Pritt Patel
Going viral & its ups and downs.
Pritt Patel is an artist, entrepreneur and radio presenter from South London, She is Eelam Tamil, born and raised in Denmark. “Drawing on her roots as a Tamil girl from South London, Pritt’s sound is a blend of East and West, incorporating her Carnatic training and love for R&B music.” (Tamil Guardian, 2022)
Pritt was releasing original music since her first year at university. She decided to release a cover of a Tamil song her father loved, ‘Unakkul Naane’, not knowing it would go from one million to fifty million streams in six months.
Pritt spoke about the many great things that came from going viral. Global recognition, being one of them. She found a lot of doors opened for her and she got to work with artists all over the world. She also played many festivals. “As an independent artists those are the stepping stones you kind of look out for, for the next step in your career” she said. Another plus is the good revenue, which is great for your future music. She also said that labels will love you and want to sign you. Which I guess could be seen as a great thing if that is what you want, and what you’re looking for as an artist. She received a lot of messages and attention of people wanting to work with her. More so, she explained about the “coat hanger effect”, which essentially means if one of your songs is going viral, people are likely to look at your other music, and it can boost your numbers overall. Your song could also be doing well for a long time. For her, the cover when viral in 2021 and three years later, it’s still getting 250 thousand streams a day. All of these things can be really beneficial to your career, if you are going viral for something positive and that you think correctly represents you, which isn’t always the case.
Pritt also spoke about some of the downsides to her going viral. She explained how it’s very difficult to stay away from what people know you for, and how she felt pressured when making new music, wanting it to be just as well received. “I don’t want to be known as just ‘Pritt, the cover artist’, there is so much more to me than that. And most importantly, I only want to release music that I like.” (Ani, 2023).
All the attention made her feel overwhelmed and burnt out. This affected her creativity. “The sudden rise of Pritt was not fun” she said. She explained how everyone wants a piece of you and you feel afraid to say no, because you don’t know if you will get those opportunities again. She said there was a lot going on, very quickly, and she didn’t handle it well.
But although going viral was quite bittersweet for Pritt, she is very grateful for the opportunities that it has given her. “I just want to do music for life, and if this is a sacrifice I’ve got to make, then I’m just going to make it.” (Medium, 2021).I think going viral is something a lot of new artists aim for, but there is also another side to it that isn’t spoken about a lot.