Long practice hours, complicated studio deals, and puzzling financial management—making music isn’t that easy these days. But the biggest issue of all is the limitations in options for launching new albums in a community that isn’t as interactive as it used to be, a group of music enthusiast friends realized. So they decided it was time to do something about it.
“Who said music is easy?” asks Ritavrat Joshi, a member of the group.
The solution was to build an interactive community that grows together, an app to bring musicians and their audience in direct contact with each other by sharing songs, albums, merchandise, gig alerts or, even regular updates.
The app was released on April 10, 2021, in collaboration with artists and avid music listeners. The grand vision of the makers of the app is to change the listening culture in Nepal, to give the audience the best music experiences all while serving the artists so that they too can receive their fair share without the hassle of mediators in between. When toying with the idea of doing something for the music industry, Joshi had been talking to different new portals and platforms that are here to support the music scene, but couldn’t find any that supported big and small artists in terms of payment ratios and copyrights issues. He then talked to singer Bartika Rai about his ideas and together, they developed a basic concept for the app.
With Sushant Roy at the back-end and design, the idea finally came to life. After Avishek KC and Suzeena Shrestha joined the team, they finally moved forward with the app with Gorato Works as the developer team.
Since its launch, Noodle has been involved in various gigs and tours in direct coordination with artists such as Zero Brains and Retro Rockets, and the recent launch of ASM’s album at Beers N’ Cheers. But the main focus is still on the virtual service app. This means that NoodleRex has many more features to be announced and not just limited to music sales.
Noodle is built with a user-friendly interface that allows guests to get the full experience of Nepali music. After the login credentials are confirmed, app users can see 30-second previews of songs from various artists. The full songs can be purchased in HD straight to your phone. The downloaded music hence is available to you even when you’re offline.
The app doesn’t charge artists who want to upload their work on the platform. Anyone interested can simply contact them and answer a few of their questions. However, their songs must be original and of high quality since Noodle wants to bring HD audio experience back in style.
Any genre of music is welcome. The team provides the artists with a personal dashboard where they can see sales and unit shifts in real life. The artist will be paid according to those numbers.
“Streaming platforms and fair payment ratios are still far-fetched ideas in Nepal,” Sushant Roy shares. “What we’re trying to assure is a sustainable future for all artists. Here, the support they receive, both social and financial, is immediate and first-hand.”
The price of one song is minimum Rs 99. However, the artists have the freedom to change that. The price of an album can be decided after rounding off the number of tracks or by the artists themselves.
Users who are logged in can use digital payment services such as eSewa, Khalti, and FonePay. Users outside Nepal can use PayPal, VISA, and Mastercard services are being introduced soon. Cash on delivery will be available for the merchandise sales feature of the app
So far, artists in Nepal have been supportive of the idea.
However, the biggest surprise came from the audience's side of things. The recently launched ASM album has already made more than 60 sales as of April 20, 2021, and that was within ten days of the app’s launch.
Consumers have also been buying older albums of Astha Tamang Maskey, Jerusha Rai, and many other artists who have a niche fan following.
Why did you name it Noodle?
Naming the app was a long process but ‘Noodle’ stuck with us because we see the app like a bowl of noodles—full of different tastes and flavors. We are also “noodling” around ideas to make the Nepali music scene better. So the name just clicked.
