Dropbox Talent: 4lienetic

Wild City explores the freshest sounds from the subcontinent in Dropbox Talents. This section isn’t about the who’s who in the scene, it's about relatively unheard of producers and musicians who we think make good music and are worth your time. If you’d like us to listen to your sounds, send the relevant info to music@thewildcity.com or contact us privately on SoundCloud.

Our latest Dropbox talent comes from a very young (19!) Mumbai based producer who goes by the name of 4lienetic, or simply Sugam Khetan to those who know him.

February seems to be the season for downtempo, ambient releases (SLM, Kumail and One Sock our most recent contributors to the genres). 4lienetic is next on that list, whose inspirations include Burial, Phaeleh, deadmau5 (what?) and Skream. We heard that the fledgling producer has just released a 4 track EP called ‘Faint’ and were curious to see what he had to offer.

To put it briefly, while 4lienetic’s EP might not be a total revelation, it does show the astounding reserve of talent that the producer possesses, particularly for someone who could still very well be fretting about final exams and acne. All 4 tracks are deep, downtempo, a little moody and very airy. This is chill out music at its purest - intricately and skillfully produced. The last standout track on the album ‘The Fog Ahead’ features ethereal rain noises, bubbling brooks and the sounds of chirping birds. It’s already been discovered by SoundCloud miners, accumulating a whopping 36000+ plays in the 3 months it’s been up.

Creatively, ‘Faint’ is a little underwhelming – there seems to be very little variation in structure and no definite direction that its sounds are taking. However, 4lienate nails it in terms of his stellar production - we hope there’s a lot more coming from the young talent in what looks to be a promising future.

"I started making music about a year and a half ago. I fell in love with an artist named Phaeleh and felt a connection with this genre. My interest in production started after I downloaded FL Studio and things just went forward from there. My sounds are generally relaxing and chilled out with a hint of darkness and sorrow. I make music to express myself and one of the things i love most is how each listener can interpret music in their own way." - 4lienetic

You can discover a lot more music from 4lienate on his SoundCloud and receive regular updates from his Facebook page. Listen to the ‘Faint’ EP in its entirety below and buy it here on bandcamp.

Words: Diya Gupta