Dhee, Photograph: @madhavan.palanisamy
Dhee is one of Australia’s most-streamed contemporary musicians. So how come you’ve never heard of her?
Over the last decade, the Western Sydney-raised artist has lent her voice to dozens of Indian Tamil and Telugu movie soundtracks. Songs from films like Maari 2, Madras and Dasara have attracted hundreds of millions of streams, while 2021’s “Enjoy Enjaami” – a collaboration between Dhee, Arivu and Santhosh Narayanan – has eclipsed one billion streams.
Dhee recently switched focus to her solo career. She released the jazz-pop single “Can’t You Stay a Little Longer” in May, and her debut album is expected later in the year. As part of the shift, the 25-year-old songwriter wants to forge a deeper connection with Australian audiences.
“I just want to get that blessing and then move everywhere else,” Dhee says.
Check Check speaks to Dhee about her plans as a solo artist, her songwriting habits, and the influence of her aunt and uncle on “Can’t You Stay a Little Longer.”
Check Check: You have a long history of working on music for South Indian cinema. When did you start working on your album?
Dhee: Some of the songs on the album I wrote when I was 19. Now I’m 25, so there’s that whole growth that happened. But officially I started three or four years ago just because that’s when I started producing and making them into songs and not just pieces of writing or little ideas.
“Can’t You Stay a Little Longer” is totally different to the film music you’re known for. Did you know what sound you were going for when you started work on the album?
I never really decided on one sound because I didn’t really want to box myself in. So, in this album, there’s a lot of influences. It’s a jumble of different sounds, and I think that’s just me. I was like, I don’t care if I’m not in one genre, I don’t mind if it’s not in one specific sound.
When I started, the only thing that I wanted to do was just be completely honest. In terms of, like, sonically, musically, visually – just be honest.
A lot of change and growth happens between 19 and 25. Has songwriting been a helpful tool as you’ve grown and learned new things about yourself?
Yeah, definitely. I don’t really write when I’m conflicted or I’m going through something. It’s always from a place of reflection or when I’m resolved. I do write when I’m conflicted as well, but I just never end up liking it. Any time I wrote a song and I was really happy with it, it felt like I was closing a chapter and I could move on from it.
“Can’t You Stay” is obviously a whimsical, very lovey-dovey kind of song, but the rest of the songs were very therapeutic for me in the sense that I could really close that chapter and move on.
It took me a while, though, because I don’t think I’m a very fast writer. I have friends who write really fast and I admire that because I really have to go through it in order to write about it – really get my head sorted before I could make it into a song.
That sounds healthy – arriving at a resolution and then writing about it. There are plenty of songwriters who seek out chaos and disorder to fuel their creativity.
I think that’s cool too, though. People have their own cool ways of finding inspiration for writing. I usually ask musicians or songwriters, What makes you feel inspired? Where do you write from? Because I love knowing that. For me it’s just, when I’m conflicted, it doesn’t feel right.
The lyrics in “Can’t You Stay a Little Longer” are a bit of a call back to classic narrative songwriting. Tell me about the origins of the song.
I wrote this during a time when I deeply missed home. I felt like I was leaving people behind or people were leaving me behind and that’s where the line “Can’t you stay a little longer” came from. And then later, it just naturally evolved into a love song.
A big inspiration was my uncle and aunt who were going through a long-distance thing themselves. I would interview them. I’d be like, “What do you miss when she’s not there or here’s not there?” And they’d be like, “He leaves his shoe in the middle of the house. It used to drive me crazy but I miss it because he’s not there.”
So I would think about these things and put it into a song, and also apply it to myself. I feel like whatever you write, you end up manifesting as well.
Can you explain that to me?
So, if you write about long distance or something really crazy, those things manifest as well. I’ve experienced that twice now. So I’m very careful about what I put down. I know that sounds a little crazy, but I think words really matter and what you say really matters. You put a lot of energy into it as well.
Are you thinking much about your Australian audience when you’re releasing new music?
Yeah, because that’s home, right? I think you always start from home and then you branch out everywhere else. So, I always want to start there, but I haven’t been home in four years. I just really want to go back, visit friends and visit family.
Working on this album, a lot of it has to do with home as well, trying to navigate what that means to me. A big part of it is just, like, missing home, longing for that feeling. I think that’s why I wanted to start anything regarding the song or the album in Australia. I just want to get that blessing and then move everywhere else.
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