Bombay Vikings are a Swedish band that play a unique blend of Europeanized Indian pop with elements of jazz and classical music. The band began to coalesce in 1994 when Mats Nordenborg, Oscar Söderberg, and Neeraj Shirdhar all met and discovered a shared interest in the popular music from India, particularly songs used in Bollywood films. With Shirdhar installed as the frontman, they played Indian inflected songs that were predominantly sung in English. They added and dropped various members over the next five years before releasing their debut 1999 album Kya Soora Hai, a collection of eight remakes of Indian songs sung primarily though not exclusively, in English. It became a surprise hit in India, and they quickly followed up with 2000’s Who Chali, which contained five original songs alongside four covers and contained the single “Angel Eyes” which would be an international success. They perfected their ability to fuse the past and the present together into modern recordings of old songs into something young audiences adored with 2002’s Hawa Mein Udati Jaaye, and enjoyed another huge success with “Ah Raha Hoon Main” from 2004’s Chhodh Do Aanchal. After 2006’s Zara Nazron Se Kehdo the band took a five year hiatus before issuing 2011’s U n I.
