like vibe,” explains Sidharth. “Tadpatri Talkies has also just turned one as of October 29, and it’s a celebration of that as well. We started out as a group of guys who were meeting up on Saturdays and discussing how we could make funny videos — then we started making them. We all brought in our own expertise and it’s been a fun journey.”