One day you’re making music in your bedroom, and the next, millions of people have an opinion about who you are. For 20-year-old Kushagra, that shift came with “Finding Her,” the breakout single that has now crossed 500 million streams, a milestone most artists spend years chasing.
His new single “Jiyara,” released September 17, moves in the opposite direction. Where “Finding Her” introduced him to a mass audience, “Jiyara” is quiet and built around a single feeling: the realization that comes only after someone has left.
Kushagra speaks to Rest In Beats about his life away from the spotlight, his complicated relationship with numbers, the lyric in “Jiyara” he hopes listeners won’t miss, and the version of himself he hopes to become.
You’re 20 and from Dehradun. What does your day-to-day look like right now, away from all of this?
Honestly, it’s pretty normal for someone my age. I wake up, go to the gym, and make my own coffee. I love doing that myself every day, grinding the beans and going through the whole process. I listen to a ridiculous amount of music every day, and it’s very mixed. One moment I’ll be listening to rap, the next I’ll be listening to a ghazal. These days I’m also trying boxing, so there’s training, and then I make music.
People often assume you’re classically trained. Where does your musical grounding actually come from?
I want to clear that up, because it’s important. I’m not classically trained. I always wanted to learn classical music, but somehow it never happened. Everything I’ve put out and everything I understand about music comes from observation. Whoever’s music I’ve heard since childhood, whatever I’ve absorbed along the way, that’s what defines my music.
What’s something about being 20 and suddenly visible that nobody really prepares you for?
Probably the fact that people form an opinion about you before they’ve actually met you. One day you’re just making music in your room, and suddenly thousands, even millions, of people have their own version of who you are. That’s a strange thing to process at this age.
But I’ve also realized I don’t need to constantly prove that I’m growing. I’m allowed to be young, make mistakes, have fun, disappear for a bit, and come back with something completely different. That’s literally what your 20s are supposed to be.
“Finding Her” has crossed 500 million streams. Has that number changed the way you look at your own music, or do you try not to let numbers influence what you create?
I’d be lying if I said numbers don’t matter to me. If you look at the industry today, the listeners, the whole ecosystem, numbers tell you how many people are enjoying your music and how far it has traveled. So crossing 500 million on “Finding Her” makes me the happiest person on Earth. I’m very, very grateful.
But numbers are a strange thing. They can tell you how far a song has traveled, but they can’t tell you why someone is sitting alone at 2 a.m. listening to it, or who they’re thinking about while they do. “Finding Her” has given me a lot of confidence, but I don’t want to spend the rest of my career trying to recreate one number. If I start making music for the algorithm, I’ll lose the reason I started making music in the first place. I’d rather make something that lasts than something that just performs.
Was there a particular emotion or experience that became the starting point for “Jiyara”?
Lyrically, “Jiyara” is my favorite track, because it’s a feeling everyone has had at some point. You must have heard people say, “When I leave, they’ll understand my value.” And it’s true. It’s often only after someone leaves that you realize what they meant to you.
I didn’t want to write a dramatic love story. I wanted to capture the quieter side of it, what happens after they’re gone. The person realizes they were wrong, that they could have taken care of her. And somewhere at the back of their mind, they know that no matter how much they apologize now, things can’t go back to how they were. The song lives in that phase of realization. It’s the kind of love that sits with you when nobody is around. For me, “Jiyara” is less about what happens between two people and more about what happens inside you when you really feel something.
Was the understated sound on “Jiyara” a conscious production choice from the start?
Very much. We wanted to leave some space. Today there’s a temptation to keep adding things, because you always can. Another layer, another sound or another drop. But sometimes the most emotional thing you can do is just let a voice and a melody exist. “Jiyara” needed to breathe. I wanted it to feel intimate, almost like you’re overhearing a thought rather than being presented with a song.
Is there a moment in “Jiyara” that people might miss on the first listen but that means the most to you?
There are two, and they work together. The first is the second verse, my absolute favorite part, both lyrically and in terms of composition. For a fraction of a second, I go a little deeper and a little sadder. The line goes, “Saath tere likhi thi taqdeer meri, tere jaane se phir so gayi hai” (I had written my destiny with you by my side, but when you left, my destiny fell asleep too).
That’s where the guy in the song reaches the peak of his realization. The future he had written with her, the one he had imagined her being part of, has gone to sleep since she left. It’s the moment he fully accepts his mistakes and his flaws.
The second is what comes right after. The song tries to lift itself back up. He tries one more time, with hope: “Hamesha tera saath nibhaunga, likhoon main teri khaatir, gaaunga. Baitha hoon taak mein, teri aas mein, chal saath mein mere” (I’ll always stand by you. I’ll write for you, I’ll sing for you. I’m waiting for you, holding on to hope. Come, walk with me). He’s owning every mistake and asking for just one more chance. That turn, from the lowest point back toward hope, is incredibly special to me.
What do you want “Jiyara” to say about you as an artist that “Finding Her” never got the chance to?
“Finding Her” introduced me to a lot of people. “Jiyara” is hopefully where they get to know me a little better. I don’t want to be an artist who is defined by one sound, one song, or one moment. “Finding Her” showed maybe 5 percent of me. “Jiyara” shows that I’m also interested in restraint, vulnerability, and letting a song exist without making it louder than it needs to be. If “Finding Her” made people discover Kushagra, I hope “Jiyara” makes them curious about what comes next.
Is there a version of Kushagra five years from now that would surprise the Kushagra who wrote “Finding Her”?
If the Kushagra five years from now isn’t surprising to the Kushagra of today, then I probably haven’t taken enough risks or put everything into my work. I don’t know if I’ll be making the same kind of music, living in the same place, or even thinking about music the same way. Honestly, I like that uncertainty. A lot of things in life shouldn’t be planned, and I feel the more unplanned an artist’s life is, the more creatively they can work.
I just hope that five years from now I’m still curious, still making things because I have something to say, not because I know they’ll work. I’d rather surprise myself than successfully repeat myself.
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