‘City Locals’ Made Me Famous In India: Raja Kumari

Mumbai: Indian-American rapper-songwriter Raja Kumari says her single, City Locals, is very close to her heart as it introduced her to the realities of India.

Her debut single in India “City locals”, featuring hip-hop star DIVINE, has now been certified three times platinum by IMI (Indian Music Industry).

The 2017 song has garnered over 37 million views till date on YouTube. It carried an old school hip-hop vibe accompanied with lyrics that captured the hustle of Mumbai. The video was shot in 24 hours.

Talking about the song, Raja said: “‘City slums’ will always be close to my heart because it is the song that really introduced me to India. The love I felt living and touring through India for the past few years is always remembered in this song. A special thanks to DIVINE for collaborating on this record, it’s been a really fun ride.”

On the work front, she recently came out with her new single “Peace”, through which she wants to encourage people to look within themselves to find “true inner peace”.

“Peace” is the second single from Raja’s debut album. The first one was “N.R.I.”

“Mentally, I knew I had to reset in order to focus on myself and my family, and this song was written as a mantra of positive affirmations for peace in my life,” Raja said.

“We shot this video in the middle of quarantine. Although I’m used to having a big crew on set to handle everything from location scouting to glam and make-up, all I had in LA was me and Shawn Thomas (long-time director and collaborator) and the help of my manager and assistant (all socially distanced with masks!). It definitely was a challenge to start from the beginning again, doing all the styling and hair and make-up myself,” she added.