Music
Break down the beats with Karan Kanchan, Sez on the Beat and Parimal Shais
The three producers of Red Bull 64 Bars Season 2 talk about their approach to first-time collaborations with star rappers across eight songs.
For the second season of Red Bull 64 Bars in India, Mumbai producer Karan Kanchan was joined by New Delhi hitmaker Sez on the Beat and Kerala-origin producer Parimal Shais to provide hard-hitting beats for some of the best rap stars in the country.
It marked some first-time collaborations as well as strengthened existing team-ups, all within the freestyle-inclined format of Red Bull 64 Bars.
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Karan Kanchan, who helmed all tracks on Red Bull 64 Bars Season 1, says, “I am so happy to be back! The first season was so much fun, I was really excited to be back, that too along with Sez and Parimal.”
Karan worked with Marathi rap star Sambata and Delhi’s fire-breathing rapper Raga for this season.
Karan Kanchan and Sambata doing a listening session
© Focus Sports
Parimal, who worked with Shillong-origin hip-hop artist Reble, plus Malayalam rappers Fejo and MC Couper, adds, “I was really excited by the prospect of working with three distinctly talented artists, each bringing their own blend of styles and flavours. The thrill of back-to-back bars is undeniable, but what truly intrigued me was figuring out how to carve out sonic space for those bars to shine.”
Sez, who worked with Chandigarh hip-hop artist tricksingh, Tamil star Paal Dabba and Haryanvi hip-hop favourite MC Square, says hip-hop was the common ground and understood how writing 64 bars could be a “hectic process.” He adds, “Being the producer, I wanted to make sure that they [rappers] have ample amount of room to write and kill it with the production.”
All producers agree that they were drawn to the 64 Bars format specifically because it laid more emphasis on writing from the heart instead of seeking a hook for each track.
“The rappers get to express so much more of their skills. And to be able to work with them in that state of flow is crazy,” Karan says.
Sez on the Beat works on some tracks
© Focus Sports
Parimal adds that he was happy to swear by his no-formula approach. “I kept that same flexibility, tailoring each beat to fit the artists’ individual energy. I appreciate the unpredictability because, honestly, that's where the magic happens between a producer and a vocalist,” he says.
In terms of processes, Karan also says he didn’t change up much. “I speak to the artists and try to understand what they are in a zone for, then curate a vibe around that space adding my ideas and then presenting them the demo,” he says.
For Sambata’s ‘Vazan’, Karan says he came up with a Detroit-style beat with an Indian sample. “With Raga [for ‘Soot Samet’], I wanted to make something very hard, with three different beat switches.”
While these were among the first times that Karan worked with Sambata and Raga, Parimal had already worked with MC Couper to the extent that they even had a prior EP project together and the single ‘Ayyayo’.
He likens their creative rapport as “second nature.” Parimal adds, “We’ve built this creative shorthand over the years, so collaborating with him is always seamless. He’s one of those artists I can dive into any project with, knowing it’ll be a fulfilling experience.”
Parimal and Reble had previously worked on commercial projects, so ‘Kill Switch’ was their way of breaking away from any client briefs and exploring a collaboration with full creative freedom.
“It felt like we were venturing into new sonic territory together, which was exciting,” Parimal says about working with Reble.
Parimal Shais and Reble work on their track
© Focus Sports
With Malayalam rap veteran Fejo for ‘Top Tier Talk,’ Parimal says he loved seeing the rapper “push past his usual boundaries.” Parimal says, “I had this vision of incorporating regional sounds for his Red Bull 64 Bars episode and we are excited with the outcome.”
Sez’s song with Paal Dabba, ‘Torrie Wilson’ kicked off Red Bull 64 Bars Season 2 and the New Delhi producer says it was the most fun he’s had.
“The way Paal Dabba just bounces on the song, it’s so refreshing. The guy is a dancer, so it feels like he was dancing on the beat. I cannot understand the language at all, so I was just trying to gauge what he was saying from English keywords so I could make sense of the song,” Sez explains.
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A lot of the track’s process started off just over texts, and Sez admits the tone of the conversation can sometimes get lost in translation over text.
Sez recalls, “I asked him, ‘Can you be more clear with the idea or a specific thing in the song that we’re working on?’ And the guy thought I was shouting at him! I was like, ‘No, bro, I'm not shouting at you at all.’ From that point forward, we were just so chill with each other, we were just two best friends working on a song.”
MC Square, tricksingh and Sez on the Beat chat in the studio
© Focus Sports
Even with tricksingh for their track ‘History Books’, the artist and producer were speaking over Discord, working remotely and sharing screens. “It just feels like you’re there together,” Sez adds.
Aware of tricksingh’s distinctive, “signature cadence,” Sez is all praise for tricksingh’s writing. After talking for hours about hip-hop culture, music, life, and both being Punjabis, it took just 20-25 minutes to work on the song.
“He's very hands on with the ideas, the production and with the mixing-and-mastering process. He's there on the song till the very end, not a lot of artists prefer to do that,” Sez says.
For MC Square’s ‘Kakori Kaand’, Sez was working with an artist he knew had a “powerful voice” and “insane” writing.
Drawing from the Ragini folk form of Haryana, MC Square – who has no formal singing training – impressed Sez with his vocal game on the track.
“There was no need for tuning the vocals or anything. I just asked him, ‘How much time have you spent on vocal training?’ And he was like, ‘I have not done anything.’ It’s just because this guy grew up around a household that was constantly playing Ragini, so the melody and the cadences of Ragini are all just in his head now, and he can sort of replicate that,” Sez explains.