Last month, Viva's music catalogue returned to streaming after years of exile, courtesy of KaanPhod Music. The four original members of the band - Anushka Manchanda, Neha Bhasin, Mahua Kamat, and Pratichee Mohapatra - sat down with Hindustan Times to talk about their journey and the changing landscape of Indian music.
The band members say they were not surprised by the response to their music arriving on streaming. Mahua Kamat says, “This started because our listeners, our fans who loved us over the years, asked, ‘Where is the music?’ This is their childhood, just like it was ours. We grew up with it. That was the catalyst for us to seek this.”
Viva was formed in 2002 after five girls won the inaugural season of Channel V’s Popstars. Their first album, released the same year, topped the charts with many tracks becoming part of pop culture. Viva is regarded as India’s first popular mainstream girl group.
However, the band's rise came towards the end of the glory years of pop music in India, which was later overshadowed by Bollywood music. Mahua says the girls were unaware of the hierarchical supremacy Bollywood music enjoyed at the time. “We won a contest and we knew we could sing. We were just following what they mapped out for us. We didn’t feel like we were breaking into a Bollywood-led industry,” she says.
The band members believe that Bollywood ‘borrowing’ the pop sound led to the demise of indipop. Anushka Manchanda credits this to Bollywood ‘borrowing’ the pop sound. “They pulled the sound from the indipop and devoured it. They took singers like Shaan and Alisha Chinai from pop into films. Everyone was eventually singing in films,” she says.
Their rebirth on streaming has given the band and their sound a new lease of life, and the women are hopeful that their music will continue to be discovered by younger listeners.
