When Chai Met Toast on selling out global venues: We never expected it to happen so soon

Even if you are not an ardent fan, there’s a good chance that you may have listened to When Chai Met Toast’s music somewhere—on an Instagram reel, playing in the background at a house party, or in someone’s car—and liked it without even knowing it.

Based in God’s Own Country, the multilingual indie-folk alternative band has cemented a solid place for itself in the last eight years playing at prestigious venues and crowded festivals across the country. Last year, they went international touring with their third EP Love You The Same, performing at packed venues in the United States, the United Kingdom, Ireland, and Singapore. They have already begun 2024 on a high note by checking Lollapalooza off their bucket list. They will next be playing in Dubai before flying off to Australia.

I got a chance to chat with the four young men who make up the dearly loved band minutes before their gig at the Jaipur Music Stage. Lead vocalist Ashwin Gopakumar, guitarist-banjo player Achyuth Jaigopal, keyboardist Palee Francis, and drummer Pai Sailesh were exactly like I hoped they would be, just as warm and wonderful as the music they create.

As much as I loved watching them perform live later to an audience that couldn’t have enough of their magic, I cherish this freewheeling, no-holds-barred conversation with them even more. It was one of the most precious highlights of my experience attending the Samsung Galaxy Tab S9 Series Jaipur Literature Festival this year. They talk about their interpersonal equations, why they don’t collaborate too often, their Bollywood dreams, and plans for the future.

Ashwin: It’s very important. Since we are four different people, there are clashes. But we can tackle them because of the friendship that exists between us. When you understand each other, it gets easier. I think we’re in an arranged marriage setup (everyone laughs).

Ashwin: Through Fight Club! (laughs)

Pai: But that phase is done. There was a phase when we were fighting but we are past that now.

Ashwin: I completely agree with what he’s saying. We’ve learned about each other’s weaknesses and strengths now. So we know who understands what better. It’s easier to agree then. We’ve come to that point. That’s one more reason why we are still co-existing.

Achyuth: Kenny was a long time back but both of them were great to work with. They are both musicians in a sense. It’s easier working with them than with non-musicians. And they both knew exactly what they wanted from the collaboration. Which is why it was quite a seamless process for us.

Ashwin: They are two very different characters but both of them were very easy to work with.

Achyuth: To be honest, we haven’t done many collaborations. We were just talking amongst ourselves that we should get more people to collaborate with on our music. These were just opportunities that came along the way. There wasn’t any active reaching out from our end to make them happen. This is something that we might explore for the next set of songs that we write.

Kenny wanted to do a series and he wanted us to do music for it. For Farhan, it was his manager getting in touch with our manager and wanting us to produce a song of his.

Ashwin: I think at the end of the day, they both came for our sound. That makes it much easier because then we don’t have to go explore many things other than what we are used to doing. Like he said, we’ve not done a lot of collaborations. We’re trying to see what will fit, not fit, and how we’ll go about it. We still don’t have any clue about it. We’re not there yet. But because they came for our sound, it was much easier from our end.

Palee: It’s nothing much really.

Achyuth: We have a very sorted team that takes care of everything on the technical side. We have to just go and perform and give our best on stage.

Pai: Today also we’ve just arrived. Our flight was delayed by five hours. But our sound check is all done already.

Ashwin: I think if we get time before a festival or a gig, then the best thing we could do is take a shower. Go and play the gig nicely. We’ve also done sweaty gigs where we’ve not taken a shower and went straight to the stage.

Achyuth: Yes, we do change the sets a little bit depending upon the venue, the kind of crowd that comes in, the mood, and the part of the country that we’re in.

Achyuth: It won’t be our closing song but Khoj is one that we don’t avoid in our performances.

Pai: Firefly too.

Ashwin: There’s a bunch of them. When We Feel Young, Khoj, Yellow Paper Daisy. Firefly.

Achyuth: But I think if it’s just one song, then it’ll be Khoj.

Ashwin: I’d vote for Firefly (everyone laughs).

Ashwin: It was great because we had a completely different experience from what we’re used to. What we usually do is—Palee has a studio. We go there, chill for three hours, whatever comes through we write and leave. We come back and do the same thing over and over again.

But this time, we had a specific schedule of a month. We had to finish all the four songs within those 30 days. We were in a different country. So we had to utilise the 10-12 hours in a day to finish certain processes, starting from a blank slate. We didn’t know how this new producer would respond to our music but Richard was great to work with. We have four amazing songs that have come out of the EP.

Palee: It was the first time that the four of us stayed together for 30 days.

Ashwin: Otherwise we’re just so used to meeting at the studio, doing our thing, and leaving. It was in those 30 days that we found out that this could work. We found each other’s weaknesses and strengths and learned to strike a fine balance.

Ashwin: Each instance is different. Some happen when we are at sound check. One of our songs, Maybe I Can Fly, happened when we were in Gangtok playing a gig and were sound-checking. It was so cold. We were doing whatever we could to move our hands and legs; it just happened to be a dance song at the end of it. Some come when you’re at home, thinking about something, or when you are in the mood, or when you are in love. It depends on the phase of life you’re in. But the complete process happens in the studio.

Achyuth: The inspiration, the particular idea can come from anywhere. And then we take it to the studio and develop it further. That can be very random. We don’t usually sit in the studio thinking we want to write a song. We usually have different voice notes that we gather from different places and then we filter those out and select the best ones.

Ashwin: Sometimes we start with the lyric. Sometimes we don't have lyrics, we just go with the melody. So sometimes you think that the melody might work, but then when you start writing it doesn’t come together. And other times, when you start producing it, it might not come together. So we chuck it at that point. We might come back to it if we need something else. Sometimes it doesn’t make sense. But then there are times when everything works out like magic. It’s difficult to explain but it is beautiful when that happens.

Ashwin: We are actually.

Achyuth: There is one more Bollywood song coming out for this movie called Do Aur Do Pyaar. It’s a Vidya Balan, Ileana D’Cruz, Pratik Gandhi movie. It’s slated to release on March 29.

Ashwin: We’re not averse to it. If people are coming for our sound, then definitely. But we’re not keen to completely music-direct a movie yet. We’re not sure if we’re there yet. That’s one thing. The second thing is, we’re not sure if we want to do it.

Ashwin: Because if there’s too many sounds, I don't know if we'll be in a place to explore it properly, with the amount of gigs and the other things that we're doing.

Pai: We don’t want to compromise our sound.

Achyuth: No, no. Suppose a project comes where the whole theme of the movie is centred around the When Chai Met Toast sound. Like, say how Marcus Mumford curated music for Ted Lasso. If such a project comes where they particularly want When Chai Met Toast sound in the movie, then that's something that we are excited about. But if they want us to do, say, a Punjabi song or a wedding song, then it doesn't make sense for us.

Ashwin: We are not in a place where we can write a wedding song or a Punjabi song. We don't know about it. So I don't think we'll do justice to it. I think we are in a place where we want to do our sound, write our own songs, and push our music out there.

Ashwin: I'm glad that my mom spoke Hindi and that I picked it up. I can also talk in Tamil as well. All of us are kind of multilingual. That's one thing that I think worked for us.

Achyuth: I think our unique sound. We have a different sound from the other Indian bands.

Ashwin: A lot of hard work.

Pai: And the perseverance to carry on.

Ashwin: All four of us just sat on this. We never had a second backup option. We were all into this one thing. One focus, one thing. Getting Palee Francis also was big for us (laughs).

Palee: If we feel a song is not up to our mark, then we rework it. Give it our 100%. Be it anything, we don't compromise on the quality for the quantity. Even if it takes longer.

Achyuth: This year, hopefully.

Ashwin: We are writing. I don't know. The thing is, every weekend we have gigs now. That takes up most of our time. I think in a bit we should be writing in full groove. It all depends on when we can sit together and figure it out.

Ashwin: For me, playing our recent London show was very exciting. It gave me a lot of goosebumps because we packed the venue. It was sold out. We dreamed of it but we thought it would be possible only after a point of time. We never expected it to happen so soon. It's something that I will remember for the rest of my life.

Pai: It was raining and yet so many people turned up. It was a great experience for all of us.

Ashwin: A lot of things. The vision board is full. So many things to do. But the main thing is to get out there, put our music on the global map, and see how people react to it. We know how India reacts to it. Now we want to see how other countries respond to our music.

Palee: Coachella. Lots of Indians have already performed there. But Coachella for sure.