Bloodywood’s ‘Nu Delhi’ Is Both a Global and Local Force

It’s a bittersweet feeling when Japan no longer feels like an “alien planet” for Raoul Kerr. The rapper from folk-metal band Bloodywood—India’s biggest export in heavy music right now—is back in the Land of the Rising Sun for the third time, playing a three-city headline tour after releasing their second album, Nu Delhi.

Back in July 2022, after their first album, Rakshak, was out independently, Bloodywood hit up the prestigious Fuji Rock Festival. Kerr recounts they even went viral on Japanese Twitter after the performance. “Fuji Rock is as big online as it is offline. There was a guy who closed his store and left a handwritten note on the front, saying, ‘Sorry, the restaurant’s closed today. I’m going to go watch an Indian metal band.’ That’s where the love story began,” Kerr says.

Japan is just one of the international markets Bloodywood have become regulars in, jumping back into tour life after a year’s break to work on Nu Delhi. Now, Europe they’ve already embarked on a headline tour in Mumbai—supported by extreme metallers Demonic Resurrection and prog band Midhaven on select dates, in a first for Indian metal—that proves that Bloodywood aren’t just hashing out of a formula.

The new album brings heavier beatdowns (“Daggebaaz”), more emotionally urgent songs (“Kismat”), a fun-loving tribute to Indian cuisine (“Tadka”), a nod to their heroes in American nu metal band Slipknot (vocalist Jayant Bhadula goes ham on “Halla Bol”), and an emotionally urgent song like “Bekhauf” with Japanese metal band Babymetal, which marks Bloodywood’s first-ever collab. When the rattling title track “Nu Delhi” came out as the lead single last year, the love letter to home marked not just a return to form for Bloodywood, but also drew in responses from unexpected quarters, from Skrillex liking their Instagram post to Indian actor Raveena Tandon sharing a video snippet.

They want to use some of that attention to make sure they’re just as well-known in India as they are globally right now. “The fact is that our support base was mainly international, and we had support in single-digit percentages from India. But it’s grown,” Kerr explains. They’ve played all the big stages in India already—Lollapalooza India, NH7 Weekender, Outrage Festival, and a few others—but they want to play more. “It’s all about working towards giving India its metal moment. It can’t be as simple as just representing the country on the international scene when the country itself doesn’t know about the genre, or about what we’re doing, right? It’s about creating that wave in India of metal,” he says.

Thoroughly of the opinion that the “Indian spirit and lifestyle is metal as fuck,” Bloodywood are convinced that India’s metal moment is coming. For their part, they’re planning to hit up more college festival shows and possibly slot their songs in Indian film soundtracks.

Until then, they’re on an international tour that’ll take up most of their year. Starting in June, Bloodywood will support Babymetal in the U.S. for a 21-date tour, joined by American rock/metal act Black Veil Brides and Ukrainian metallers Jinjer.

With Babymetal, “Bekhauf” took them to new audiences, and midway through this tour, the Japanese band will drop their album Metal Forth with the song “Kon! Kon!” featuring Bloodywood. Kerr says just as Babymetal helped Bloodywood’s vision for “Bekhauf,” they worked on “Kon! Kon!” with a similar mindset. “Karan [Katiyar, guitarist-producer] gave them an instrumental, and they took it and they made it their own. They were so helpful and cooperative, and they supported it [‘Bekhauf’] however they could, the same way we just let them steer when it came to their song,” he says.

There are 12 more shows as well in the U.S., part of their ongoing Return of the Singh headline tour. Then, through October and November, Bloodywood joins American rock/metallers Halestorm’s headline Europe tour, performing 18 shows ending in London on November 26, 2025.

Kerr says, “We were just talking about how this time, it’s twice as intense and awesome as before, because we picked our five top songs from this album and our five top songs from the last album, and we just doubled up on the level of energy and enjoyment that someone might get, listening to the set.” In addition to Kerr, Bhadula, and Katiyar, Bloodywood’s live band that brings the heat includes bassist Roshan Roy, drummer Vishesh Singh, and dhol player Sarthak Pahwa.

After a slew of headline tours, they’re now trimming their set to a 30-minute runtime, going on support tours for the first time. Kerr says, “It’s a different experience when you know everyone who’s over [at a headline show] is super excited and familiar with the music, versus having to win a crowd over. That’s a cool, different challenge.” That said, expect a half hour of madcap energy, hard-learned life lessons, and lots of dhol. “We’re going to be blasting in that half an hour to hopefully win some people over every day, wherever we play,” Kerr says.