Vidya Vox: YouTube sensation mixes her Indian and American identities and finds success
- A painful childhood in the US spent hiding her Indian heritage left the young Vidya isolated
- Meeting the like-minded Shankar Tucker put the pair on the path to ‘electro world dream pop’ stardom
It’s a grey Wednesday in the Downtown Los Angeles Arts District and Vidya Iyer is walking ahead with her boyfriend and collaborator, Shankar Tucker. They’re on the hunt for the area’s famous murals. Despite the overcast skies and unseasonable chill, she is as buoyant as her millions of fans around the world might expect from her music videos.
During the morning’s photo shoot, with only a pants-sari to shield her from the wind, she is eager to talk: holding forth on India, clothes, music, video games, her past and her future.
Only later, over avocado toast in a trendy cafe, will Iyer – better known to her fans as Vidya Vox – let on that she is exhausted, having been awake since 3am, straight off a plane from India. It’s a state that seems less a hardship than a natural way of being for an international, internet pop sensation.
Finally, Iyer is right where she belongs.
Hong Kong musicians fuse jazz, Bollywood and Indian classi cal tunes
An artist with truly broad appeal is increasingly a rarity in the fractious, democratised world of online music – especially one with a unique identity and viewpoint. But, Vidya Vox is exceptional. Since launching an eponymous YouTube channel in 2015, Iyer’s trademark mix of Western pop and classical Indian music has garnered a fan base that avidly consumes her videos to the tune of millions of views a month.
To have a flourishing music career and a prodigious online presence is the dream for many musicians. But, for 29-year-old Iyer, it is just a beginning. She hopes to bring Indian music into the mainstream, doing what BTS have done for Korean pop and Luis Fonsi has done for Latin music.
