FALAK FAHIM- A GGT INTERVIEW — Good Game Talent

See down below everything Falak Fahim had to tell us down below!

Man, you’ve had a hell of a trip musically over these past two years. I first met you at Dallas Ain’t Dead when you signed up for the open mic and now, most recently, you had the longest set with us at Summer Crush. How would you best summarize the musical journey which you have embarked on between those two points in time?

Falak: “Dallas Ain’t Dead was a cool experience because I had never performed in front of people before so I was able to get a feel for that. Since then I mainly focused on putting out an album to see if I was capable of doing that. The journey so far has been surprisingly accepting and I’ve made a lot of good friends and met a lot of good people that I’m thankful for.”

Now let’s talk about some of the people most important to that journey, well at least those that appear to be from the outside looking in, the 617Banks team. How did y’all form?

Falak: “617banks started with Salar, I won’t really explain how exactly it started if you want to hear about that you’ll have to come watch a living room set and I’ll tell you. Around the time Salar started 617banks, a bunch of close friends and I had been working on making music which we all started sharing in our group text. We had Hassi, Beanbro, and Ponzo making hits together in Dallas, while me and Alby were trying to figure out how to use a mic in College Station. Meanwhile, our friend Mehrab stumbled upon this huge pod while he was walking around in Austin and when he opened it up this super saucy Mongolian dude that goes by Indra Namuun just like slide out and was like what’s up I make music. They became roommates and I met him shortly after. We also have a secret weapon (Jiasheng) but I’ll wait longer before we dive into that. The timing worked outright because we decided to start working together as a collective which is what 617banks became. Go check out 617banks on youtube, Instagram, Twitter, Spotify, SoundCloud, tidal, amazon music, RedTube, youtube2mp3.com, Reddit, Pinterest, Google, Nike, Adidas, and apple music.”

How would you explain what 617banks is and your role within it?

Falak: “I mainly just make music, and do the living room set stuff with Nikhil. Over Summer though I basically was the only one not doing shit so I took responsibility of making the first 617banks album featuring some of the friends we’ve made on our journey so far.”

Who is Falak Fahim?

Falak: “Someone that’s physically incapable of being on time to something. I don’t know what it is but somehow the universe (I blame the universe) finds a way to always get me late to everything. Falak Fahim is naturally upbeat and has a terribly lazy sense of humor.”

You represent a cultural minority within the American musical landscape. Why would you say that your culture is so under-represented in the music scene?

Falak: “I think as we get more and more generations moving and growing up here naturally there becomes more of an audience for the sounds or ideas that our two cultures could bring to music. Being a first-generation immigrant I had both American pop culture and Desi pop culture but rarely was there anything that bridged the two. It’s cool though because today we have more and more people contributing to that community like IBRA, SOHZA, Shreya, Piya Rai, Lifafa (I could talk for days about how incredible Lifafa is), Quiet Luke, and countless others that are slipping my mind right now.”

Why do you make music? How did it start?

Falak: “It was my freshman year of college and I was bored. That’s how it usually always starts you just have to be bored enough, plus I go to Texas A&M so I’m bored quite often.”

Who does Falak Fahim make music for?

Falak: “Mostly myself and then whoever will listen to what I am saying. In all my songs I like to either just talk about what’s going on or put myself in a situation and write from that perspective so it’s nice when people listen to what I’m talking about.”

You have a style that sits somewhere in-between alternative, hip-hop, bedroom pop and rock. Where do your diverse musical style stem from? Your influences?

Falak: “I have too many influences and you’ll hear that with some of the music I’m going to be dropping in the near future but to name a few easily Donald Glover, Anderson .Paak, IBRA, The Strokes, Hassan, Mac Miller, Kaz Moon, Luke Jr., Adnan Sami, Mac Ayres, A-Wall, Mac Demarco, Poor Rich Boy, Pretty Boy Aaron, Macdonalds, Tyler, Frankie, Michael Jackson, Lifafa, Quiet Luke, and Phony Ppl (I could go on for days once again).”

You’re majoring in electronic systems engineering technology you told me when I asked over text, with a degree so far from the music scene does it mean there will come a day when Falak no longer makes music? Do you think you’ll succeed in the music industry? Do you want to succeed, or do you view music more so as a hobby?

Falak: “ESET actually overlaps really well with a lot of music-based application, not saying that that’s what I’ll end up doing but I definitely went into this major with that route in mind. I think about the music industry but mainly because I don’t really know how it works and it seems like an interesting concept (I kind of imagine it works how Monsters inc. worked). There could be a day where I stop making music but right now I couldn’t really picture a reason why, I make music to talk and I’m a very chatty person but maybe I’ll shut up one day.”

Now we are at the final question and that question is…what do people need to know? Summarize as best as possible.

Falak: ”Which camera do I turn to?”

Jon: The left one

Falak: Thanks for watching my hot ones. I have a new song coming out October 11th. Check out dontwatchtheclock me and Sohza are acting in our friend’s web series @dwtcproductions on twitter. Banks Tape coming out hopefully this Winter Break. The next living room set that comes out will be featuring Bby Bruja, SOHZA, IBRA, Hassan, Yellow Jones, Jacob Albers (I think), Indra Namuun, and myself all have solo projects coming out soon so be sure to follow 617banks on everything if you care to hear the music!!

We wanna give King Falak a huge thanks for letting us annoy him endlessly into finishing this. - Jon