Bigg Boss Kannada OTT: Did you know Rakesh Adiga is regarded as the FIRST ever Kannada rapper?

Bigg Boss Kannada OTT is officially underway with all the 16 contestants nestled comfortably inside the opulent house. As expected, the showrunners have put together an eclectic list of individuals for our benefit with each of them boasting of some kind of vibrancy or the other. Kiccha Sudeep returns as the host for the OTT edition.

One among them is musician/actor/filmmaker Rakesh Adiga who steps into the competition as a most promising candidate. Rakesh is popular in the public domain for his acting credits in films like Jhossh, Alemari, Manasology, and others but not many know that he holds the feat of being the very first Kannada hip-hop artist/rapper.

Yes, Rakesh Adiga first rose to prominence as a part of the hip-hop collective Urban Lads that also comprised Alok Babu (popularly known as All Okay) and Sameer Kulkarni. Today, Urban Lads owns the stature of being the maiden Kannada hip-hop effort with the trio managing to bring a new form of popular music to the fore, thus also achieving a cult status over the years. Fans, till date, regard Rakesh Adiga and his mates highly for introducing rap music to the Kannada milieu.

Although Urban Lads, the collective, would dissociate over time to head in different directions individually, their music has gradually gained tremendous traction on the internet. Tracks such as Madabeda, Dual Mind (reportedly produced by Suraj Sarja), and many others exemplified that the Kannada language withheld a unique rhythm for the hip-hop.

Rakesh Adiga, by virtue of his status as a rapper, would land his maiden acting opportunity in 2009 with the film Jhossh, written and directed by Shivamani. As the lead, Rakesh won a lot of praise from both the audience and the critics and the film too went on to become one of the highest grossers of the year: it would be later remade in Telugu as Keratam and as Yuvan in Tamil. Rakesh Adiga won the Suvarna Film Award in the Best Debut Actor category.