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Popular Instagram and Tiktok singers Kiran and Nivi shared how they first started singing together, and how they went from singing covers to releasing their own single ‘ 8 Billion People’.
The duo, who are also twin siblings, started singing Indian classical music at the age of 2, and slowly transitioned into singing pop covers on social media.
“The aspect of singing together has always been there from day one. And then we kind of explored new genres and that’s how it came about.”
The first cover that Kiran and Nivi sang was ‘This is my now’ by Jordan Sparks, and they performed the song live at several events at their high school. From there, they continued to sing and perform hundreds of covers before transitioning to original music.
“What made us grow [on social media] was definitely the covers, and the videos we post on reels.”
Their most recent single ‘8 Billion People’ has hit 10 million streams, which the duo wrote together.
“It just started off with the chorus, and then we kind of teased … we posted that portion on TikTok, and then overnight, it went viral.”
After the chorus of the song blew up on social media, Kiran and Nivi completed the rest of the single, and produced the song to be released.
“It did take a while for us [to produce it]. We did distribute it, and they took care of releasing it on all of the platforms. The process of actually producing the song, and then the stages of producing, the mixing, and the mastering … there’s like all these nitty, gritty stuff that you kind of learn when you’re doing it.”
Kiran and Nivi say that they enjoy singing live more than recording in a studio, explaining that there’s more freedom to improvise when singing and performing live.
“I feel like people do see the magic when you’re live, between us, and when we both sing together, and some harmonies just happen on the post, that’s what I think makes it more magical live.”
They also explain that singing in a studio makes you hear more of the imperfections in one’s voice, and allows you to perfect the nitty gritty areas of one’s singing.
The duo has blown up on social media due to their amazing covers of popular songs. However, they have also received criticism that their covers aren’t sung live, and are instead edited and corrected to make their voices amplified.
“Singing live and singing recorded … It’s like showcasing your voice in a different way. Like if you’re doing pre-recorded, it’s amplifying your voice, you just increase the volume, and have a little bit of effects, like reverb, or like echo … we do both [live and recorded], it’s based on what kind of content we do.”
Kiran and Nivi had the opportunity to sing with Alicia Keys, when Keys messaged them to collaborate on a music video regarding her project with Apple TV. Then, when Keys was touring, the twins decided to go to her LA concert, and were able to record a video with her!
“Somehow the collab thing, it was really close to the show, it was a last minute thing, and it just happened.”
Kiran and Nivi say that although their genre of music now is mainly pop, they have infused and incorporated elements of Indian classical music in their singles, especially through the rhythmic base. The duo have upcoming work that we can’t wait to see!
