Band Interview: Jayant Bhadula (Vocals) of Bloodywood (Written/Audio)

Indian heavy metal/folk band Bloodywood stopped over in London during their mammoth European tour recently. A show that was sold out and saw a diverse collection of fans go absolutely wild for the hard-working band’s music. Bloodywood delivering an immense showcase of their debut album, Rakshak at The Electric Ballroom in Camden. It was a 10/10 show and you can read our full review here.

A few hours before the show, we grabbed a quick chat with vocalist Jayant Bhadula. You can read a transcript of the interview below. Or listen to the full thing via Soundcloud, Spotify, Apple Podcasts, and YouTube.

Thank you for taking the time to speak with me. How are you feeling?

Oh, excited, but tired too, it was not a long journey, but it has been hectic for us. So now we are very excited because it’s the biggest, I’d say, club headline show that we’ve done. So everyone’s super excited and we’re filming it as well today.

You’re filming the show?

Yeah. That’s why we were so busy today. An impulse decision, but we were like, you know what, we’re never going to get to do this again, let’s just film it as well. We then also got a message from our manager saying the same thing, you got to record it.

We just organised everything in the last two days. I won’t even say two days. Yesterday we were like, oh, we are getting LED screens. Okay, we do not have graphics. Let’s figure that out. We were messaging a light engineer in India, like, hey, we need notes, what do you do? So we’ve given the notes to the light engineer of Electric Ballroom. Then Karan went and stepped in and they discussed every song, played them, did the lighting there. That’s how we’re managing it today.

It’s going to be incredible.

Hopefully!

The tour has been insane. You’ve been on the road throughout all of March across Europe. London is the penultimate show. Are you just looking forward to having a rest after tomorrow?

Yes, definitely. Five shows in a row, one day off and in India you do not do such extensive metal shows, I’d say at least tours. We do practise, like, every day, six hours for like two months before the tour starts, but it’s in a controlled environment. But then to do it every day on the road, where you got to travel also the whole time is something else.

There’s no off days really, is there? I mean, you wake up in the morning, you’re feeling a bit rough, you don’t really have much choice but to carry on!

The off days are basically laundry days. So, you’re just carrying, like, trash bags full of dirty clothes.

No chance to spend time wandering the city?

We planned things. We were like, hey, we’re going to do this, we’re going to do that. Nothing happened. Everyone was tired. Everyone was waking up at, like, eleven in the morning, like, oh, no, let’s just get back in the bunk again in the bus. So, yeah, it’s not as glamorous as people think. Like, oh, wow, you’re in a band. You guys are touring the world. Yeah, we see streets wherever we park.

The overall experience of the tour, as a group, what has it meant to you to be in so many countries, so many cities, as we said already, with almost every date sold out.

At least something that I can say about this experience is that not a lot of Indian bands have done this, at least to this extent that we’re doing. On top of that, What has been happening with Bloodywood is a very steady graph upwards, which is, like, enabling us to do shows like these.

Like I said, Electric Ballroom and everything, which we could never dream of. At least it wasn’t in my dreams. I wanted to, but it wasn’t something that I thought would be achievable in the next five years, six years, because we’re just seven years old. So we weren’t expecting this to be happening so quick. But we are thankful it’s and it’s all because of the fans that we’ve got all over the world.

Sometimes even we are overwhelmed on the stage. Like, hey, it’s not happening for the first time, but, wow, it is happening again. There’s so much love that we receive.

You’re still struggling to take it in. That reaction across all these cities and countries.

Not struggling. It’s just, like, overwhelming in a good way, even. We sometimes, just a little bit, tear up. Like, oh, fuck, this happening again.

Wow. What has been your most eye opening show of the tour so far?

Scotland. So Scotland was a little, I’d say, not divided. Like, there were some people that were just standing still, but you could hear their voices because it was so loud. They started this chant and then midway during our set, it turned into Bloody, Bloody, Bloody Fucking Wood. So that I was like, wow.

Those moments where you could look at every face and know that they were enjoying themselves.

Yeah. Every time at least the light went on, at least.

Do you feel like you’re finally able to capitalise on Rakshak and its popularity now?

We were supposed to tour in March 2022. We released it in Feb 2022. We placed the release around the tour as well, figuring, hey, we release an album, we get on the road immediately. But there were so many problems just getting a visa because of COVID and all the restrictions and everything that was happening around the world, that we were just like, we’ll have to push it because there’s no other way that we can do this.

So we pushed it a year and now the whole album went into, like I won’t call it limbo because we did tour that year, but that was a festival run. This one was more important because, again, it’s headline shows and you’re meeting people directly, you’re getting to talk to them. It’s more intimate, I’d say. So this was more important for us. So pushing it. Now at least we’re able to get the name of the album back out again. And the majority of the people, because they’ve heard the album so many times, they know the lyrics as well, so that makes it even better.

In your opinion, what is it about Bloodywood that’s captured the minds and hearts of so many people around the world? That’s the thing. It’s not localised, it’s the world.

I’d say we write from the heart, like, whatever the words that you listen to. There are no ghost writers sitting somewhere just writing lyrics for us or something. It’s just something that either we have experienced or we know people who have experienced. So when we talk about these things in our music, I think it resonates with people on a personal level. Because, again, like I said, either we’ve gone through it or we know someone who’s gone through it. So it’s easier for us to channelize those emotions and things that we talk about.

It’s not just happening in a local pocket in India. It’s happening all over the world. Some people choose not to talk about it. Some people do talk about it. That’s why people listen to their stuff and how do I say, associate themselves, being a part of the music. And that’s what I think happens with Bloodywood as well.

That is an important aspect. Do you see yourselves as flagbearers in a way for the Indian metal scene now?

I wouldn’t say we are the flagbearers of the movement, but I certainly would say that, yes, that is being spread through us. Because a lot of people actually tell us that, oh, we didn’t even know there’s metal in India. And I was like, that is weird because it’s such a big country. It surprises me because the amount of Indian bands I used to listen to when I was growing up, it just blew my mind. I was like, Why isn’t that out there? Why isn’t it internationally known?

Now I see it because there’s definitely a little distance between the metal world and India. A little bit that it’s not yet explored. We surely do open those gates, but I won’t call us the flag bearers. That is Sahil Makhija.

Of course!

I’ve been seeing him since I was a kid!

What is the glass ceiling that you think exists for the Indian metal scene that means, as you say, it’s not well known elsewhere?

It’s a little tricky for me to answer that because for us, our vision was very streamlined since the time we put out the first cover. It was very streamlined that we need to put a mark on the international market. You cannot, especially being a metal band, because other genres, I personally think, for example, Bollywood, it’s not that big all over the globe, but in India, it’s the biggest, so people can do that. But with metal, specifically, when the market is so saturated and you want to make a living out of doing what you love, you definitely need to look at the global scenario.

So, for us, it was very streamlined, like what we want to do. And that’s why we put out covers, so that we could have eyeballs, so people would come down. Like, if there are 10,000 people who will come and listen to the original. You’re there. That’s what you need. You need global eyeballs. So that’s what we did. And right now I think everyone is trying to do that. But where we got lucky with all the hard work was finding our own sound.

The sound that we play today is a direct result of experimenting.

Have you run into many people who cite themselves as fans of Bloodywood from the very start?

A lot of those guys. We have people who are like, oh, we’ve been listening to you since this track. And I’m like, oh, that was the fourth one released. So we’ve got so many of those who are like, in for the long game. They just believed in us. And those guys are the initial reason where we could be because they stuck with us and they’re still with us.

It’s incredible that it’s only been seven years. Which is a long time in itself, but a couple of those years are COVID related, so not really a lot happened. What’s your proudest achievement to date with Bloody Wood?

It’s going to sound very cheesy, but the proudest achievement is the amount of people that just come out, because no awards, no money to be gained can ever come close. In the middle of a show, we take a moment before we start speaking again because we’re tired, so we’re just adjusting our clothes, whatever, and a pocket starts into a chant. The amount of support – I say this in good ways – but we almost have, like, rabid fans. In the good way, because they want more music from us. They want to give us their love and us give it back, so we try to do that when the rooms are a little smaller because it’s easier to meet people. Or when we’re not tired.

When we do that, we hear people telling us their stories, how they got into us, how it helped them, or maybe how they just had fun listening to it and just didn’t go back ever again after that. So this is irreplaceable. That’s more addictive than any drug, I’d say.

I can attest to the rabid nature as well, because Bloodstock 2022 was the first time I saw you guys play live. And watching that crowd and that heat, if you remember as well, that heat was insane. Absolutely incredible and this is not the end for this year. You’re in the US in May, supporting Gojira in June, Japan at the end of June. Is it fair to say that Bloodywood is becoming, at least at this stage, based off all of that, a bit of a global phenomenon?

I won’t deny that. I actually like the ring of it, honestly. I don’t know. We still have to see. Honestly, with the reception, the first US tour we did back in September, the reception was out of the world. So that is where I realised that people are listening to us on different parts of the world.

Links

Website | Bandcamp | Facebook | Instagram | Twitter | YouTube