Astha, a two men band formed by two music enthusiasts who carved to create some new kind of music is one of the most popular bands in Nepal. Astha means “Faith” and the band members, Naren Limbu and Sudip Gurung, definitely had faith in themselves that they could create music that would be loved by all. The band was formed during the early days of their college and they released their first album in 2003. The album was self titled and their first video ‘Harpal’ remained on top of the charts for a longtime. The music as well as the video was very well received by the audiences and the band became everyone’s favorite with their first album. The success of their first album made it clear that the two guys hailing from Dharan had made a start into the world of Nepali music.

In the second album released by Astha, Sudip, however, was not present and Naren was seen alone giving rise to the assumptions that the band had split up. Contrary to other’s assumption, the band is still intact and Sudip, who had to go to UK for his further studies, was always in touch with Naren helping and supporting him in every way possible while releasing the album. A year later, Sudip also came up with his solo self titled album which was a part of their experiment in trying to do their own kind of music as Naren likes rock music while Sudip enjoys R&B.

Releasing an album was just a desire that they had during their college days. Naren likes to compose music and write lyrics but does not have deep interest in singing. He has started writing more and he is just moving along with the flow, unknown to the fact how long he would be involved into creating music. However, he might be seen working on music videos, handling the direction and production department rather than acting, as he had studied film direction. He has already directed about a dozen music videos and he does not believe there should be concept or theme rather a video should be simple that people would enjoy watching and feel good while they watch it. He, however, wants to be remembered as a good song writer more than anything else.

The other half of the Astha, Sudip, is busy with his studies. He strictly believes that music is not his career but a very serious hobby. It is something that he wants to do when he get time from his studies. He wants to be involved into the music field as long as he can create good music that could contribute to the Nepali music industry and if someday he feels he could not create good music anymore, he will stop.

Although the band members are not sure about how long they will be working and have different thoughts and taste when music is considered, we can expect to her some good Nepali songs as long as they are involved in the field.