Mid-Day Anniversary Special: Tejas Mangeshkar recalls how his group pioneered Mumbai`s underground electronic music scene

When we meet Tejas Mangeshkar and Mukul Deora at Social, Khar, Mangeshkar informs us that this was once a club called Squeeze, where this writer spent many a nights dancing in 2007. Both of them were going down memory lane as we chatted. “We used to just drive around in our car, and be like, let’s do a gig here. We would talk to the manager, and get complete control of the space.” That’s how they found the venue of their first gig, Madness at Ramee Guestline near Khar station. Now, it’s called Voltage.

“That’s where the first gig happened,” said Mangeshkar as he added, “Once, cops came by thinking it was a dance bar. And we had to run away.” Deora laughed, “I couldn’t have left my records behind, they were sourced from all over the world, wherever we travelled. They were so heavy to carry. It was like a movie scene, us running through the kitchens, and then climbing a wall.”

Tejas Mangeshkar (right) and Mukul Deora held their first party at Madness (now Voltage) in Khar. PICS/SATEJ SHINDE

Deora and Mangeshkar were co-founders of Bhavishyavani Future Soundz (Bha), a group credited with pioneering Mumbai’s underground electronic music scene. Back then, they played drum and bass and other alternative music, the kind that Mumbai hadn’t heard before [both Mangeshkar and Deora were on DJing duties], and had the cool crowd frequenting their gigs. “For us, it was important to set the vibe. 

We didn’t want this naatak of no stags and all. It was supposed to be a place where people who liked music could go. We also decided on the décor, and the drinks. We used to make fliers — there was no social media so we would send out fliers. You could attend this party. Your money, your sex, your age, your clothes, nothing was a problem,” said Deora. Today, Deora is a producer (White Tiger), and musician (his album Stray came out in 2006), and is working on couple of movie projects, while Mangeshkar runs BHA Future Co, a design and branding company behind brands such as Nicobar and Raw Pressery.

“It was an amazing time where we had graphic designers, musicians, wannabe filmmakers. People who just wanted to do something. I would say alternative was the right word,” said Deora and Mangeshkar added, “There was the MTV crowd, and the fashion magazine crowd everyone was there, we were the GenZ of that time.”

Deora felt that it was a time when you had to go out if you had to meet people. He explained, “There was no Netflix and no Internet, so if you didn’t go out, you didn’t meet anyone.” And where do they party now? Mangeshkar laughed, “At home.” But they like Bonobo, Social and G5A. “But you know what’s nice now — people are making a living by making music. I’m very happy about that. When I was growing up, it wasn’t possible in India,” said Deora.

Asked about one standout memory from those times, and they smile at each other. Deora began, “Once I was playing a set at Razzberry Rhinoceros and at Raz, you had this whole Bollywood crowd. And there were these two guys and a girl in the crowd, I think they were Bollywood extras, you know like actors. And they did a whole 20-minute choreography there, where the boys fight it out for the girl, all to the beat of the music. It could have been a video, but we didn’t have any phones then.” Mangeshkar recalled, “We were playing at a place in Bandra. The club was in a residential building, and every few songs, the manager would come and tell us to lower the volume, and as he left, we would crank it up again. He then came with a silver gun. So we said, okay, we will stop, but then we went on.”

2006
The year Deora’s album was out