The first thing that comes to your mind when you think of the supremely-talented singer Benny Dayal, is the term ‘swag.’ He defines it, personifies it and it helps that he’s one of the most sensuous male voices in industry today with a face to match. A week ago, his latest release, Sher Khul Gaye, from Siddharth Anand’s Fighter featuring Hrithik Roshan and Deepika Padukone sees him share the track with Vishal & Sheykhar and Shilpa Rao; and already has more than 30 million views and counting on YouTube alone. Benny is a rockstar and you can’t deny it.
But Benny is no new name to fame. If you were in college in the early 2000s, he was already quite the star and was a regular at college fests across the country, with quite the fan following even then. He has since gone on to win several awards for songs like Pappu Can’t Dance from Jaane Tu Ya Jaane Na (2008) and Kaise Mujhe from Ghajini (2008), incidentally both composed by AR Rahman, with whom he has had several hits till date.
The singer-composer was born and raised in Abu Dhabi, UAE and went on to complete his bachelors and masters degree from Madras Christian College, Chennai. He has sung over 3,500 songs since his debut in 2002 with the song Maya Maya in Rajinikanth-starrer Baba and was also a member of the South Indian pop ensemble band S5. He now also performs with his band Funktuation and has released a solo, earlier this year, Mehki, as a single from an upcoming album. The video of the single also featured his wife, Catherine Dayal.
Christmas has been a special time for the singer and his family every year and while it might not be a religious observance among his kin, Benny has always held that the festival is very special to him. Keeping that in mind, we reached out to him for our Christmas special cover, this year, and also decided to catch up to talk about his career, his new releases, what we can expect from him in the year to come and lots more...
“I’ve celebrated Christmas all my life in the UAE and my father made Christmas a big deal for us, every single year. We always had a tree; we didn’t have turkey, but we always had a chicken roast; and a whole lot of Christmas parties with relatives, family and friends and the clubs that we visited often. When I was growing up in Abu Dhabi, it was a smaller city, today it’s much bigger but within that community, we’ve had such fantastic Christmases and I only have fond memories of the festival,” begins Benny as we caught up with him earlier this week.
With Sher Khul Gaye getting so much attention in such a short span of time, we ask Benny what the last few months of 2023 looked like in terms of his career. “Just before this, I released a track for Battlegrounds Mobile India that I composed, Jeeto, that has already been streamed over 15 million times. There was also the Bollywood Music Project which returned for the third edition after a break of two years, thanks to the COVID-19 lockdowns,” Benny adds.
But we are sure, this year, it was his Malayalam hits that got him more attention. Being Malayali by ethnicity, this must be a big deal, we enquire. “Of course it was. I didn’t have too many Hindi or Tamil releases this year, but all my Malayalam songs were immediate hits. I sang for King of Kotha, RDX, Kasargold and Otta and all the songs are now hits. I am so thankful to the industry for the love and appreciation,” he tells us.
And will we be seeing anymore releases in other languages? “Yes, there are the songs from Tiger 3 in Tamil and Telugu and I have a whole bunch of my own music coming out soon too,” Benny enthuses.
Known for his dexterous voice that easily aligns to both western styles of music, film music and Indian classical music with equal ease, we are always left wondering where this journey started.“I was actually in my final year of school, I was 17 and I knew that singing makes me happy. I was singing in choirs by then and in bands and I fought for it. Thankfully, my fights were fruitful and today I am here, as a singer, happy with what I am doing. If I was not a singer, I’m not sure what I would have become as the joy I find in singing is permanent, while every other joy seems temporary,” the multifaceted artiste explains.
We, however, know that this is a lie and remind him that he can also dance really well. “I can dance, I won’t deny it, but I don’t think I can make a career out of it. I think one should do things that they’re really good at. My life policy is do one thing and do it really well,” he says and bursts into peals of unbridled laughter.
Known for his flair with languages, Benny is not someone who was prepared for such a multilingual career. Singing in Tamil, Telugu, Kannada, Malayalam, Hindi, Bengali, Marathi and Gujarati; the singer is always open to a challenge. “I learnt to be comfortable with languages on the job. I didn’t come into the industry with a catalogue of languages ready. I just told myself that if I needed to do it and wanted to do it, I would find a way to do it,” he avers.
And how do you compose your own music, we ask? “I create the stencil. If I hear a nice beat, on social media or in an elevator or anywhere for that matter, I’ll do a voice recording and then ensure I use it later when we compose our music. I take inspiration from here and there. I compose my music by ear. In Funktuation, we’re nine people doing what three people could do and we love the creative energy. I’d have it no other way,” he tells us.
We’ve already chatted for quite some time now and so we decide to wrap the interview up with our last two questions. First, we are keen to know how the singer manages to look so dapper all the time! He has been adjudged as one of the best dressed men in India, several times in a row. “You’re being too kind. But it’s simple, I follow one rule: dress like a million bucks while outside, but dress like a gardener at home,” he replies with a smile.
And finally, what can we look forward to in 2024? “Well, there’s lots really. Quite a few film song releases, the remaining of my solo album and a brand new album from Funktuation, Funk Vazhga,” he concludes.
Sher Khul Gaye is streaming on all audio platforms and YouTube.
romal@newindianexpress.com
@elromal