LA-VIA-MUMBAI ARTIST SCAYOS SHARES NEW COMING-OF-AGE SLOWCORE EP
October 1, 2025 BY Bailey Vigliaturo
Today, 23-year-old singer/songwriter, producer & multi-instrumentalist Shaan Chhadva aka SCayos shares his new indie slowcore EP, felt like forever, produced by Phil Ek (Duster, Built to Spill, The Shins).
“This EP as a whole feels like the sound and energy of youth in all the best and worst ways—when every emotional change in your life is the most drastic,” shares SCayos. “The breakups feel horrible, and when you’re in love, it feels like you’re on top of the moon; everything is heightened. You’re dumb and you make stupid mistakes, but you’re also free. There are so many parallels and opposites that happen at this point in your life.”
The tales of youth told on felt like forever are largely based on SCayos’ high school experience, where at 14 years old, he left behind the constant construction, honking, and hustling of Mumbai, the seventh-most populous city on earth, to live in Interlochen, Michigan and attend Interlochen Center for the Arts, an internationally renowned boarding school that boasts alumni like Chappell Roan and Norah Jones. Interlochen let Shaan live entirely within his thoughts, imagining what the future might hold. Nearly a decade later, SCayos returns to those formative years to chart his bold path forward.
“We have this love-hate relationship with it,” he shares on Interlochen, “Some parts were so intense: you were making art for hours, doing regular school, trying to figure out your life… The amount of pressure, the ugly sides of the school, and also the beautiful parts… it all really forced you to be the best version of yourself, and it made me understand how much I loved music.”
felt like forever revisits the heartbreak and homesickness of his early Interlochen days and interrogates the success that far exceeded any of his dreams. His 2021 instrumental debut Ethereal Nights, a lofi, Dilla-indebted record made in his bedroom, amassed millions of streams and launched a global career, but Chhadva found himself wondering, “Is this what I’m supposed to be doing? Do I want to be making only beats until I’m 40?” The answer: “No. I really want to explore my artistry.”
That exploration led him to Los Angeles’ psychedelic jazz scene, where he rechristened himself Ornithology—a nod to his childhood obsession with birds. His Hotel Cafe debut became a viral sensation, introducing jazz to new audiences and inviting a wave of listeners into his world. But while many artists try to replicate virality, SCayos chose reinvention. felt like forever trades polish for vulnerability, stepping into a beginner’s mind as a songwriter. The EP’s second single “michigan” isn’t just about a place, but a state of mind: “what it means to be confused and dumb and anxious about the world, and you’re just trying to figure things out.”
He leaned into that uncertainty by immersing himself in slowcore, shoegaze, and orchestral folk, discovering artists like Florist, Pinegrove, and Duster, whose Ek-produced Stratosphere loomed large over the record. The result is a dusky, gritty indie rock album grounded in collaboration—like the haunting “i kissed her,” built from three words and five creators, or “chest cavity,” a song that transformed from too-pretty folk into gnarly catharsis via cassette-deck distortion.
felt like forever is a snapshot of youth in all its contradictions—beautiful and naive, messy and loud. “That’s what music does for people,” Chhadva says. “It gives it a shape and a name.” And at just 23, he’s giving shape to what’s still to come…
