Meet Mersum Khokhar

We recently connected with Mersum Khokhar and have shared our conversation below.

Mersum , so happy to have you with us today. You are such a creative person, but have you ever head any sort of creativity block along the way? If so, can you talk to us about how you overcame or beat it?

If I cant think of a guitar riff I like to start songs with a drum beat or a synth tone instead. I tend to do this more often than not and use the guitar as a supplementary tone to enhance the rest of the track. I think the best way to beat creativity blocks are exiting the comfort zone and begin experimenting. Go deep into searching for something that clicks with you. It could be as simple as a single note. For our single “Places” I had no clue how to start the song off so I whipped out a piano. and hit 2 keys and from there I had a vision for how I wanted the intro of the song to kickoff. Another example is our latest single “Bring Me to the Beach” where in that case I had no guitar ideas in mind and so I messed around with some pads and some arpeggio’s and from there a slide guitar melody came to mind and Ive never even picked up a slide so I had to learn that but man did it pay off.

Great, so let’s take a few minutes and cover your story. What should folks know about you and what you do?

Hush Valley is a band consisting of vocalist/lyricist Mersum Khokhar and guitarist/producer Ben Musiala. We met in our high school guitar class and bonded over artists we both admired. Once we graduated, we found ourselves starting to write original songs and eventually started to produce them. Our first single “Places” was released in November 2023, which has been followed by four more singles since then. Our love for music continues to grow with each song we make, we’re endlessly excited about exploring our sound and giving our audience songs that they can connect to.

We’re currently in a phase of trying to grow our audience and simultaneously finding a sound that embodies everything we admire about music. We have a few gigs coming up at local venues around Toronto including Dakota Tavern on July 17th and Horseshoe Tavern on August 12th.

If you had to pick three qualities that are most important to develop, which three would you say matter most?

The first thing that comes to mind is definitely passion. We’re both so immersed in music and always have been, so dedicating a large part of ourselves to our art came naturally. It’s easy to give a hundred percent when you have genuine passion for it. The second thing would be figuring out our identity as a duo. Ben and I come from different backgrounds, not just with music but in life as well. Finding our common ground and learning what we both bring to the table was definitely a major step in our journey. The third quality is to always be open minded and adaptable. This rings true for all artists navigating the industry right now, but especially for those who aren’t solo artists. To collaborate with people means compromising, find a balance between your vision and your teammates’ vision. Adaptability is also required in artistry, continue growing, keep consuming music and broadening your tastes so that you can bring those qualities to the music you make. Do not stagnate, keep moving forward.

What’s been one of your main areas of growth this year?

In the past year, we’ve released our music to the world for the first time. We’ve been a band for about two and half years now, so getting to the point where we actually put it out to the world was a huge step. That’s the most important thing we could have done for ourselves as artists. A lot of people have the passion and skills to create music, but they don’t ever get to the point of sharing it with the world. We’ve announced ourselves to the world, shown what we can do and continue to market ourselves so that people know what we’re doing. That’s an essential part of success that we’ve continued to improve on in the last few months.

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Image Credits

James Bottomley

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