Hyderabad, 6th August 2018: Kool104, Hyderabad’s very first international radio station, officially announced its launch in the city today at a special event which was attended by none other than the talented film director, screenwriter, producer, actor, playback singer and television host, Farhan Akhtar!
The music on Kool 104 comprises a carefully curated selection of the latest international chartbusters with some evergreen hits in the afternoon. This is an FM station for everyone who craves for the best of English pop music andwho follow contemporary international sensations like Justin Bieber, The Chainsmokers, Rihanna, Coldplay, Ariana Grande, Maroon 5, DuaLipa, Selena Gomez and the like.
The RJs on the station are the extremely opinionated Kool Sana who comes on from 7 AM to 12 noon and is available on Instagram @sanakool104; the man who knows every bit of trivia about international rock and pop acts, Kool Deep who comes on-air from 12 noon – 4 PM; the snarky but entertaining and chilled out Kool Savio, who does the evening drive show from 4 PM – 9 PM and is available on Instagram @saviokool104; and, the host of the night show, Kool Paran, who takes to the airwaves from 9 PM – 12 midnight.
The launch event saw Farhan take to the stage to unveil the logo of Kool104 in front of the audience. When asked about the event, Farhan said, “I have grown up listening to classic bands and artists from the 70’s, 80’s and 90’s. Most have them have influenced my song writing and music. So I’m sure Hyderabad’s first international station – Kool 104 - will keep everyone entertained with the best international hits!”
Farhan said, the Kool 104 is really cool. For all the listeners out there, this will be a great option when you are driving or when you want to have great time listening to music, the kind of music which you normally don’t get to hear. On being asked whether he is cool or hot, he said, I don’t think too much about these things. We all have grown up listening to a healthy mix of Hindi film music, regional film music and some how the option of listening to international music was taken away from us, and the fact someone bringing that to us and we have an option to listen to that, gives you choices to listen to different kind of music when you want to, that’s something that we all should be grateful about. The most exciting thing about the launch of this radio is the content, the kind of music we don’t get listen to on radio. On being asked if he wants to be a Kool RJ for a day, he said, I don’t want to be an RJ, there are many who do way better than me, may be in a film take on a RJ role, but not otherwise. I listen to lot of older music, but my kids listen to new music, I like Jason Brown’s music the most. My memories about Hyderabad are pretty limited, haven’t really experienced to have an informed opinion, I have been here for movie promotion and for couple of concerts, so I haven’t really seen the city to speak about it. On the multiple roles he plays, which one he likes the most, he said, I don’t know, I do these because I enjoy doing them, I don’t take them as a job, I take it as something I am passionate about and I am very fortunate that I get paid for it. About being cool with his kids, he said, no matter what parents do, we can’t be cool for the kids, the coolest thing you can be, is to let them be and leave them alone, and when they need to discuss something I think they do appreciate if you make time, that I think is a cool gesture and beyond that there is nothing more you can do. On being asked about different roles he does, is there something he has left out in the industry to do, he said, beyond what I do needs lot more technical education, so I am not qualified to do those things, the ones I doing currently are the ones I am comfortable with. About how he balances time to do multiple tasks, he said, if you like doing something the time creates itself, if you don’t like doing something, no matter how free you are you will not do it, I enjoy doing it, it happens by itself, more out of passion. Who do you find to be a cool dude in the industry, he said, I find Bacchan in his early movies a supremely cool guy, the other character I love is Bruce Willis, these are the coolest characters. About Bollywood not doing movies of social relevance, he says, it’s a kind of misnomer that Bollywood doesn’t do movies of social relevance, we do make films of social relevance, we do try our best, especially now in the last 5 to 6 years there has been a tremendous shift towards more responsible kind of film making, lot of stories of meaning and value that awakens one are being made. OnJavedsaab being inseparable from Bollywood, Zoya also being so talented, it’s so much talent in one house, what do you guys talk at the dinner table, he said, anything but films.
Tapas Sen, Chief Programming Officer, ENIL, commented, “We are very happy to be launching an international radio station in Hyderabad. With this new station, we now cover all three languages in the city, Telugu with Mirchi 98.3, Hindi with Mirchi 95 and English with Kool 104. As with all our stations, the product was devised after a lot of research and we hope that people love the content on Kool as much as we loved coming up with it!” Regarding expansion of this station, he said it all depends on how many licences the Government gives. We would be very excited if we can expand the English network across the country, by the way, we already run an English station in Shillong, these are the only two we are able to do so far. Regarding promoting live artists in Hyderabad, as Hyderabad today is hub of live music in the whole country, he said, Radio Mirchi is completely in sync with the artists interests and the testimony of that is the biggest award ceremony called the Mirchi Music awards, which is something not popularity based but based on excellence, it happens across ten different languages across the country including in the South across four languages, that’s an attempt how we encourage new talent, apart from that we definitely bring in new artists may not be as much as we would like to, our approach is inclusive, the good thing is that there are lots of independent artists who are coming up, so we are in a very happy phase at this point of time and spoiled for choice.
