Divine Announces First Video for Debut LP ‘Kohinoor’

As we’ve written before, Mumbai rapper Divine’s ascent has been no ordinary chronicle. From gully-based productions to launching his ownand entertainment conglomerate Gully Gang Entertainment, the rapper sure has done his bit to imprint hip-hop in the cultural consciousness of India.

Since discovering American hip-hop heavyweight 50 Cent’s music as a school kid, the Mumbai rapper has dabbled in English (“Voice of The Streets”), Gospel (when he started penning gospel rhymes and found his moniker) and Gully rap (“Yeh Mera Bombay,” “Mere Gully Mein” feat. Naezy, “Jungli Sher”); finding his groove on the world stage. He was recently announced as the first Indian hip-hop artist to be signed to Mass Appeal India, the new hip-hoplaunched by Universal Music India and American media platform Mass Appeal (co-led by American hip-hop artist Nas), creating quite some buzz around the label’s first release, his forthcoming debut LP Kohinoor.

Divine just announced that the first single off the album along with a music video is set to release on September 13th. He is also set to perform the track for the first time at Prism Club & Kitchen in Hyderabad on the same day as part of music lab BUDxHYD. Earlier this year, Rolling Stone India broke the news of the rapper’s album when he chatted with Ebro Darden on Apple Music Beats 1. On the number of tracks on the record, Divine said, “I think 11.” He added, “I have a lot of features [and] a couple of collabs.”

The 2019 Bollywood film Gully Boy and the documentary Gully Life – The Story of Divine have served to expose Indian hip-hop to the masses. The former created a countrywide wave that made a real dent for the genre in Indian pop culture while the latter traced the story of one of Indian hip-hop’s christened stars. With his own music festival Gully Fest, his owned and associated labels and a new album to boot, Divine’s is perhaps the hip-hop success story that will continue to be written.