Nikhita Gandhi: ‘Be it musical landscape or fashion, there’s a sudden affinity towards the nineties’

Having belted out Bollywood chartbusters like Ullu Ka Pattha (Jagga Jasoos; 2017), Qafirana (Kedarnath; 2018) and Poster Lagwa Do (Luka Chuppi; 2019), musician Nikhita Gandhi is busy carving a niche for herself in the world of independent music. After singles like Humnava, Bura Na Mano Yaara and Ruh, the pop singer recently released an EP titled Saazish comprising three tracks – Pitch Black Dark, Saazish and Khushnaseeb. Pitch Black Darks is all about vulnerability and talks about how you make someone else your sunshine, your source of power and light. And while Saazish is a quintessential love song, Khushnaseeb’s a powerful ballad which can be perceived as a take on life and taking all the experiences of love and loss positively,” she tells us. Firstpost catches up with the musician as she talks about the predominance of English lyrics in her latest EP, the resurgence of the nineties with the return of indie pop, the joy of making music sans any external control, the desire to collaborate with international artistes and more. Excerpts from the interview: The seamless blend of English and Hindi lyrics stands out in your recently released EP. What’s your thought on English lyrics now taking a centre stage in indie music? Pitch black Dark was a song I wrote in English. And as for Saazish, the words just kept flowing in tandem with my thoughts. While one line made sense in English, the next one made better sense in Hindi. I think it’s refreshing to say things in the way they are meant to be said. With indie music now dominating the music scene, would you say that the golden period of the 1990s, which saw an influx of singles and indie pop, is back? In a way, yes. Be it musical landscape or fashion, there’s a sudden affinity towards the nineties and the things it stood for such as disco, retro tones, colours. Today, art of all forms, whether it’s visual or aural, seems to resonate to that era. The nineties is back in a new way, and I love it. You have written, composed and sung Saazish. Did you feel more in control as a creative person considering there was no pressure from external sources like a music composer, a label or a production house? The funny thing is I wrote Saazish while I was taking a brief break. I was trying to crack a song for a collaboration where I got the responsibility of making it. It was a commercial track and I was under a lot of pressure to get it right. The next day when I sat in on a session, I told myself that I’ll make whatever comes to me naturally. And that’s how Saazish happened. I think some of the most important music in an artiste’s life is the one that comes without any bias or control by letting your brain, mind, soul and creativity loose. Last month, your other single Bura Na Mano Yaara was featured at NYC’s Times Square billboard. What did that global exposure mean to you? Just like we spoke about the resurgence of the nineties and the surge of retro, there’s also a sense of globalisation that’s happening in the music scene. K-pop and Latin music have transcended borders, much like Hindi music. There are so many collaborations happening across the world. A few months before Bura Na Mano Yaara, I had hit the billboards for the song Jugnu with Badshah. But Bura Na Mano Yaara featuring at New York City’s Times Square billboard was extra special and meant a lot to me because it had no music label attached to it and there was no infrastructural support behind it. I hope things go onwards and upwards hereon. What are your thoughts on contemporary pop? Do you think our Indian audience has developed an appetite for it? Yes, I think our audience is warming up to it. But it’s also very hard to classify what people like and give nomenclatures to musical genres. We’ve been witnessing a lot of blend across genres like pop, lo-fi, funk pop, soul pop and R&B. Youngsters in India are enjoying international sounds, which is great for artistes like me, who always wanted to see that crossover. Do you have any plans for more international collaborations? Is there any artiste in particular you want to collaborate with? Yes, I do have plans. Apart from Pink Sweat$ (American singer), I’ve collaborated with CARYS, a Canadian artiste, on a track called Princesses Don’t Cry in the past. There are a couple of more collaborations in the pipeline, and I want to do many more of that in the coming years. And I do have a bucket list of artistes who I would want to make music with including the ones I grew up listening to and those I recently started admiring like Rosalia (Spanish singer-songwriter) and Kehlani (American singer-songwriter), among so many others. Speaking about the West, how do you think we can take a cue from them to better our music scene? The lockdown gave a slight independence to our music industry, which has otherwise been very dependent on Bollywood, historically. With the emergence of OTT, music has taken its own independent path in a way. I want to see more and more artistes emerging, not just as voices in films. I love how the West works, where musicians have their own identity even though there are cross-pollinations where they feature in and give music to a movie’s original soundtrack. But I want to see artistes standing on their own feet and making their own sounds and identity, which has already begun in India. I’m truly excited to be a part of this movement. Titas Chowdhury is a journalist based in Mumbai with a keen interest in films and beaches. Read all the  **_Latest News_** _,_  **_Trending News_** _,_  **_Cricket News_** _,_  **_Bollywood News_** _,_  **_India News_**  and  **_Entertainment News_**  here. Follow us on  Facebook_,_  Twitter and  Instagram_._