Building India's Next Rap Wave — B12 Collective

Finding the Right People

From the very beginning, MC Joint's intention was never just to represent established names — it was to find talent worth representing before anyone else did. That meant looking in places the industry hadn't thought to look yet. Street cyphers. Underground sessions. Open-mic nights in the city's lesser-known corners.

Hyderabad has always had a thriving underground rap culture, and when we started attending local cypher events, we weren't expecting to find what we found. Faraz OG stood out immediately — an OG Hyderabadi in the truest sense, whose bars carry the weight of the city in every line. He uses the pen as his mightier sword, and it shows in the precision and depth of his writing. His verses aren't just rap — they're literature delivered at tempo.

The Trio

Faraz didn't come alone — he came with a band. B12 is Faraz OG, Kiyaan and INK Toxic. Each one of them is a distinct presence.

Kiyaan was born in Meghalaya and spent time working as a sound engineer in Bangalore before relocating to Hyderabad. That engineering background gives his work a precision and texture that most rappers don't have access to — he understands the music from the inside out, on both sides of the glass.

INK Toxic remains as mysterious as he can be. That's not a metaphor — he simply prefers it that way, and his music is all the better for it. There's an intensity to what he does that feels earned rather than performed.

Kitaab Se Jhoot — Nothing Came Easy

Our first real project with B12 was an album — Kitaab Se Jhoot. We started by connecting them with local recording studios in Hyderabad, looking for the right sonic space to build the project. The recording process was itself a creative experiment — testing different rooms, different engineers, different approaches to see what fit.

Nothing came easy. The project faced delays that could have ended it. Unforeseen circumstances pulled at the timeline from multiple directions, and there were moments when it was unclear whether the project would ever reach its final form.

It did. Purely through the sheer will of the trio. Faraz, Kiyaan and INK Toxic refused to let the album die on a hard drive. MC Joint released Kitaab Se Jhoot as singles across December 2025 and January 2026 — dropping track by track, building anticipation with each release rather than dumping everything at once.

Zaban Hai — The Video

Post the album, we shot a music video with the boys for the Zaban Hai track. The video brought the whole energy of B12 onto screen — the intensity, the chemistry between the three, and the Hyderabad underground aesthetic that makes them who they are.

The numbers? Not millions. But that was never the point, and we're honest about that. We're happy with what we've built — a real piece of work that reflects exactly who these artists are, created without compromise and without a major label's backing. That counts for something.

What Comes Next — Flintstory

After the video, we got back to business — which for us means finding the next right collaborator for our artists. For B12, that meant finding a producer who could match Faraz OG's level of craft and ambition for his next solo album.

We didn't have to wait long. Revanth Pottimuthyala from Flintstory came on board — and he came in as one of the most enthusiastic people we've ever had walk into the room. He met the artists, connected immediately, and set out on a new journey with Faraz OG for his next album.

This is also not our first collaboration with Flintstory — we worked with them previously on Beyond Physical, and having them back feels like a natural continuation of a creative relationship that clearly has more to give.

The details of the album remain under wraps for now. What we can say is that it's currently in production and is expected to release later this year through the Flintstory music label. We're glad to have helped Faraz find the right producer for this chapter — and genuinely excited to see where it goes.

Watch: Zaban Hai

Listen on Spotify