Rohan Prakash’s (‘24) music career began with the humble piano, but it soon blossomed into something bigger. With NEPTUN3, he kickstarted his career on Spotify while following his passion for making music.

Praksh’s introduction into the music industry started small. As a 6-year-old, he enjoyed playing the notes on the piano and learning this instrument. While simple, this start was necessary for later laying the foundation for his love for music. 

“I started learning piano when I was six. I kept practicing and I got better and developed my skills in that. It was just a small experiment but I think it really helped me set the foundation for the future,” said Prakash.

The piano gave Prakash a small taste of the jungle of music. However, in 8th grade, he discovered a whole new avenue. With newfound accessibility to software online, making instrumentals acted as the inspiration for him to start diving deeper into music and its many intricacies.

“In 8th grade, I made a decision to start producing music and making beats. I opened up Garage Bands for fun because it was already on my computer, but I realized how much I actually enjoyed it.  I convinced my parents to buy software for me, FL Studio, a more powerful creation program and I managed to make even better beats than in Garageband,” said Prakash.

Even while Prakash honed his ability in crafting instrumentals, there was a missing element that just wasn’t present to make his beats come to life. In 2021, he started incorporating vocals into his instrumentals, feeling more confident in showing his work to the wider community. 

“In 2021, I decided I want to start putting my own vocals over my beats and releasing music like that because until then I was just making beats. Now I’m putting vocals, with rapping or singing, and it really adds another layer to my music. The music became more personal and because of that, more relatable for the audience to hear,” said Prakash.

By using this personal element in his music, Prakash slowly gained an audience for his music on user-driven platforms like SoundCloud. With his music gaining some traction on SoundCloud, Prakash felt confident to move to a bigger, larger undertaking: Spotify. The platform allowed him to do never-before things and more importantly, get his music out there for the mass audience to digest.

“I think Spotify is where I’m getting the most success right now more than anything else. More than YouTube, more than SoundCloud, more than all other platforms. At first, I didn’t actually know how to upload music on the platform but I learned to use a distributor and managed to get my music out there. Spotify is great because it allows you to customize it, put your own images, put your own pictures, and make it look like it’s your own profile. With that, I was just able to create my own aesthetic,” said Prakash.

Despite his newfound success, Prakash was backed into a corner. He had to start producing music consistently or he was at risk of losing even his most die-hard supporters. To counter this, he developed a streamlined process to get music out there for his fans on a consistent basis.

“There’s a process for creating my music. I come up with an idea in my head and then I decide to take that and put that into my software FL studio. If it’s a melody, I put drums over it. If it’s a drum, I put a melody over it. I repeat this till I get something that I enjoy listening to. In the end, I make sure it’s polished and all. Finally, I write down lyrics and these lyrics are just a way for me to express myself. I then sit down at my microphone because I have a little studio mic in my bedroom, and I record it into my software. After putting the vocals in there and polishing it, I finish the song,” said Prakash.

For newer artists like Prakash, having a variety of materials in their discography proves to be a difficult task. However, by eliminating the complexities and focusing on his core emotions, he’s able to always write unique songs.

“I don’t make finding my topics super complicated. It really just comes from me expressing what I’m feeling at the time. Usually, it’s just something chill, something happy, or something aggressive. It depends on how I’m feeling,” said Prakash.

Prakash has found his avenue. He’s been able to gain a considerable following as NEPTUN3 on Spotify, with over 300 monthly listeners. His newest song “SORA!” has already passed  1000 streams, and some of his other tunes “again! – sped up” have been streamed over 3000 times. While only a newbie to the music industry, Prakash plans big for the future. He craves to expand his brand to newer and more ambitious ventures.

“Hopefully in the future, I can perform a live concert that I host myself, and hopefully I can make my own album. I’ve been planning on doing that, working on an album. I’ve also been working on a new song. It’s called ‘Lost N Found’ and it’s coming out very soon,” said Prakash.