MUMBAI: From producing ‘Yeh Mera Bombay’ to opening for Skrillex at Vh1 Supersonic Arcade in Mumbai, Vivian Fernandes, best known by his stage name- Divine, has evolved as a musician. Today he is not just the ‘Mere Gully Mein’ singer; he is a talent house and many from the Indian independent music scene are looking forward to working with him.

It all started when a young Divine was exposed to rapper 50 Cent by a school friend. This was just the beginning of his preference towards Rap. His inclination towards the genre soon became a way of expressing himself, and a change finally came when he was in college. It was also when Divine felt the need to record his rap, for which he bought a computer, and soon started recording at home. After initially rapping in English, but failing to get attention, he decided to experiment with Hindi and from that ‘Yeh Mera Bombay’ was created. “I recorded ‘Yeh Mera Bombay’ in a recording studio after saving up some money because I wanted it to have a better sound quality. We went around Mumbai to create a video for the track. My best friend- JD helped me with the video, and then we uploaded it on YouTube, not knowing what kind of response it would get. So naturally, we were overwhelmed to see one million views in a month’s time,” stated Vivian.

Divine, who is signed under Sony Music, was spotted by the label during a gig at blueFROG, Mumbai. The rapper was performing ‘Meri Gully Mein’, a song that was not released back them. The Sony team liked the track so much that they decided to sign Divine to the label and release ‘Meri Gully Mein’ under it. “Sony Music found my music fresh and asked me to send them a scratch. I did the same and I was onboard,” he added. “There was this time when I was going to quit rapping because money had become an issue. My parents had started questioning me, but things are more settle with Sony backing my videos financially and otherwise.”

Much like Divine’s rap journey, shooting the video for ‘Meri Gully Mein’ has an interesting story to it as well. Since, the rapper and his friends did not have permission to shot in the ‘gullies’ of their localities –Kurla and JB Nagar, Andheri – they were often caught by cops. However, they managed to evade trouble with the help of cold drinks and ‘paan’. “We would shoot a scene and run from the place as soon as we saw a cop walking towards us,” Fernandes chuckled.

The one thing that separates Divine from most other rappers is that he does not plan to highlight drugs, cars, alcohol, violence or women in his music videos. He believes that rap is the most expressive form of music and one must share life experiences through it. Going by this ideology, the musician has produced ‘Jungle Raja’ for Nucleya’s album ‘Bass Rani’. “They were looking out for a good rapper and that is when they came across ‘Meri Gully Mein’. They contacted me, and sent me the beats of the song and asked me to create the rap portion for the same. The song turned out to be good,” he added.

His collaboration with Nucleya helped him bag the opening act at Vh1 Supersonic Arcade where American DJ/producer Skrillex was performing. “I had performed on a truck during Ganpati Visarjan for ‘Bass Rani’ and that gave me a platform to perform in front of thousands of people. The performance turned out to be really good, so Nucleya gave me an opportunity to open for Skrillex as well,” Divine revealed.

Today, the rapper’s calendar is packed with music collaborations and performances. He will be performing at Bacardi NH7 Weekender, Pune, after which he will get busy working on his next single ‘Jungli Sher’; a track that will narrate his life’s story. He also has plans to create a remix version of ‘Meri Gully Mein’ with singer-rapper Raftaar, and hip-hop artist Brodha V. Divine also has plans to work with English band- Foreign Beggars.

The rapper is also being talked about in the Hindi film industry. Bollywood celebrities like Sunil Shetty, Ranveer Singh and Karan Johar have all expressed their liking for his work. Apparently, Sooraj Pancholi, who made his Bollywood debut with ‘Hero’, also wants to do a Dubsmash video with him. “I have got to know about celebrities through someone in the industry. Whereas Sooraj, he contacted me but unfortunately I was tied up then,” confirmed the artist. So it will not be much of a surprise if Divine is next seen in a Bollywood video.