New Delhi Artist Pho Showcases Confessional, Diverse Debut EP ‘Bheetar Bahar’

On her debut EP Bheetar Bahar, New Delhi singer, rapper and composer Pho aka Akriti Lal tells us why the mind matters and why the heart matters, perhaps equally.

Pho first appeared on Indian hip-hop radars after providing smoky R&B English vocals on New Delhi rap artist Frappe Ash’s single “About You” in 2020. Since then, she’s been flittering genres as a collaborator and solo artist as well. Over the span of a year leading up to Bheetar Bahar, Pho sometimes took the trip-hop (“Ek Si”), R&B/neo-soul (“Sabab”) and also sad-pop (“Nazuk”) routes with her music. With the EP, the intent to leapfrog over easy categorizations still shows.

The EP’s opening songs “Panja” and “Aastik” – produced by Vaaman – sulk and sneer at love, going over garage-blues rock kind of guitar work. A vibrant horn section punctuates the sparkling “Sambhav,” which features rapper Sant and confronts how Pho never kept secrets from a significant other. On the centerpiece that’s the downcast title track, Pho introduces us to a whole new inside as she traverses from her outer monologue to inner. She sings over a plaintive acoustic guitar melody, “Main tab bhi galat, tu ab bhi sahi (I was wrong then and you are now right).”

In this way, Bheetar Bahar slowly develops its cinematic side, which swells on “Milawat,” featuring the warm baritone of singer and beatboxer Pahaad over production by singer-songwriter and producer Samaksh Lekhwar. The artist in a press statement says the EP “revolves around the concept of love and the courage to love. It is an expression of feelings that are either unexpressed or not expressed enough to pursue a relationship.”

Pho explains the conceptual narrative of the record, pointing out that the first three songs express all that “goes on, on the outside – the adrenaline rush and the initiation of contact.” While the final three tracks are “an expression of what goes on within.” She adds, “[The] realization that maybe this cannot become something that one expected it to be because of lack of courage to love from the other side, and eventually receiving a response from the other side which is quite not what one expected, or let’s say, feared.

Confessional and openhearted alike, Pho says she wanted to keep the project straightforward and simple in its intent, for want of finally getting a chance to write and express feelings she was holding in for long. “The EP shows Pho’s fall and rise in love, or what she believes is love,” the artist adds in her statement.

On the back of releasing the EP in late November, Pho has a couple of shows lined up in Mumbai, including a launch gig at Raasta in Khar on December 21st. Also on the lineup are hip-hop artists such as Farhan Khan, producer Mr. Doss, Qaab, Shinigxmi and more.

Listen to ‘Bheetar Bahar’ EP below. Stream on Apple Music and JioSaavn.