Singapore has been a regional centre of music industry for a long time. Recordings of Chinese and Malay popular music were done at the EMI studio in Singapore in the colonial period, but until the 1960s, recordings were sent to be pressed in India and the records then sent back for sale. It was a centre of Malay popular culture where Malay stars such as P. Ramlee were based, but after Singapore independence in 1965, the Malay music industry began to shift to Kuala Lumpur.