Interview: Nikhil Korula discusses his influences and his success as an indie artist

Los Angeles musician Nikhil Korula and his band, the aptly titled Nikhil Korula band, have had great success in their music career. Without the help of a label, they have played major music festivals, released 6 albums and collaborated with members of Dave Matthews Band. I had the opportunity to speak with Nikhil about his background, making it as an independent artist and recreating a live sound in the studio.

Tell me a little bit about how you fuse different styles into your sound.

I started singing when I was a kid in church choir when I was five years old and from that I was asked to be in the Los Angeles Children's Chorus. The group was just starting and I was the youngest founding member. Through that I started singing classical music, freedom marches, gospel hymns and contemporary modern pieces. So I had gotten a lot of experience in that group and it was something that I really enjoyed. By the time I got to college, I was still doing a lot of music and I was traveling a lot, which was influential in learning different rhythms and a lot of different stuff you can do. I want to create a sound where instead of having to travel somewhere to get it, we can bring that sound to people from all of the travels that I and the other guys in the band have had.

When did you know that you were going to be a musician?

The funny thing is I think it chose me long before I knew that I was going to choose it. I had been singing since I was five, but I still didn't think of it like a proper career because I wasn't really focusing on that. I sang opera with Placido Domingo. I sang at the Grammy awards and recorded with Luther Vandross, but singing was just a normal thing all throughout my youth. As I got older, I started singing in a high school jazz choir just to keep singing because it's something that I love to do. I really didn't understand that music had chosen me until I was a freshman at USC and I got accepted in the school of music for opera, but even that wasn't the sign. It was living with all jazz musicians by chance. That was the biggest sign for me. It was like, “Wait a minute.” What are the chances that an apartment is full of music majors by chance. It hasn't happened before and it hasn't happened since. They put me in this room with all of these musicians and it made me think, “maybe this is meant to be”.

Radiohead and Nine Inch Nails have released albums independently, but they had the backing of a studio in the early stages of their career. How do you make it as a true indie artist?

I noticed a lot of bands do that and it's cool that they do that, but to me it's kind of like you've spat in the face of those who made you. That's not really that indie to me. To me, indie is completely trying to break down walls on your own. Bands like that want to make it look like they're heroes but it's really financially motivated. They are getting screwed by these deals, but at the same time they will never understand what it's like to fund a tour on your own dime, when you don't know where the money is going to come from or how many people are going to come to your show. We've been doing things on our own from the beginning, competing for spots against major labels and we're getting them. It really comes down to the music for me. I feel like the way that music is marketed from the labels, someone who doesn't have that much experience or even talent, can be marketed really heavily and could be really successful. We basically cracked every venue around us and we just kept pushing, “What's the next big venue? What's the next big festival? What's the next big stage that we need to reach?” I think there's no better way to do it than that because when you put yourself up against a band that has been marketed for years, the proof is in the pudding when you get on the stage.

Have you run into any trouble booking venues without being associated with a label?

Everybody used to tell us if you represent yourself, you're going to have a problem. Actually, I know people who have been on major labels and they haven't done as much as we have been able to accomplish independently. The one thing I do notice is there is a leniency to give someone who is on a major label an opportunity over a band that's doing it themselves. At the end of the day it comes down to, can the band play and perform in the way that you wanted them to. If a band can do that, you'll be asked back. That's part of the reason we started being asked back to play Bonnaroo and Summerfest. They get input from fans and from the crew saying, “This band is outta sight, we've got to have them back.” We've been getting opportunities not just by hard work, but really how it's received by the audience. That's it. I know a lot of bands get fans through different ways, but we get fans because of what we do.

I think especially at festivals, the crowds are much more responsive to bands through their talent rather than through marketing.

A great thing is that fans see that. Our fans have been loyal to us for years. They keep buying records. They keep coming back to shows. They are the ones who have pushed us up and we still know that we have a long way to go, but it's amazing to see how passionate people can be about music and our fans make a difference when they tell someone about what we do.

With all that being said, would you like to work with a major label?

That's a really difficult and delicate question. On one side, I love that I can make music in the studio and release it to fans the way I want it to be. The second thing is when you work with a label, sometimes they are going to want to weigh in on how a mix or a song should be. They give input when they may not have the background in music where they really understand what they are asking. The guys I trust are the guys that I'm making music with, the guys I'm working in the studio with. That's who's opinions I will ask. I'm not really interested in working with people who don't have that kind of musical background, so it's very delicate because I love making music and being able to release it to the fans right away, but there are advantages with a label. They can market it way easier and with much more of a powerhouse than we can. But sometimes, they will pick up an artist really fast and then spit them out just as fast and we're still here. I don't know if our band is something that a label would want to keep for as long as we've been around.

What's next for the Nikhil Korula Band?

We will start touring heavily in October and we are working on a music video. I can't say too much about it, but it's going to be pretty extraordinary. It's going to be shot on the Santa Monica pier and we have a lot of great people involved with it so it should be cool.

You can pick up Nikhil's new EP, featuring Butch Taylor and Jeff Coffin from Dave Matthews Band, “The Solo Sessions” at iTunes.

For more information about how Nikhil collaborated with Butch Taylor and Jeff Coffin, head over to examiner.com.