Two weeks after dropping his debut track Parotta & Beef, Tuhin Menon is still trying to wrap his head around the response. The music video sprinted past a million views on YouTube in ten days. “Man, it blew up,” he says, a mix of disbelief and delight in his voice.
Tuhin is not just another rapper. He is the CEO of Asiaville, a media-tech company with bases in Chennai, Kochi and Delhi. Rapping has been part of his life, but until now, he had not released a proper track. "Back in college, I did a lot of underground rap battles and gigs. But this is the first proper track I’ve put out there," he explains.
The idea came from something ordinary. After a long, frustrating day in Kochi, he stopped at a local parotta shop near his office. "I grabbed some parotta and beef, had a beer with it, and called it a night. The next morning, the song just came to me," he recalls. "It was such a shift, from a crappy day at work to eating something that made me feel good. I thought, dude, I’ve got to write this down."
Parotta & Beef has been pitched as “an ode to the everyday person that yearns for an outlet from their often mundane, drab existence.” For Tuhin, the food is a metaphor for those small, grounding rituals that carry us through. “We chase all these big outlets and distractions, but sometimes it’s the simplest things that give you an escape,” he says.
Directed by Vijay Siddhartha Ravindranaath, the music video leans into that metaphor with bold colours, playful choreography, and dreamlike transitions. A weary office worker is swept into a food-fuelled reverie with just one bite. “I wanted it to feel relatable,” Tuhin adds.
The sonic backbone comes from composer and long-time collaborator Sandeep Thulasidas, better known as Yestey. “The entire composition is his,” Tuhin says. “He used Indian instruments to keep it rooted while giving it a global vibe. Then halfway through it shifts into a proper boom bap hip hop section.”
Tuhin’s ties to hip hop trace back to his student years at New York University, where he devoured the work of Big L, Rakim, Jurassic 5, Tupac, and Biggie. “Rap is rebellion,” he reflects. “It’s about going against the grain.” While the cultural familiarity of parotta and beef struck a chord with Malayali listeners, Tuhin insists the song is bigger than that. “Parotta and beef is just a metaphor. It could be anything — going for a walk, listening to a song, doing something small that lifts your mood.”
Parotta & Beef’s momentum spiked when actor-producer Dulquer Salmaan shared it on his Instagram stories. “He came across it on his own and really liked it,” Tuhin recalls. It was a reminder, he says, of how small acts of support can make a huge difference. “He even asked me for the posters and put them up, which was really sweet of him.”
Meanwhile, Tuhin is also juggling ventures like producing Aadu director Midhun Manuel Thomas' upcoming JioHotstar web series Anali, and heading AyeVee, an interactive entertainment platform blending storytelling with gaming. For him, these pursuits don’t compete; they sustain one another. “Without the creative part, life would be quite boring, and that’s exactly what this track is about. Running a startup has been a grind. Music and acting help me blow off steam.”
Tuhin made his screen debut last year in Barroz 3D, veteran actor Mohanlal’s directorial debut. “Not many people can say they’ve been directed by him,” he reflects with pride. “It was completely special. His style of letting you be yourself and bringing the best out of you was a real learning experience. It opened up a creative side I’d shut off for years.”
That spark carried forward. Long active in theatre, Tuhin returned to the stage recently with Tamil director Michael Muthu’s play Shakespeare in Love in Chennai, which reignited his passion for performance. That fire now fuels his music as well. He already has “three or four tracks” in the pipeline — some light-hearted, others more layered and introspective.
For the moment, though, he is savouring the thrill of a debut that arrived by chance. “It’s been amazing to see people connect with something so personal,” he says. “Sometimes all you need is two parottas and some beef to remind you of the magic in life.”