Producing music is obviously fun, so is DJing, but following a music scene and participating in it, and meeting the people in it also leads to a lot of interesting thoughts, observations, and insights. The Indian-American dance subculture in the United States is an important cultural vehicle for the promotion and reproduction of “Indian” culture amongst the diaspora. Interestingly, even with the upcoming Hasan Minhaj movie on the topic, it remains painfully under-studied and under-documented.
When TamilCulture posted a few months ago on their story that they were looking for article pitches, I figured it was time to start chronicling how Tamil music fit into the circuit.
It started from nowhere, and now frankly, Tamil music actually is disproportionately used in Indian-American dance circuits relative to the actual Tamil speaking population as a percentage of India. This mirrors box office earnings on Tamil films which are also a disproportionate percentage of Indian box office sales. The former however was not always the case, in fact it was at times, actively excluded. This provides the context for a piece I worked on with Dr. Srimix for TamilCulture titled “The American Collegiate Indian Dance Circuit and the Tamil Question (Part 1)” covering an “Introduction to the Indian-American collegiate dance scene and the role of Tamil music.” The article is available here: https://tamilculture.com/the-american-collegiate-indian-dance-circuit-and-the-tamil-question-part-1
As a Tamil-American DJ, and someone at the forefront of promoting Tamil music in America to non-Tamils, it feels great to be able to get the writing muscle going again. I’m looking forward to working with G-tam and Dr. Srimix on future issues. When the best Tamil-American DJs in the game tie up, it’s not just about the music, but also about chronicling and promoting culture and language, and sharing it with others.
Many who have come across my Soundcloud or YouTube have come for the Tamil mixtapes that I have led and been a part of. Figured it would be fun to jot down some notes about each and tell some lore about them. Each of them always feature music from India, Eelam, and Malaysian Tamils and their respective diasporas and the Tamil songs and Tamil remixes are layered over a wide variety of global sounds.
Summer 2019 – The American desi dance scene (Bollywood fusion, but also Bhangra and Classical) has a culture of promotional mixtapes for dance competitions. However, outside of Hansini 2017 (led by Dr. Srimix) and Laasya 2019 (led by me), there weren’t any good mixtapes where the majority of the music was South Indian. I was very inspired by the smoothness of DJ MG’s BollyAUS 2019 mixtape and decided to create a 20 minute tape that featured Indian, Eelam, and Malaysian Tamil music layered over a variety of American and global dance genres, and hence “Athirvukal” (Vibrations) was born.
Alaigal Tamil Waves Mixtape – Margib, Dr. Srimix, VGo, G-tam, viYOLIN
Fall 2020 – During the pandemic, I knew I wanted to create another Tamil mixtape, and I had to loop in Tamil legends Dr. Srimix, G-tam, and VGo. This one was called “Alaigal” (Waves). viYOLIN and I go back to childhood Bengali singing class and he developed a gigantic listenership on Spotify for his instrumental violin covers. We had talked about collaborating for a while and this provided the perfect opportunity to feature some of his amazing covers in a new light. A lot of the concepts on this tape were tested on TikTok before I strang them together. This mixtape was also where I started drawing on a global pop theme. The “Kalyana Vayasu” mix is layered over a Russian rap song, “Dappava Kizhichan” is mixed with a famous Lebanese song, and the intro mix samples Vietnamese pop.
Oligal Tamil Sounds Mixtape – Margib, Dr. Srimix, DJ MG, Swizzee, DJ Vishnu
Spring 2022 – Coming out of the pandemic, it had been a year and a half, and I had made a lot of Tamil concepts that needed airtime, so time for another mixtape. One thing we have in America is a lot of talented desi DJs who are language agnostic; they are as comfortable making Punjabi mixes, as they are with Hindi, Telugu, and other Indian languages. In America we bring Tamil music and culture to non-Tamils, with Dr. Srimix being a pioneer in that sense. In that spirit, I looped in three non-Tamils to join myself and Dr. Srimix: DJ MG, Swizzee, and DJ Vishnu. This mixtape continues with global sensibilities – “Venpanju” features Turkish rap, “Rasa Magarasa”, “Ma Cherie”, and “Idhazhin Oram” feature Afrobeats, “Candy” features Reggaeton, and “Thaen Thaen” features Albanian pop and UK R&B.
Spring 2024 – It had been two years since the last one, and since Oligal I had entered the ring as an actual live Tamil DJ. I had quite a few Tamil meetups under my belt at this point and was adept with playing popular kuthu songs, singalongs, and throwbacks, but my own personal taste in Tamil music has always gravitated more towards independent projects and Tamil rap. About a third of the songs on this mixtape are from independent projects and artists. This mixtape uses instrumentals from a lot of Indian languages including Hindi, Punjabi, and Telugu, and also uses some Tamil versions of popular Hindi songs. The global element is also very prominent, with “Innum Enna Thozha” utilizing amapiano, “Kadhal Kadidham” and “Thaka Thayya” featuring afrobeats, and “Chaaral” featuring deep house.
Kings of Gaana 2025 Mixtape – Dr. Srimix, Margib, G-tam
Winter 2025 – Dr. Srimix hit G-tam and I up in late 2025 mentioning that he was in talks with Kings of Gaana (KOG), a UK Tamil dance competition to make their promotional mixtape. Having seen competition videos from KOG before, I excited told him that I was in for the ride. The deadline for the mix sneaked up on us and Srimix messaged us the saturday of thanksgiving weekend reminding us of the deadline. I was heading to Miami for Art Basel with other travel right after and was about to not have my computer for 10 days. I spent 2 hours that Saturday cranking out 6 mixes, ultimately landing on four that I sent Srimix for the compilation. Given it was a UK competition I added some nods to UK music, and additionally added some Amapiano and Arabic flavor. Dr. Srimix hit it out of the park with his Kuthu intro and hip-hop segment and G-tam added the melodic touch and throwback to round it out.
Shoutout to the competing teams: City University Tamil Society, Warwick Gaana Dance Society, UCL Tamil Society, Queen Mary Tamil Society, Tamil Society of Cardiff, Aston Tamil Society, and Cambridge University Tamil Society. Special shoutout to the winner, St George’s/SGUL Tamil Society and to the King’s College London Tamil Society for hosting.
There will be more added to this list in the coming years, one of the most rewarding parts is the non-Tamil representation (viYOLIN, DJ MG, Swizzee, DJ Vishnu). It is awesome and hilarious to see non-Tamils making better Tamil remixes and Tamil mashups than most popular Tamil DJs.
Excited to announce the Official Kings of Gaana mixtape with my frequent collaborators Dr. Srimix and G-tam! Kings of Gaana is one of the top Tamil dance competitions in the world, featuring teams from colleges across the United Kingdom, and hosted by the King's College Tamil Association. You can check their Instagram for more information: https://www.instagram.com/kingsofgaana/
The mixtape is 16 minutes of hard-hitting Tamil mixes, spanning Tamil Kuthu, Hip-Hop, Melodies and more from Kollywood and the Tamil independent scene across India, Eelam, and Malaysia and mixed with global and electronic genres like Future Bass, Amapiano, Arabic, and Trap. Our last collaboration was for the Alaigal mixtape I hosted in 2020, available at: https://soundcloud.com/margibmusic/alaigal?in=margibmusic/sets/tamil-mixtapes
For more information on the DJs and for a little walk down memory lane check out our instagram carousel below:
Excited to announcing the fourth mixtape in the Tamil Mixtape Series, “Malaigal” (Mountains)! This one is a solo project, featuring 20 minutes of Tamil Film, Rap, Funk, R&B, and Tamil adaptations of Bollywood songs mixed with a variety of genres including: Deep House, Amapiano, Afrobeats, Arabic Pop, Russian Rap, Reggaeton, and Hip-Hop. As always, Indian, Eelam, and Malaysian Tamil artists are featured in this ~20 minute mixtape.
Just dropped my first track of 2024 on all streaming platforms titled “Come Dance” which samples the Bollywood song “Aaja Nachle” from the movie of the same name. Its a Tech House production featuring an AI-generated male Indian vocal cover.
I debuted this song at Desi Darty Debauchery’s Holiday Party in December, and again live at our recent MMXXIV Party a few days ago in January. Make sure to check it out on streaming and check out the video of the first drop at the bottom!
Excited to announce my first mixtape of 2023, a collaboration with Norman Nachle, a Bollywood fusion dance competition out of the University of Oklahoma, in Norman, Oklahoma.
Its 19 minutes long, mostly “Bollywood singalong”, but featuring Punjabi, Kannada, Malayalam, Tamil, and Telugu songs on the desi side and a lot of genres seldom heard in dance competition mixtapes in the background (French Hip-Hop, Angolan Afro House, Brazilian Baile Funk, Tech House, and Country).
Excited to announce the release of my new Tamil Mixtape for 2022!
Third time around, after “Athirvukal” (Vibes) and “Alaigal” (Waves), this time its “Oligal” (Sounds). This time brought on the bros Dr. Srimix, DJ MG, DJ Vishnu, and Swizzee along for the journey! ~20 minutes of Eelam, Indian, and Malaysian Tamil songs mixed with Dancehall, Afrobeats, Reggaeton, EDM, Turkish, Albanian, Hip-Hop, and more!
Two mixtapes to look out for: my annual Tamil mixtape, set to release in March titled “Oligal” as well as a collaboration with a dance competition. Both featuring some other great desi producers.
Last few months have been focused on short-form content. Below is a list of my short form mixes released in the last few months, with bolded ones getting some more widespread recognition:
Arabic Kuthu x Daba Tzian ( TikTok – Reels – Shorts ) – Tamil x Arabic
It's been a while since the last post. Summer has been an interesting time, both in terms of music and in terms of Web 3 exploration. Released two tracks, went semi-viral on TikTok for a mashup, and finally properly sold an NFT.
Music
Released two mashups this summer: Invincible Swish (A Punjabi Rap x Hip-Hop mashup) and Rowdy Baby x Param Sundari (a kuthu mashup of Hindi and Tamil). The latter after receiving a rave response on TikTok, with tons of covers. Links below:
The key audiovisual release this summer was the mashup of Rowdy Baby x Param Sundari, which at current count is at more than 25k plays and 70 covers on TikTok so far! The sound is available on TikTok, Reels, and Shorts!
Some standout covers of the Rowdy Baby x Param Sundari Mix were:
For updates on Audiovisual content - Follow on TikTok, Instagram, and YouTube!
Web 3 Exploration
Finally accepted the bid for my NFT from March during the recent dip where $ETH prices hit close to $1,800. You can read about the process of minting that NFT here.
Below are some of my favorite pieces around the intersection of Web 3 and art that I read this summer:
