MUMBAI: The year should see a more balanced distribution of hit songs from Bollywood across genres than being dominated by item numbers alone, playback singer Neeti Mohan has said.

With the previous two years being dominated by upbeat item numbers, the music industry has suddenly witnessed a surge of such tracks being featured in most bollywood films. Most directors now use it as a 'success mantra' with the audiences to garner buzz and increase ticket sales.

Speaking with Radioandmusic.com, Mohan said, “Every bollywood music album has different types of songs, from peppy numbers to romantic ones for different people who will have different tastes. Although item numbers are big, not every filmmaker is going for it. And not every director wants to insert a song which has little relevance to the flow of the story.”

But item numbers, whatever their shortcomings might be, have their place and relevance amongst people and their differed moods. They have their place in bringing in a type of song that adds colour to the country’s popular music soundscape as well.

“All songs have their place, the peppy item songs gets you on the dance floor and love songs have the most staying power. I like to wake up to ghazals or bhajans in the morning. But in the evening on a night out with friends I’d go for the peppy item numbers. That’s when you’re not too bothered about the lyrics of the song and the groove takes over,” Mohan pointed out.

While the purist in her goes for the deep romantic numbers and relates to tracks like ‘Jiya Re’ from ‘Jab Tak hai Jaan’, ‘Ishq Wala Love’ from ‘Student of the Year’, Mohan however is not averse to to trying out an item number in the future.

She stated, “Yes, I’ll be okay singing an item number depending on the film, script and director. But I’ll have reservations about singing certain types of lyrics. I need to like to sing all kinds of songs.”

For Mohan, who grew up singing on stage, performing live is almost second nature to her. What she has learnt more recently is how to work in the studio for films - getting a grip of the technicalities involved in playback singing. She divides her passion for singing live and in the studio by reserving the daytime for live audiences and the evenings for the recording booth.

“Music is such a huge thing, it covers every emotion,” she added.