Music Consumption Habit in India | Past, Present & Future

Recently, I came across a few song tracks via Instagram reels which I was compelled to go and check out on Spotify. I started playing them back to back and now they are a part of one of my Spotify favorite playlists. It led me to think about how music consumption habit in India has evolved through the eras, how people across eras defined hit music and how did they discover new music. I was lucky to have a professional stint of working very close to music and more importantly close with people who had a better understanding of music consumption in India than I ever did.

Today, music consumption in India is one of the highest engaging activities Indian indulge in beyond sports and cooking.

Here is a comprehensive account of how music consumption habit in India has evolved over the years.

Early Days of Music Consumption in India

In the early 60s, 70s, 80s the prime feed of music was movies (it still is to a very large extent), and AIR – All India Radio. Movies airing once a week or so on Doordarshan gave exponential reach in those days. Ascertaining whether a song is hit or not, was directly proportional to how a particular movie did at the box office – the number of weeks it stayed (remember the silver and golden jubilees) and the corresponding revenue is made. As all these parameters were closely correlated to the star cast, A-Lister actor movies tended to stay longer, and gradually their songs also got attention. 

The 90s

As Doordarshan programming evolved through the years, the music era in the 90s saw the arrival of countdowns. The Chitrahaar announced its arrival in the 90s. The count down ran from 10 to 1 and everyone was hooked to the television (Of course, there was no phone to gaze at all the time). With the arrival of cable TV in the early 90s, I recall many countdowns running across different channels – one I can recall in the early 90s was ‘Gaane Anjaane’ on Zee TV. The songs featuring on these countdowns were hits of the week. However, discovering new music was still a challenge. Every countdown played familiar music but no one helped discover new music. Obviously, because these channels had limited time slots allocated for music and they preferred playing familiar hit music to keep the audience hooked rather than experimenting in the time slot allocated to them.

Music Consumption Habit in India in the late 90s & 2000s

Govt also opened up licenses for private FM in the country in the late 90s and by the early 2000s FM radio became another benchmark for listening to ‘hit music’. As FM channels had entire day bandwidth to play music, they started experimenting with new music as well. So Countdowns and FM radio became two source feed of music till the late 90s-early 2000s which defined music consumption in India by introducing both hit music and new music to listeners in the country.

Then came the Music Channels (MTV, Channel V etc-). Though these channels went live in the late 90s, they kept experimenting with their content to suit the preferences of the Indian audience. For instance, MTV and Channel V first tried breaking in with new genres (English, Pop etc-). By the early 2000s, these channels found their ground and became the new source of exploring and discovering new music. As more and more players started launching their music channels (9XM, Masti etc), the mainstream channels lost interest in countdowns as it was not their core competency and ultimately the countdown died a slow death on GEC (General Entertainment Channels).

The Arrival of the Internet

Then came the arrival of internet services in the country. Though officially rolled out on 15th Aug 1995, it took more than 5 yrs for services to mature and the internet to become accessible at ‘decent’ speeds in households and in cybercafes. There started a revolution. Consumers who discovered new music on FM & music channels now downloaded the same from pirated websites and put their feature phone memories to best use. SongsPK was one such popular website. Those who didn’t have decent internet accessibility would buy MP3 discs from the market which will have thousands of songs – again sourced by these websites. Consumers started discovering new music via websites and MP3 discs and get a testimony of songs being hit or trending via music channels and countdowns FM Radio or some GEC channels whosoever aired it. This had been the trend for good 10 years till the arrival of 3G (in 2008) and Youtube (again in 2008).

YouTube takes Centerstage

YouTube has been the place to discover new music and as well and look at what was trending right from its launch in 2008. This was the first time both consumers and music experts could see the actual count of playouts and get a very quantifiable idea of the music preferences of people in the country. More the views, more hit/trending the song was.

Just when things started to look sorted and quantifiable, the YouTube mafias cracked the counting code. The playout numbers started getting manipulated to a level that even Google had raised its eyebrows. Music experts started looking at other correlations to ascertain music consumption in India and get a concrete idea about the popularity of a song. E.g. Has the song hit 10 mn organic views on YouTube? Is it popular in clubs in the area? How much footfall does the concert in the area witness? Answers to all these questions define the popularity of the song for experts today.

The role of short-format content platforms

In addition to YouTube, other streaming players (Spotify, Gaana, JioSaavan) have joined the bandwagon of defining song consumption in the country. Though YouTube and other music streaming services still have the direct measure of hit music, today’s new music discovery has largely moved to short format content platforms. Post the withdrawal of Tik Tok in the country many short format content platforms caught up pace and today we have more than 240 mn users of various short formats content platforms in India.

If a new track is trending on, say, Reel, it is most likely picking up to become the next hit song. Consumers are coming across new music on Insta Reels/Stories and then they look for the song on YouTube or Spotify. No wonder all new artists are tieing up with influencers to make their songs trend via reels and other short format content platforms. The final testimony of whether the song will stay or erode stays with the consumer and the quality of music.

Influencers, platforms, and labels can momentarily push the popularity of a particular track but it has to stand the test of time to get a final testimony from consumers to be classified as a classic.