Boston Common - Niche Media - A side of Boston that's anything but common.
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TALENT PATROL Jeet Singh playing at Redstar Union, the studio and performance space he founded in Kendall Square. on St. Barth's, became a full-time musician, and created his band, The Singhs. And it's why he decided to return to Boston and his entrepreneurial roots by launching Redstar Ventures, a start-up incubator, and Redstar Union, a cutting-edge, live-streaming multimedia studio and performance space. Local haunt: "The Blue Room in "It seems weird for people who haven't Cambridge. The been in this position," Singh says, "but a lot food is great, the of my CEO-type friends—they can't quit vibe is chill; perfect their jobs because they don't know what the for pre-show." hell to do with their lives. When people Touchstone: asked me 'How could you quit?' I said, 'It's "Who's Next by The Who. It was really easy. I'm going to play music.' The my rock 'n' roll music was always waiting." revelatory Singh first picked up a guitar as a teen moment." while growing up in India and wrote songs Favorite quote: "If I and played in rock bands for six years after had a pony, I'd ride he came to MIT in 1981. "Music has always him on my boat." —Lyle Lovett been part of my life," he says. "Creativity is not so dissimilar from business." The Singhs' second album, Science Fiction, was released this fall as a CD and an iPad app. (Two albums had previously been released under the band name Dragonfly.) Tony Visconti, famed producer for David Bowie, among others, produced it in New York. "I love to work with people who aren't well-known," says Visconti. "The first thing I heard was the song 'Science Fiction,' and I got goose bumps. We went for an eerie, emotional sound. Jeet has a unique voice—a AFTER HITTING IT BIG IN HIGH-TECH THEN FOUNDING tenor, but he uses the lower range. He's kind of fragile, CAMBRIDGE'S HIPPEST MUSIC STUDIO, JEET SINGH RELEASES and I mean that in a good way. He's got a vulnerable HIS NEWEST ALBUM. BY JIM SULLIVAN quality, the voice of a balladeer." At Redstar Union, guests can expect to hear The Singhs play regularly (bandmates include veteran coolest-of-cool music studio is the last thing you'd expect in the musicians Peter Parcek and Brother Cleve), along with Boston's hottest cement-walled, computer-cord-wrapped maze of Kendall Square. music stars: Amanda Palmer, Melissa Ferrick, Bill Janovitz, Tanya Donelly, But Redstar Union music studio founder Jeet Singh loves a good and Shea Rose. "Fundamentally, we're trying to experiment," Singh says. surprise. Embracing the unexpected is why he walked away from high-tech "I think of it as a media lab. I wanted a studio to be able to rehearse and in 2002 after hitting it big (and amassing $50 million in company stock) record in, but as we started building out this space we thought, Let's make with his start-up, Art Technology Group, which he cofounded with his best a place where people can mix more. It evolved." Redstar Union, One Kendall friend Joe Chung; it's why he bought a sprawling home-studio complex Square, Cambridge; redstarunion.com BC INSIGHT A 66 PHOTOGRAPHY BY MICHAEL YOUNG Name Is Destiny BOSTONCOMMON-MAGAZINE.COM 066_BC_SP_TP_Jeet_Holiday_13.indd 66 10/31/13 4:08 PM