Prateek Kuhad: ‘I don't think too much about the emotion and vulnerability while writing a song’

Prateek Kuhad says “'Tere Hi Hum' is the song that kind of sparked the idea of the EP ('Shehron Ke Raaz'). It’s a hopeful love song.” (Photo: Prashin Jagger)

Prateek Kuhad is hailed as one of the leading singer-songwriters of India. (Former US President Barack Obama famously added Kuhad's 2018 EP cold/mess to his playlist of favourite songs in 2019.) Kuhad is now back with his quartet EP Shehron Ke Raaz.

Since its premiere a month ago, the EP has garnered approximately 10 million cumulative streams worldwide, reaching the #2 spot on the Apple Music India All Genre charts.

In an interview, Kuhad talked about what goes into making his music and why his songs turn out the way they do.

There’s actually no connection to how my life was: cold/mess just happened to come out. I wasn’t with anybody at that point. Although when the song was written, I was going through a tumultuous relationship and I had a pretty bad breakup. cold/mess happened to be a song I really wanted to put out. I picked all the other songs I'd written over the preceding years on a record that worked well. Shehron Ke Raaz was kind of the same thing. I am in a relationship right now. Tere Hi Hum is the song that kind of sparked the idea of the EP. It’s a hopeful love song, and I looked through my library of songs to find ones that would all tie in well together.

The songs on the EP were written before the lockdown. To be honest, the lockdown was quite a stressful time, and I really wasn’t too productive as a songwriter. We did a bunch of other things, but not really much with respect to writing the songs.

I put out the band version in 2020, with the music video by Jugaad. And before I put that out, there was a bootleg version of Kasoor (Acoustic) that I’d played on some live gig. I wanted to formalise it and put out an official version with better vibes and sound quality.

It totally depends on the thought and the song. I try to be always involved in the video-making process, depending on how busy I am with other things. Many times I have a vision of a music video. For instance, for cold/mess I had the idea of showcasing a couple going through it in a toxic manner. So, we had that underwater sequence, to show certain metaphors of what it feels like to be in a relationship that's not the easiest.

Read more: Zoya Hussain on getting her big break, and making her web series debut with 'Grahan'

With Shehron Ke Raaz, I did have an idea. I wanted the couple to be in a public place, in a restaurant or a bar, just getting so lost in their own world of love and that emotion that it sort of becomes a bit of a fantasy.

I don't think too much about the emotion and the vulnerability. I just write without thinking too much, and probably that's why the songs turn out the way they do.

I’ve been writing for film since I became a musician. I haven’t done too many projects as I’ve been selective - a lot of things have to fall into place with the song or the series - about what they want me to do. I also like to do projects where I feel I can do justice to the project and I can also bring to the table what I’m really good at, especially on the production and song-writing aspect. I haven’t done a tonne of work and I definitely enjoy working on my own records a bit more. However, it's also fun and challenging to write for film, so I’ll do them every once in a while.

I think it was definitely one of the high points of my career; 2019 was a special year, in terms of touring around the world, selling out shows everywhere (including USA, UK, EU and India). It was nice to see the big crowds. In India, we had close to 9,000 people in Delhi and 7,000 in Mumbai along with some amazing shows in smaller cities across the country, so it was a pretty cool time.

(Photo by Prashin Jagger)