Frontman Suryakant Sawhney’s (better known to fans as Lifafa) swinging serenade of “So move over darling…”, the opening lyric of “Memory Box”, soars over views of the San Francisco runway and planes across the glass. Low-lit lamps are placed between the swaying crowd of airport attendees. In June, the Delhi-based indie veterans Peter Cat Recording Co. took a 17-hour flight to the Californian city, landed at the airport, and played a pop-up concert at Terminal 1’s Gate B4 to a swarm of music enthusiasts who had flown in for the Stern Grove music festival.
Fans who had made the trip for the San Francisco festival heard Sawhney’s signature croons over cabaret rock sounds at the airport, and rushed to catch the Delhi-hailing act live at the terminal. Amongst them is a fan from Mexico who has watched them more than five times over the past couple of years.
Sean McHugh and Alex Bramwell, the band’s live agents at WME group, tell Billboard India that they both became fans of Peter Cat Recording Co. in 2019 after their album Bismillah. “We were instantly hooked. It was unlike anything we’d ever heard before, and there was a mystery to them that intrigued us right away.”
In the early days of the pandemic, McHugh and Bramwell spent months trying to track down the band and convince them to let WME help with their debut global tour. By 2023, Peter Cat Recording Co. made their first U.S. and Canada tour happen. It was sold out across 30 cities. For Sawhney, their international fan following wasn’t apparent until then. “It wasn’t real until we played our first few shows,” he adds. Within a few months, the band was also touring the U.K. and Europe, selling out venues in London and Paris. At Stern Grove, they played to a crowd of 11,000 people.
The band consists of vocalist/guitarist Suryakant Sawhney, drummer Karan Singh, bassist Dhruv Bhola, keyboard/trumpet player Rohit Gupta, and multi-instrumentalist Kartik Sundareshan. Sawhney’s favourite overseas show so far has been on the small Dutch island of Vlieland. At the Into The Great Wide Open festival in the Netherlands, the band performed in a forest – one of the many zany international venues over the last few years.
A usual performance from the five-piece act comprises a 90-minute set – which includes the band trading instruments and lead singing duties – with clarinet, synths, trumpet and saxophone all part of the sonic lineup. The setlist usually commences with new songs off their latest album BETA (2024), going across eras with jaunty crowd pleasers “Floated By”, “Soulless Friends” and the aforementioned “Memory Box,” and closing with the poignant “I’m Home” from Portrait of a Time (2018).
The band’s highest number of overseas listeners are based in Los Angeles, New York and London. While some of this international cult status can be traced back to Spotify’s Editorial playlists such as ‘Feel Good Dinner’, ‘Indie Chill’ and ‘late night vibes’ – a more accurate attribution would be towards the pandemic.
During the two years of lockdown, North America was their biggest listener base outside of India. Critical acclaim from American media outlets such as NPR and Paste magazine for the Bismillah record helped fuel their credibility to music listeners in the West. “Memory Box” was also synced and licensed for the closing credits of HBO’s Emmy-nominated show Hacks in 2021.
“Bismillah was a compelling record and it really spoke to people. In those two years we didn’t do a whole lot on the marketing front to push the album,” shares Dhruv Singh, of Pagal Haina – the band’s management. “Because the whole world stopped and everybody had a lot more time on their hands to be able to consume art whether that’s to listen to music or watch films or read books; it allowed people the opportunity to delve deeper. The album found its own audience organically on Spotify, Apple Music, YouTube and other streaming platforms,”adds Singh.
When US ticket sales opened in 2023, the New York one sold out within an hour or two. The team scrambled to add additional shows. Soon, this happened in every city. In Los Angeles, they ended up putting up four gigs – including one at the iconic Roxy Theatre. Eventually, the band sold out 30 shows, well in advance for their first run. Die-hard fans followed the band from California to the Napa Valley BottleRock festival and then Los Angeles and San Francisco.
The band sustains its international tours economically through merchandise and vinyl sales. “Across these three years, vinyl sales have been an important part of the band’s income. They’ve made more money selling vinyl than they have from streaming,” says Singh.
By the time BETA was announced in mid-2024, the band was primed for the drill as the team put together a 78-city ‘Good Luck BETA’ globetrotting tour. They have now played festivals alongside Patti Smith, Deftones, Major Lazer, St. Vincent, Martin Garrix, Mogwai, Kings of Leon and Massive Attack.
Jehan Johar, co-founder of the Mumbai-based venue Blue Frog, is not surprised. The band began its journey by performing at his venue way back in 2011. “It was clear that the band already had a unique identity, which was driven by a playful and breezy synergy of different genres, and a quirky sense of humour and irony. They have something to truly say, and they say it well,” says Johar.
