People might call him a crybaby but 22-year-old Prakash Poudel doesn't mind. Instead, the third year BBS student from Dharan bawls his heart out in unabashed longing for the girl he can't have in Nai Malai Tyahi Keti Chahinchha-the first single in what he calls the Nepali C-Rap or Cry-Rap genre. The entire song is composed of lyrics delivered through a plaintive wail. What the lyrics lack in imagination, the delivery compensates for with originality. And ironically, all this wailing leaves many of his fans howling with laughter. Most others don't know whether to laugh or cry.

But don't think creating C-Rap is easy. Prakash entered a recording studio and cried for six hours straight-in tune and time with the rhythm. And he didn't forget to rhyme. "I just wanted to try a different style. I think we need to widen the field of Nepali music. Rap, rock, metal, whatever you do, do it in Nepali," said Prakash, who was in Kathmandu last month to promote his debut album, 3 Much.

So did Prakash decide to weep publicly when he didn't get his girl in real life? "No, it's just a song I wrote. Also, mostly, in love songs like these, the families are not involved-they just talk about the girl and the boy. But in this one, I have included the boy's mother, to whom he cries out his sorrows," says the innovative young man who got a cool Rs 95,000 advance from Moonlight Records for 3 Much.

Between playing basketball-he almost made it to the national team, working at the BP Koirala Institute of Health Sciences, and attending classes, Prakash, whose wailing is gaining immense popularity on the airwaves, is already at work on another album entitled (what else?) 4 Much.

He's tightlipped about whether this one, too, will feature loud, hysterical weeping. "I have a few tricks up my sleeve," he says mysteriously. "I will bring them out one by one." Now should we laugh or cry at this threat?