Chandigarh
Chandigarh () is a planned city in India. Chandigarh is bordered by the state of Punjab to the west and the south, and by the state of Haryana to the east. It constitutes the bulk of the Chandigarh Capital Region or Greater Chandigarh, which al ...
in 2008, and based in
New Delhi
New Delhi (, , ''Naī Dillī'') is the capital of India and a part of the National Capital Territory of Delhi (NCT). New Delhi is the seat of all three branches of the government of India, hosting the Rashtrapati Bhavan, Parliament House ...
since 2015. The band's current lineup consists of lead guitarist - Paras Thakur, bassist - Ramit Mehra, and drummer and percussionist - Sahil Sarin. In April 2022, the band announced that their vocalist / frontman Raman Negi has left the band.
Having started their career by releasing a stream of singles, the band's debut album ''Aalas Ka Pedh'' was released in 2015 and their second album ''Vaaqif'' followed in 2018. Both the albums have been among the top 5 most-streamed rock music albums on
Apple Music
Apple Music is a music, audio and video streaming service developed by Apple Inc. Users select music to stream to their device on-demand, or they can listen to existing playlists. The service also includes the Internet radio stations Apple M ...
communalism
Communalism may refer to:
* Communalism (Bookchin), a theory of government in which autonomous communities form confederations
* , a historical method that follows the development of communities
* Communalism (South Asia), violence across ethnic ...
and
faith
Faith, derived from Latin ''fides'' and Old French ''feid'', is confidence or trust in a person, thing, or In the context of religion, one can define faith as "belief in God or in the doctrines or teachings of religion".
Religious people often ...
which has made them popular with younger audiences across India.
The Local Train frequently performs at live events and music festivals in India. They performed at Bacardi NH7 Weekender, SULAFEST, One Plus Music Fest, Red Bull Tour Bus, Grub Fest and Sympulse Fest. Their music has been featured in
Pan Nalin
Nalin Kumar Pandya or Pan Nalin is a filmmaker of Indian origin. Nalin is best known for directing award-winning movies like Samsara, Valley of Flowers, and Angry Indian Goddesses. His debut feature SAMSARA (Miramax) was worldwide critical a ...
's 2015 film
Angry Indian Goddesses
''Angry Indian Goddesses'' is a 2015 Indian Hindi-language drama film directed by Pan Nalin and produced by Gaurav Dhingra and Pan Nalin under the banner Jungle Book Entertainment. It stars Sandhya Mridul, Tannishtha Chatterjee, Sarah-Jane Dia ...
, which premiered at the
Toronto International Film Festival
The Toronto International Film Festival (TIFF, often stylized as tiff) is one of the largest publicly attended film festivals in the world, attracting over 480,000 people annually. Since its founding in 1976, TIFF has grown to become a permane ...
Chandigarh
Chandigarh () is a planned city in India. Chandigarh is bordered by the state of Punjab to the west and the south, and by the state of Haryana to the east. It constitutes the bulk of the Chandigarh Capital Region or Greater Chandigarh, which al ...
in 2008 when Ramit, who was working in radio, theatre and performing with several local bands, collaborated with Raman on a song. Soon after, Ramit introduced Raman to Sahil, a well-known independent musician and educator in the circuit, who had known Ramit since their school days and they formed The Local Train. In 2011, Paras joined the band, replacing Abhinav, and dropped out of his
civil engineering
Civil engineering is a professional engineering discipline that deals with the design, construction, and maintenance of the physical and naturally built environment, including public works such as roads, bridges, canals, dams, airports, sewage ...
course. In 2012, Raman quit his job at TCS to pursue music full time and the band relocated to
Delhi
Delhi, officially the National Capital Territory (NCT) of Delhi, is a city and a union territory of India containing New Delhi, the capital of India. Straddling the Yamuna river, primarily its western or right bank, Delhi shares borders w ...
. Throughout this period, they functioned independently; they handled the management and logistics while simultaneously working on songs and releasing them online. Their single Choo Lo was released on MySpace in 2009 and continued to be refined until its music video release in 2011. Other singles released then include "Aaoge Tum Kabhi" and "Kaisey Jiyun" in 2014.
2015 - 2016
The Local Train had recorded most of their debut album ''Aalas Ka Pedh'' when they won Sennheiser's first Top50 band talent hunt in India in 2015, bagging an endorsement from Sennheiser. They finished the album, which contained two of their previously released singles, and released it with Flying Carpet Productions in September 2015. The album was mastered by Chris Hesse and was one of the highest selling Indian rock albums of the year, featuring on the “Most Streamed Rock Albums'' list on Apple Music India. In November 2015 they signed on with Spectal Management.
The Local Train worked extensively with The Morpheus Productions for their initial music videos. The first video was for "Aaoge Tum Kabhi", which featured in
Pan Nalin
Nalin Kumar Pandya or Pan Nalin is a filmmaker of Indian origin. Nalin is best known for directing award-winning movies like Samsara, Valley of Flowers, and Angry Indian Goddesses. His debut feature SAMSARA (Miramax) was worldwide critical a ...
's 2015 film
Angry Indian Goddesses
''Angry Indian Goddesses'' is a 2015 Indian Hindi-language drama film directed by Pan Nalin and produced by Gaurav Dhingra and Pan Nalin under the banner Jungle Book Entertainment. It stars Sandhya Mridul, Tannishtha Chatterjee, Sarah-Jane Dia ...
that premiered at The
Toronto International Film Festival
The Toronto International Film Festival (TIFF, often stylized as tiff) is one of the largest publicly attended film festivals in the world, attracting over 480,000 people annually. Since its founding in 1976, TIFF has grown to become a permane ...
. Their second music video for Kaise Jiyun featured a performance by choreographer Ryan Martyr. The Dil Mere video was shot in
Solang Valley
Solang Valley derives its name from combination of words Solang (Nearby village) and Nallah (water stream). It is a side valley at the top of the Kullu Valley in Himachal Pradesh, India 14 km northwest of the resort town Manali on the way ...
and Manali, and was produced by Snow Leopard Productions, and Atharva Studios.
2017 - Present
The Local Train released Khudi in 2017, a single from their second album. Its music video starred
Arjun Mathur
Arjun Mathur (born 18 October 1981) is a British people, British-Indian people, Indian actor working predominantly in Bollywood films, web series and television serials. He was seen internationally in the British drama series, ''Indian Summers' ...
, was directed by Vijesh Rajan and produced by Jungle Book Entertainment. It won Platinum Film of The Year at the 2017 India Film Project Awards. The second album Vaaqif was released in January 2018, with mixing and mastering done by Erich Talaba. The band toured extensively in 21 cities before the album launch. In 2018, they released Mizaaj's music video, their first foray into animation that was conceptualized and animated by Ekabhuya Animation. A cyber-punk themed animated video for Gustaakh soon followed, produced by Plexus studios and edited by Shreyas Beltangdy. It was selected for the 18th Miami International Science Fiction Film Festival, and chosen as one of
Rolling Stone
''Rolling Stone'' is an American monthly magazine that focuses on music, politics, and popular culture. It was founded in San Francisco, San Francisco, California, in 1967 by Jann Wenner, and the music critic Ralph J. Gleason. It was first kno ...
’s 11 best Indian music videos for 2019.
The band is reported to be currently working on a third album.
In April 2022, it was revealed that vocalist Raman Negi had left the band. However, the band reported they will continue making music.
Hindi
Hindi (Devanāgarī: or , ), or more precisely Modern Standard Hindi (Devanagari: ), is an Indo-Aryan language spoken chiefly in the Hindi Belt region encompassing parts of northern, central, eastern, and western India. Hindi has been de ...
lyrics, and has been described as soulful, evocative, and anthemic. The band cites their musical influences to include
Nirvana
( , , ; sa, निर्वाण} ''nirvāṇa'' ; Pali: ''nibbāna''; Prakrit: ''ṇivvāṇa''; literally, "blown out", as in an oil lampRichard Gombrich, ''Theravada Buddhism: A Social History from Ancient Benāres to Modern Colombo.' ...
,
Aerosmith
Aerosmith is an American Rock music, rock band formed in Boston in 1970. The group consists of Steven Tyler (lead vocals), Joe Perry (musician), Joe Perry (guitar), Tom Hamilton (musician), Tom Hamilton (bass), Joey Kramer (drums) and Brad Whi ...
Porcupine Tree
Porcupine Tree are an English rock band formed by musician Steven Wilson in 1987. During an initial career spanning more than twenty years, they earned critical acclaim from critics and fellow musicians, developed a cult following, and became ...
,
Lucky Ali
Maqsood Mahmood Ali (born 19 September 1958), better known as Lucky Ali, is an Indian singer, songwriter and actor. With several popular singles and albums, he emerged as a significant figure of Indipop during the 1990s.
Early life and educatio ...
,
The 1975
The 1975 are an English pop rock band formed in 2002 in Wilmslow, Cheshire. Now based in Manchester, the band consists of lead vocalist and rhythm guitarist Matthew "Matty" Healy, lead guitarist Adam Hann, bassist Ross MacDonald, and drummer G ...
, and
Alt-J
Alt-J (stylised as alt-J, real name Δ) are an English indie rock band formed in 2007 in Leeds. Their lineup includes Joe Newman (guitar/lead vocals), Thom Sonny Green (drums), Gus Unger-Hamilton (keyboards/vocals), and formerly Gwilym Sainsbur ...
. They’ve expressed a desire to “put the Hindi in the indie”, and to make a mark on audiences looking to switch from mainstream
Bollywood
Hindi cinema, popularly known as Bollywood and formerly as Bombay cinema, refers to the film industry based in Mumbai, engaged in production of motion pictures in Hindi language. The popular term Bollywood, is a portmanteau of "Bombay" (fo ...
to other genres of music.
While Aalas ka Pedh was more
pop-rock
Pop rock (also typeset as pop/rock) is a fusion genre with an emphasis on professional songwriting and recording craft, and less emphasis on attitude than rock music
Rock music is a broad genre of popular music that originated as " rock and ...
inclined, showing the evolution of the band's music, the band started to experiment with larger themes in their second album Vaaqif. The tracks and accompanying videos explore diverse topics and stories including those about
communalism
Communalism may refer to:
* Communalism (Bookchin), a theory of government in which autonomous communities form confederations
* , a historical method that follows the development of communities
* Communalism (South Asia), violence across ethnic ...
,
faith
Faith, derived from Latin ''fides'' and Old French ''feid'', is confidence or trust in a person, thing, or In the context of religion, one can define faith as "belief in God or in the doctrines or teachings of religion".
Religious people often ...
,
existentialism
Existentialism ( ) is a form of philosophical inquiry that explores the problem of human existence and centers on human thinking, feeling, and acting. Existentialist thinkers frequently explore issues related to the meaning, purpose, and valu ...
,
self-actualisation
Self-actualization, in Maslow's hierarchy of needs, is the highest level of psychological development, where personal potential is fully realized after basic bodily and ego needs have been fulfilled.
Self-actualization was coined by the organism ...
, over-dependence on technology, and oppressive regimes.
Tours and Live Shows
The Local Train is prolific in its live performances, with 300 shows performed since October 2015.
* 7 City Summer Tour (2018)
* 7 City Summer Tour (2019)
College festivals
The band has performed at colleges in more than 90 cities across India including
*HILLFFAIR 2016, 2019
National Institute of Technology, Hamirpur
National Institute of Technology Hamirpur (NIT Hamirpur or NITH) is a Public university, public technical university located in Hamirpur, Himachal Pradesh, Hamirpur, Himachal Pradesh, India. It is one of the thirty one List of National Institut ...
*
Indian Institute of Science Education and Research, Pune
Indian Institute of Science Education and Research, Pune (IISER Pune) is an autonomous public university established in 2006. It is one of the seven Indian Institutes of Science Education and Research, and was one of the first IISERs to ...
*
Indian Statistical Institute, Kolkata
Indian Statistical Institute (ISI) is a higher education and research institute which is recognized as an Institute of National Importance by the 1959 act of the Indian parliament. It grew out of the Statistical Laboratory set up by Prasanta ...
*
Indian Institute of Technology, Hyderabad
Indian Institute of Technology, Hyderabad (abbreviated IIT Hyderabad or IITH) is a Public university, public Technical university, technical research university located in Sangareddy district in the Indian state of Telanganaa. As with all Ind ...
*
Indian Institute of Technology, Delhi
The Indian Institute of Technology, Delhi is a public institute of technology located in New Delhi, India. It is one of the 23 IITs created to be Centres of Excellence for training, research and development in science, engineering and technolo ...
*AARUUSH 2018,
SRM Institute of Science and Technology
SRM Institute of Science and Technology (SRMIST), formerly SRM University, is a private higher education institute deemed to be university, located in Kattankulathur, Chengalpattu (near Chennai), Tamil Nadu, India. Founded in 1985 as SRM Engin ...
*Effervescence 2018,
Indian Institute of Information Technology, Allahabad
The Indian Institute of Information Technology, Allahabad (IIIT-Allahabad), is a public university located in Jhalwa, Allahabad (Prayagraj), in Uttar Pradesh. It is one of the twenty-five Indian Institutes of Information Technology listed by ...
Other shows
The band has performed at venues including
Hard Rock Cafe
Hard Rock Cafe, Inc. is a British-based multinational chain of theme restaurants, memorabilia shops, casinos and museums founded in 1971 by Isaac Tigrett and Peter Morton in London. In 1979, the cafe began covering its walls with rock and rol ...