This ‘local-first, sustainability-focused’ conference emphasizes grassroots movements, regional sounds, and city-centric perspectives, ensuring the vibrant sounds of India are heard and celebrated. The Deccan Alternative Music Conference is set to take place on 7th and 8th February 2025 at Kerala Museum, Kochi, Kerala.
BeatCurry Team
With its second edition, Deccan Alternative Music Conference (DeccanAlt or DAMC) is set to electrify Kochi with its unique blend of insightful conversations and showcase performances. Carving its own niche, DAMC champions India’s diverse regional music scene, providing a platform for local artists and fostering a deeper appreciation for the country’s rich musical heritage.
WHAT IS DECCANALT?
Deccan Alternative Music Conference (DAMC) is an annual music business conference that travels across the Deccan region of India, exploring a different city’s music scene each year. Curated under the vision of Prarthana Sen and Vishruti Bindal, founders of the Bengaluru-based music business consultancy Neon Culture, the conference successfully held its inaugural edition in Bangalore. The second edition will take place in the vibrant port city of Kochi on 7th and 8th February 2025.
With a global perspective, DAMC dissects this ecosystem scene by scene, investigating local dynamics, exploring innovative strategies for fan engagement, community building, and international exports, fostering the growth of the independent music scene within the Deccan region and beyond.
WHO SHOULD ATTEND? WHAT TO EXPECT
If you’re an artist, student, music business professional or stakeholder, music creator, or just enthusiast of music, film and everything in between, looking to learn, upskill, understand and network and develop your horizon of work, DAMC is your destination.
Participate in a diverse range of professional development opportunities, including workshops, masterclasses, fireside chats, presentations, case studies, networking opportunities, installations, and explore showcase performances by iconic local indie bands shortlisted for artist showcases at DAMC from across India.
WHY DECCANALT?
Towards understanding why DeccanAlt exists, how it came into existence, and what some of her observations were, Vishruti Bindal says
“When we began attending conferences to grow Neon Culture, we noted that discussions around the realities of people starting out like us, emerging artists wanting to start their career, and addressing grassroots problems, were missing.
We weren’t able to see the merit in India-level conferences being held in metro cities like Mumbai. Given the diversity of Indian culture and the different music scenes, how can one conference per year adequately highlight this in a two-day event? We wanted to move focus. We thought why not start a music business conference that travels to a new city every year, highlighting music scenes across India. We wanted to start something different and fresh.” says Vishruti Bindal, Co-founder and MD, Neon Culture.
To understand the lesser-addressed concerns and narratives, and how DeccanAlt aims to address them and differentiate itself from other conferences, Prarthana Sen says,
“One of the big voids we observed was how only a particular type of success was spoken. I believe that a lot of bigger conferences talk about success on this huge scale, be it millions of streams, money and brand engagements, and the reality is that 90% of the music industry doesn’t have access to or can tap into all of this. There’s no defined path. There’s no clear definition of what success is!”
“Rather, lots of people who do things at a regional level, whose success could be objectively measured in traditional metrics, have their stories never highlighted. It’s not really a clear void, rather it’s a more national versus regional conversation that we try to spark off.” Says Prarthana Sen, Co-founder and MD, Neon Culture.
Talking about collaborations and exchange within artists of our country, Prarthana says, “There is significant untapped potential for music exchange within India and we need to focus on ‘intra-country music export’ – connecting artists from different regions and facilitating collaborations and performances. Our aim is to bring this forward leaning approach through our conferences and conversations.”
Prarthana believes that India’s diverse tapestry of languages, cultures, traditions, attires, and cuisines imbues each town, region, and city with a unique identity. This distinctive character, she says, is largely unexplored and underappreciated.
She believes, “By swiftly recognizing our local strengths and weaknesses and proactively addressing grassroot concerns, we can better prepare for the inevitable emergence of groundbreaking music and breakthrough artists from India.”
READ THE FULL INTERVIEW:
In a short interview with Yash Warrier, founder of BeatCurry.com, here’s what Prarthana Sen and Vishruti Bindal, the co-founders of Neon Culture, curating the DeccanAlt had to say about the upcoming conference. Read to know more.
Do you think that you should be having more than one edition for a city that you have already covered? Like a second edition for Kochi or Bengaluru? How do you think it would work for a ‘traveling conference’ as that of yours, wherein you have already covered culturally happening cities like Kochi and Bengaluru, and now people from those cities are looking forward to the next edition?
“Yes absolutely, once we are done with taking this conference to major cities in the Deccan region, for sure. But the hope is also with us bringing this to cities where people haven’t seen conferences or music business events as such. I feel, with DAMC hosting a music conference in those cities, many other organizations or businesses too would start entering that music market, finding that music scene to be lucrative.” says Prarthana Sen.
“Over the next ten years, we aim to reach ten cities in the Deccan region. This will create a strong network where people from different cities can work together, share ideas, and support each other. We hope to see more local businesses grow and unique things happening across the region. This will also motivate people to explore the music scenes in other cities every year, instead of it being just about one mainstream music scene of a metro city.” says Vishruti Bindal.
Do you envision DeccanAlt expanding its impact to benefit culturally and regionally diverse music scenes, including those from Rajasthan, Punjab, Gujarati Sindh, Assam, Bengal, and the North-East?
Talking about reaching out to other music scenes, Vishruti says, “Yes, we do have that vision. The idea for Deccan Alternative Music Conference is not to restrict ourselves to the Deccan region, but it is to start conversations in the region. We welcome artists from all corners of India to collaborate with us. For instance, we could partner with a collective in the Northeast for a ‘Showcase Night’ at DeccanAlt. This could also facilitate collaborations between different regions, enabling artist showcases and touring opportunities. It’s like, we would hope to have a collective of tour managers coming together at this conference, wanting to drive regional artists touring in a sustainable manner. We want to nudge people in these directions too.”
Why Kochi? What about this city is something you look to explore, learn, make an impact and add value to attendees through your conference?
Elaborating on this point, Prarthana says, “Kochi has always been a melting pot of culture, boasting a rich tapestry of folk traditions, diverse religious expressions of music, and traditional arts that originate from this region of the country. In a contemporary sense, a lot of emerging Indian indie hip-hop and electronic artists specifically, are coming out of Kochi, Trivandrum and Thrissur. A lot of artists also push social boundaries and use music as a powerful platform to address and comment on contemporary social issues.”
Adding further, she says, “The city has also witnessed the Kochi-Muziris Biennale for over a decade every year bringing in thousands of visitors from around the world. Kochi serves as a central hub for artists across Kerala, attracting them with its numerous venues and abundant resources. This is further strengthened by the fact that the Deccan region itself is home to four major film industries. Secondly, artists frequently travel between these cities for gigs, showcases, and festivals. We also felt it was an ideal location to build upon existing connections and leverage word-of-mouth to spread the word about DeccanAlt. That’s why Kochi is an interesting destination to bring the conference to.”
Speaking on the lines of delivering impact, Vishruti says, “We are working on bringing about social impacts and sustainability through initiatives such as waste management, partnerships with local NGOs, engaging women entrepreneurs, and implementing sustainable on-ground branding and decor. Many of these efforts are sustainability-focused, and we envision continuing to prioritize this approach.”
How do you see this concept taking shape? Which other cities would you want to potentially take this conference to? And what does a near future vision for Neon and DAMC look like?
“Honestly, we want to take this concept everywhere! We definitely want to explore a different city each year. I believe a couple of things come into consideration – as to what is the level of activity taking place in that city, is the music scene ready, would implementing and actioning certain takeaways from our conference be possible, locations where we have our existing networks already built.” says Prarthana Sen.
Furthermore she adds, “DeccanAlt is not a conventional music business conference, which is also why we are looking at bringing together people who are just getting started – emerging artists, students, musicians, who don’t know the ropes yet. Hence, our conference tickets are priced in a manner that is accessible and open to all. It shouldn’t be that a platform that you learn, network and grow your work, is inaccessible, else who is it really for? If someone is genuinely eager to attend but facing financial constraints, we encourage them to reach out to us. We will do our best to find a solution to accommodate them.”
Vishruti adds stating this initiative “As a ‘traveling conference’ where we aim to create a strong network of music industry stakeholders and local businesses across cities to share ideas, work together and support each other.”
Closing the interview with Neon Culture’s vision for the future of DeccanAlt, Prarthana Sen says,
“It’s all about staying consistent. That’s for sure. Even if immediate profits aren’t forthcoming, there is impact. So we want to keep it consistent, measure impacts and drive it as a local-first conference true to the identity of the city we are going to.”
GETTING THERE:
-The shortest route via road from Cochin International Airport to Kerala Museum is nearly 20KMs
-The distance from Ernakulam Junction South Rly Stn to Kerala Museum is nearly 11KMs to 12.5KMs
-The distance from Ernakulam Town North Rly Stn to Kerala Museum is nearly 7.5KMs to 8.5KMs
EVENT DETAILS:
What: Deccan Alternative Music Conference
When: 7th and 8th February 2025
Where: The Kerala Museum, Kochi, Kerala
How To Buy Tickets: Get your tickets here
Read more about Neon Culture and DeccanAlt
All information sourced purely for factual reporting purposes only. Courtesy: DeccanAlt, Neon Culture
Photo Courtesy: (Thumbnail Photo credits: Sakshi Nishu instagram.com/sakshinishu)
(DAMC Photo credits: Shivam Ghai instagram.com/iamshivamghai/)
Neon Culture and Deccan Alternative Music Conference
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