‘If I was to speak about pollution all the time, I’d be asked to shut up. So, I sing about it’: Musician Ditty

In her newest single Money, the Delhi native musician Aditi Veena aka Ditty examines her relationship with her own growing success in the current music landscape. There will be things that money won’t buy, sings 34-year-old making it clear that she is determined to not sell out. It was her deep sense of conviction that made her past work – albums Poetry Ceylon and Mumblings – stand out. The thought continues to reflect in her new EP, Skin, which was released today.

Skin is a record born out of a period of transformation in Ditty’s life. She opens up about the process of creating the record, saying, “I found new love. I got married. But I also got diagnosed with a life-threatening illness. I had to go through a big surgery. And I had to slow down. I was not writing so much but I was thinking a lot, which I believe is also writing of a kind,” says Ditty in a conversation over the phone.

The theme of introspection engulfs the album. It carries her signature sound of spoken-word fused with haunting melodies as well as these bold, purposeful lyrics. But Skin has a unique vulnerability to it too, wherein Ditty gives her listeners a window into her inner world. There is a brazen honesty in the way she documents her life as she experiences heartbreak, disappointment, loss, and ultimately healing. In her song Hold Me, she opens up about falling in love with another person while being in a relationship. “It’s not like I practised infidelity. I longed to be with this other person, but I couldn’t. So, I had to put it into a song because I couldn’t express this,” says Ditty.

While she dives into her personal life, Ditty also explores the larger ideas that concern her. The care that she feels for the environment is the thread that ties the whole record together, “It is about taking better care of ourselves and the earth”, she says. “It’s about slowing down, coming back to ourselves, holding space for ourselves and our communities, families, for each other, and for love,” adds Ditty.

Underneath her gentle indie-pop sound, what she really sings are protest songs. She finds it easier to do it through music. “In a room, if I was to speak about pollution all the time, everyone would ask me to shut up. So I sing about it, and it’s okay, and some other people also feel it. I can’t have a lot of these conversations with people through words and with music, it’s easier.”, she says.

 

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Growing up in Delhi, Ditty always wanted to sing but didn’t know how. Her mother was a big influence in shaping the way she grew up, even though it was a “relatively conservative family”. “My mother fought with my dad when I wanted to sing in this choir,” says Ditty, who lost her father early. A homemaker, she somehow sent Ditty to art lessons and Kathak classes. “I didn’t have the privilege to just be able to explore or not earn or be free,” says Ditty, who went on to architecture school, worked as a conservation architect, a researcher, and sang for other bands before she started recording her own music.

The success of her breakthrough album, Poetry Ceylon, made in Sri Lanka, allowed for her career to take off. It started off in her bedroom and was about her experience of moving to Sri Lanka and working as an architect. In the songs she highlighted the urgency of the climate crisis but did it through personal experiences. The album went on to gather praise from fans and critics alike.

In 2019, Ditty went on her first band tour, discovered how destructive touring actually was and the dissonance between her values and how the music industry functioned. “We were a small band of four, we went to five cities, and we basically took like twenty-five flights. I was quite shocked by it,” says Ditty, who does not prefer flights and takes small distances at a time which can be covered by transport on land, like trains or buses. “I say no to flights. No to plastic. I also try to minimise staying in hotels, I stay here and there. I try to take my own cutlery. I cook for myself on tour. Even now, it’s really hard because the organisers, the venues, the promoters, they all seem to think it’s an inconvenience for everybody,” says Ditty.

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