With its peppy numbers, stylised videos and loads of oomph, the Indian music video culture added a lot of zing to our TV sets in the late ’90s and early 2000s. It also gave rise to a new breed of musicians who commanded a fan following equal to that of a popular Bollywood star. However, lack of support from music channels spelt doom for many of these artistes who could not even manage to come up with a second album. While some explored new avenues, others just sank into oblivion. We chatted with a few to get an insight about creativity, stardom and being away from the public eye.

Band of Boys, featuring Karan Oberoi (centre), (L-R) Sangeet Haldipur, Chaitanya Bhonsle and Sherrin Varghese, was India’s first boy band. It was formed in 2001

Heady start
Many singers in music videos were youngsters who became overnight stars. While boys swooned over Meghna Naidu in UMI10’s remix version of Kaliyon ka chaman, Shefali Zariwala gained notoriety as the ‘thong girl’ among college-goers. Meghna is currently doing a period drama on TV while the latter has settled down with actor, Parag Tyagi. The most meteoric rise was, perhaps that of Abhijeet Sawant, India’s first common man superstar. He tells us, “I never expected to be a star and that too through a reality show. In fact, I was worried after the finals as neither did I  understand contracts nor did I have much clarity on what I would be expected to do as a ‘singing superstar’.