Taking Charge
With a new EP and her own record label, Indian-American rapper Raja Kumari is now calling the shots
SSvetha Rao, better known as Raja Kumari, had had enough. For seven years, the Indian-American rapper, singer, recording artist and Grammy-nominated songwriter had been dealing with the whims of record labels. “There was a string of men between me and the music,” she says. “And so many opinions. I had one label head tell me that Indian girls don’t rap. Another said they’ll increase the budget for a music video if I don’t wear a bindi!” Screw this, she said, and started Godmother, her own label.
Through it, she plans to support younger women artists and provide a safe space for them. The inaugural release on Godmother is her new EP, appropriately titled HBIC (“head b**ch in charge”). “It was a statement… it’s not like ‘Oh, I’m better than anyone’. It’s that I’m in control of my life, my music, my brand, my message. With that came such liberation,” she says. ‘Made in India’, a song on the EP, has already made waves, thanks in part to its striking video featuring Bollywood legend Madhuri Dixit. It’s an interpolation of Alisha Chinai’s indipop classic from 1995—Raja Kumari’s version borrows its central refrain, the memorable chorus melody, around which she composes her own interpretation. “I grew up in America, and I would watch this song on Saturday mornings. In America, there were no Indian popstars. When I saw her, that really registered. She was a full-on popstar living her best life. I’ve always loved this song,” she says.
Kumari has, aside from her own music, been a songwriter for globally recognised names, sharing writing credits with the likes of Iggy Azalea, Gwen Stefani,
Fall Out Boy. She has worked in Bollywood. While working with Gwen Stefani, she had a revelation. “I cannot half-ass my music career. I can sit here and write songs [for others] forever, and people will think that songs written by a South Asian woman are good enough. But she’s not good enough to sing them. It ignited in me the feeling that if my words are good enough to sell millions of records, why can’t I do it with my face, my identity, my culture?”
A central theme of identity runs through her work. By her own admission, her earlier music was more aggressive, but ‘Made in India’ features growth and acceptance; it’s softer. The foundation remains the same, but she’s exploring deeper emotions around it. “I rewrote the lyrics to make it an anthem for the diaspora and the world. There’s this talk of how if you’re an Indian outside India, you don’t understand the culture. But the diaspora is also building its own culture. I call myself the bridge. I want to deal with the duality of my existence.”
The music video, co-directed by Kumari, features several young girls, symbolic of the many different lives and faces of girls and women in India. Halfway through, Kumari is joined by Madhuri Dixit, whom she has known for a while. “Madhuri—the great MD!—gave me that archetype of how to be that beautiful, bubbly Indian woman, that sort of grace. Sexy and fun. She gave me the archetype of who I want to be.” ■