“It’s the time for disco!” As arms fly, the crowd is emotionally split. About half the packed dance floor is experiencing high nostalgia as they belt out the chorus of this popular Bollywood tune. And the other, non-Indian half? After looking lost for a few seconds, the contagion catches hold, and soon everyone is singing together. Masala Beat Club, a monthly event held in the student and IT dense North Carolina triangle area is arguably the most joyous celebration of Indian music in the South East and has been creating love for the beats of the subcontinent for 3 years. The catch? The ambassadors are American.

DJ Marco and DJ Mogambo (aka Mark Weddington and Tim Meehan) are spinning new and old Indian beats tonight. 70’s Bollywood classics mix with the Asian underground blend of Bhangra, reggae, hip-hop and dancehall that came out of the Post-Colonial Diaspora in the UK. Hypnotizing Bollywood dance scenes are projected on a wall above the dancers. The eclectic dancefloor moves as one – groups of American college students, Indian IT professionals, indie rockers, hippies, and international students break apart and dance together into the night. Indians who grew up watching Bollywood films and mirroring dance moves proudly display their knowledge. And the American newbies dance in familiar ways, but watch and learn and slowly start shaking their hips and throwing their arms in the air in the contagious Bollywood style.

Masala Beat Club has grown organically. Marco is a well known DJ in the area and began playing global soul and funk beats from the 70’s. He mixed in some old style Bollywood and noticed that the crowd went especially wild whenever it came on. As he began getting more and more requests for newer Indian stuff, he began to build his knowledge and is now connected to the global scene of Indian beat lovers. The internationally acclaimed Panjabi Hit Squad, the originators of “urban asian fusion”, guest DJ’ed a recent Masala Beat Club, and gave Marco and Mogambo an amazed shout on BBC radio. “We’ve never seen anything like it.”

DJ Mogambo’s interest in Indian beats came after listening to a Talvin Singh album given to him by an American friend. A busy PhD student in Physics, Tim loved the music, but knew that he needed some kind of obligation to motivate him to spend time learning about it. So, he began to DJ. Mogambo’s interest began with the Asian Underground sound that came out of South London in the 90’s. You can see the excitement and curiousity that has fueled this interest as Mogambo begins to talk about the history of this music and how it has transformed over time. As people and music traveled from India to the Caribbean with colonial indentured servitude, and then to the UK, Mogambo feels that the resulting music has developed a universally appealing beat. The raging crowd at Masala Beat Club clearly agrees.

Marco and Mogambo’s event brings together a surprisingly mixed group. “I mean, just look at this table” Marco notices. We have two turbaned Sikh Bhangra lovers who have grown up in both India and the US, a second generation Bengali (that’s me), an African American, two white Americans and a “fresh of the boat” professional Indian, newly transplanted here as one of the wave of talented IT stock. The event has come to serve two purposes: a) to bring out Indians who grew up with the music and deeply appeal to their nostalgia, and b) to introduce the sound to open-minded Americans and internationals who just want to dance and have a good time. Bhangra and Bollywood mixed with western sounds like hip-hop and dancehall, mixed back in with Indian percussion creates an utterly danceable beat. Marco’s reputation and ability to play at well known clubs and the atmosphere of global appreciation created by the nearby universities has allowed the event to flourish.

Conspicuously missing are second generation Indians. Mogambo has tried to reach out to these groups, but says that they always end up asking for American hip-hop as their comfort sound. They lack the nostalgia draw that brings in newer immigrants, who come to dance because it reminds them of home, and they don’t share the uncomplicated appreciation that many American newcomers feel towards the music. Too many second generation kids are still recovering from the feelings of embarrassment and shame brought on by years of hiding their Indian heritage from their American classmates.

But Masala Beat Club is changing the way Americans feel about India. Gagandeep Bindra is a regular attendee, and values the purity of appreciation that he sees in Marco and Mogambo. Gagan, who was born in India and wears his turban proudly, and feels that Masala Beat Club has “actually brought awareness of South Asia, on a real street level”. They have successfully introduced hundreds of people to the irresistible Indian sounds and made it something accessible and digestible to American tastes.

Many people happen upon Masala Beat Club by chance and get hooked. Mary Lindsley says she walked innocently into a Masala Beat Club night happening at a well known club in Durham, NC just because she felt like dancing. Her life has changed, as she met and started dating sometimes DJ (DJ Turbinador) and regular dancer Montek Singh, and is now a true convert. “I didn’t even know what ‘bollywood’ meant”, she says, but was drawn to the “universal beat”, and comforted by the diverse crowd.

Marco says he is regularly approached by Indians who are amazed that he knows so much. He is going to continue having these extremely successful monthly events and has started playing his appealing mix at weddings, his first for an African-American groom and Malaysian bride who just loved the music. As the night ended on a well-known (to Indians) Bollywood tune, a group of first generation immigrants continued singing, throwing their arms around each other and still dancing to the absent music, overjoyed not only by the beat but also the nostalgia, doubtless recalling their much missed homeland . Marco looks pleased at the success of the event, but maintains a slight distance from the euphoric mix of deep nostalgia and longing that these Indians are experiencing. But he is creating it.

Originally published by The Indian American, July-August 2006