Inception
Antariksh has a come a long way from its inception. What started as a fun and experimental side project by Varun Rajput, Mridul Ganesh (Former Singer) and Gurtej Singh (Former Guitar Player) in mid 2012 to fulfil their common dream of recording and releasing a full-fledged album, took a serious turn when their first song, ‘Dheere Dheere’ got a phenomenal response and became a hit with a variety of audience.
Early years and Khoj (2012 – 2013)
The popularity and appreciation propelled the trio to record a full length album and find a drummer and a bass player to begin playing live. With Vipul Malhotra on the drums and Raghav Verma on the bass, the band recorded and released their first album, Khoj in September 2013 and since then there’s been no looking back. ‘Khoj’, as the band describes is about a search for identity, a quest to understand our own nature. It is in moments of disconnection from our own selves that the journey inward begins – Khoj, an intense and passionately crafted musical journey, captures these moments through hard, edgy Hindi rock music. The album has a strong theme across all songs both musically as well as lyrically, touching topics such as ethics, identity crises, hope, greed, chaos and realization – emotions that are a part of our everyday lives. Through Khoj, the band elegantly integrated their diverse backgrounds and love for music into a coherent work of art making a dent in the world of Hindi Rock. The album also featured guest performances by guitar virtuoso Baiju Dharmajan (ex-Motherjane), Gaurav Chintamani (Advaita), Indian classical singer Rini Rajput, Sidhant Mathur, and Kartik Dhar.
Touring and Line up changes (2014-2017)
Post releasing Khoj and overcoming what Varun describes as the “gestation period”, the band gained a lot of praise, generated interest, and began touring all across the country through 2014 and 2015. However, Mridul went back to the US in 2014 to pursue an MBA and with Vipul and Gurtej not being able to balance their full time corporate jobs with Antariksh’s hectic touring schedule, the band saw a lot of line up and configuration changes between 2014 and 2017. In November 2015, Antariksh was featured on Season 4 of Music Mojo, a popular music show on Kappa TV which features live renditions of 11 songs performed by the band featuring Varun Rajput and Gurtej on Guitars, Vipul on Drums, Aditya Jassi and Kimberley Rodrigues on Vocals and Sonic Shori on Bass. The band began recording some of their new material in mid 2016 but that took a back seat because of the extensive and sporadic gigging schedule, lineup changes and all the additional work that came their way of onboarding and preparing multiple session musicians and backups for the gigs. However, Varun continued to persist and in 2017, the band began releasing a lot of live content, after movies and showreels leading to a lot more gigging.
Song Releases and a Grand International Tour (2018 – 2020)
Since multiple vocalist changes between 2014 and 2017 were hampering and slowing down the band’s progress and not allowing Antariksh to establish a clear identity, in early 2018, Varun decided to take up lead vocal and frontman duties and onboarded some incredible, full-time session musicians which included Shrikant Biswakarma on Guitars, Dan Thomas on Drums and Joshua Peter on Keyboards. Finally, achieving some stability, Antariksh began composing and recording again in 2018 and also starting playing a lot more gigs. Varun having finally settled in as the lead singer of Antariksh, released a new single Kaahe Re after a hiatus of 5 years! The song again did incredibly well – It was shortlisted as one of the 7 songs among 170 entries to be played before eminent Bollywood directors such as Anurag Basu, Subhash Ghai, Mohit Suri and Rakeysh Omprakash Mehra at ‘All About Music’ 2018. The incredible testimonials (biography page) served a great inspiration to the band. 2018 and 2019 saw Antariksh tour extensively with a lot clearer identity and also went on their first international multi-city tour of Mauritius and Madagascar. They played at various venues in Mauritius which included the Indira Gandhi Centre for Indian Culture, Centre de Flacq and Triolet. In Madagascar, the band performed at an event organized by the embassy of India in the Ampefiloha Plaza in Antananarivo, the capital of Madagascar. Post this amazing tour, Antariksh played the prestigious NH7 Weekender in Meghalaya.
A mighty collaboration and other releases (2020-2022)
NH 7 Weekender, apart from being an absolutely fantastic gig, also presented Antariksh the opportunity to bump into meeting one of their guitar heroes and an incredible guitarist, Marty Friedman (Former Megadeth). Varun spoke with Marty and pursued him to play on their song, ‘Quest’ which went on to becoming Antariksh’s biggest collaboration also put the band on an international map. Just when the band had put their foot down on the accelerator, Covid hit and everything stalled. During this period, Joshua and Dan, who had been regular session members decided to part ways with the band to focus on their teaching careers. In almost all of 2020 and 2021, Varun spent most of his time finishing all the pending productions, mixes, writing and releasing a lot of new music as well as invested heavily in producing music videos for Antariksh including Fanaah, Jee Le Zara, Raahiya, Kaisi Ye Jeet?, Aashayein (Live) and Quest feat. Marty Friedman. Quest put Antariksh on the international radar with the song making it to Spotify’s ‘Progressive Metal’ and ‘New Metal Tracks’ Playlists alongside artists such as Dream Theater, Porcupine Tree, Leprous, Pain of Salvation and stalwarts of Prog Rock. Once again, deriving energy from tiny victories, Antariksh pretty much became Varun’s solo project and went on to release another Prog-Rock epic, ‘Kaisi Ye Jeet’? in Oct 2021 questioning the meaning of “victory” over Covid and its significance!
2022: 10 Years of Antariksh and AWARDS
In August 2022, the band completed 10 years since its inception. The year also saw the release of ‘Ye Jhootha Samaa’ which featured amazing Shruti Dhasmana on Vocals and Abhay Sharma on the Saxophone. 2022 also saw the band bag prestigious awards for their song ‘Kaahe Re’ in the ‘Best Rock Song’ category by ‘Artist Aloud Indian Independent Music Awards’ (IIMA) and the ‘Best Rock/Metal Act’ for their songs ‘Quest’ and ‘Kaisi Ye Jeet’ by ‘The Indian Music Diaries (TIMD)’.
To celebrate these 10 years of making and playing music, the struggle and joy of it all, Antariksh toured extensively and played several college festivals and clubs pan India. Varun, accompanied by phenomenal guitarist and dear friend, Shrikant Biswakarma, was joined by Arko Ganguly, a seasoned drummer on a full time basis in the summer of 2022, while Joshua and Marc Aimond kept juggling the keyboard duties throughout the season. Antariksh headlined some of the biggest college festivals in the country including the ever continuing streak of shows including IIT Bombay, IIT Delhi, IIT Kanpur, NIFT Delhi, SRM Chennai, IIM Lucknow, BITS Pilani, IIM Amritsar, VNIT Nagpur and many other distinguished festivals.
While the live gigs have been a huge hit, Antariksh has recently collaborated with Salim Sulaiman at Merchant Records for a brand new single, called ‘Dastan-E-Dil’ which has been featured on the season1 of a series called ‘Soundchk’. Other than Arko and Shrikant, Varun is joined by Sahil Dhingra on bass, who is also Antariksh’s live sound engineer.
Boasting of incredible musicianship, mature songwriting and a wide variety of influences presented in a cohesive manner, Antariksh has a reputation for delivering high quality, meaningful, and fresh music both in a studio as well as a live setting. The band loves to write about human emotions and experiences, perceptions, and shades of good and bad in the society. Cloaked in some great guitar melodies and riffs, challenging syncopations, cinematic themes, Antariksh has a sound that’s as unique as it gets.
Testimonials
Bollywood Directors' Comments on Kaahe Re at All About Music Conference
I really like your song. I felt that the orchestration and the overall arrangement is really good! Everything is good! – Subhash Ghai
I could hear two songs in one. It built up a certain neuron in my brain. It was fantastic! – Rakeysh Omprakash Mehra
I loved it. What I liked the most was you didn’t conform to the standard song structure and followed your heart. Your knowledge of music is quite evident in the song. – Anurag Basu
Marty's experience with Antariksh
Something about Varun gave me the idea that he was the real deal, and once I heard the song, I was in. The song was really well thought out and I could feel that Varun and his band put a lot of energy and care into the details.
Life so far
Ten years and counting since the idea of Antariksh blossomed in Varun Rajput’s head. Finding inspiration in day to day events, experimental song writing, and an uncompromising approach, Antariksh has taken its creative brains and sprung out some incredible music over all these years! With an album (Khoj) and several singles to their name, Antariksh is counted amongst some of most amazing ‘All-Time Great Indian Rock Bands’!
Quest ft. Marty Friedman
This has been one of the most exciting events in the band’s journey. Right from watching him live to meeting him at the airport and ultimately getting him to play on Quest was such an incredible story! Check the song here!
Latest Release
Antariksh’s most recent single ‘Dastan-E-Dil (Shine your light)’ in collaboration with Merchant Records and Salim Merchant, on SoundChk Season One is out now. The song presents a very fresh and modern sound as they experiment with a new approach to song-writing including lush soundscapes, intimate vocal melodies and uplifting lyrics that talk about freedom and selfless love. Go check now!
