Children's Day Gulzar Playlist

A little playlist for Children's Day, all courtesy Gulzar-saab and friends:

1. "Masoom" (R.D.Burman)

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2. "Kitaab" (R.D.Burman)

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3. "Makdee" (Vishal Bhardwaj)

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4. "The Blue Umbrella" (Vishal Bhardwaj)

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5. "The Jungle Book" (Vishal Bhardwaj)

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The Brain-fever bird

It's 3 am. It's frightfully warm inside; the doors and windows are shut to keep the mosquitoes outside. You can almost hear them knock. It is cool outside, they're bar-hopping, and would love some house-warmth and a pint of warm blood. Finally, the heat gets to all of us, the baby most of all, and I open the balcony door to let in the assassins and the cool breeze.

Soon, the baby gives her discontent a rest, allowing the night sounds to be heard. I hear it: it's a three-note phrase. Where have I heard it before? In a quiz. Didn't I ask a question on this?. Ah, how appropriate: it's the brain-fever bird.

The bird is so termed because of its distinctive call - listen to it and you can be easily persuaded into believing it's chanting brain fever", "brain fever", "brain fever". Aptly, for one with such a febrile name, the chant becomes more and more urgent, rushed, and high-pitched.

"Brain-fever Bird" is much more evocative than "Common Hawk Cuckoo", you will agree. It's also very easy to notice, once you've heard the call. You can prepare yourself by listening to this:

Yes, Vani Jayaram was not this monotonous in "Guddi":

They say that you can't find birds in cities anymore, but we've seen a lot of birds around us. With the help of a good book (like this one), some binoculars, and by the simple expedient of keeping your eyes and ears open, you'll be surprised what you can spot in the nearby tree (that's assuming, you have one handy).

RMIM Puraskaar 2011 - Nominations open

Vinay Jain and friends run the annual RMIM Puraskaar, an effort to rate the best Hindi film soundtracks and songs each year. It is 2011's turn, and the process of nominating songs has begun. If you'd like to suggest a few songs, go to this link and put them in.

Links to previous Puraskaar awards can be seen at the bottom of this page. It's a fun exercise and the results are certainly more interesting than commercial awards.

The nomination page will be open till the end of this year.

String theory

IBN Live quotes Extreme Tech, a technology website, as saying:

The innovative doodle that Google put up for the country and jazz guitarist, songwriter and inventor Les Paul resulted in $268 million in lost productivity.

The calculations are basically a house of cards made of slabs of back-of-the-envelope calculations built on a foundation of assumptions. Still, even if I ignore the number or method, the exercise annoys me. Consider the positives:

• Several million+ people, who may not have heard of the pioneer Les Paul, now know who he was.
• Instead of muddling 5 minutes on Facebook or Powerpoint or thinking about what they'd do after work, they spent time with a new toy, and some of their neurons (especially on the right hand side of the brain) welcomed the change.
• They marveled at the current state of web technology and some of them resolved that day to learn to build such cool things.
• By listening to what others had done with the audio-doodle, they figured out that great music can be made even from humble instruments. Some dusted off their old guitars and others made appointments with musically-inclined friends and teachers.

I wouldn't know how to calculate it, but I guess that whatever the loss to numerical productivity and annoyance to neighbours, the contribution to human knowledge and creativity was firmly in the black.

And if you want to pluck a few strings again, here you go.

The music of Udaan

The soundtrack of Udaan should be properly introduced as being created by Amitabh Bhattacharya (lyrics) and Amit Trivedi (music). The duo, in their first full-length album since Dev.D, are clearly masters at exploring themes of angst. This collection of songs has a cohesion rare in most film soundtracks, with the tracks complementing each other in mood and thought. Restlessness and the optimistic desire to escape current orbits suffuse the songs.

Kahaani establishes the mood of Udaan with its whispered beginning slowly developing into a electric guitar-fuelled rock piece. The title song is more conventional, with a catchy riff and words of quiet rebellion. It is a little weak though, in comparison to the songs that follow. Geet... is wonderful - somehow the Amits manage to perfectly capture a sunbeam of naive optimism. The mood is upbeat and there's some very nice use of harmony and guitars. The two also have an interesting singing partnership - this is as far removed from Bandmasters Rangila and Rasila as you can get.

For me, Naav is the standout song from the album. I'm assuming Mohan (I don't know who he is!) is the lead singer. Though the diction is a little odd, the delivery is wonderful. The thought is age-old: a call to overcoming impediments, but the metaphor (of a boat struggling for breath) was new to me. You will scarcely find a more rousing song to listen to when you are sinking to the dumps. Compositions like these put the 'rock' in rock. (Here's a link to the lyrics for this song.)

Aazaadiyaan reminds me a lot of a previous Amit Trivedi song - "Ik Lau" (Aamir) - it has the same lingering start and perhaps the openings of are similar too, though the tempo is different. The sitar riff is very pleasing, and serves as a springboard for the rest of the song to take off (almost literally).

In contrast, Motumaster is quite out of place. To be fair, it has been designed as an 'arbit' ad-hoc kind of song (Anurag Kashyap's official debut as lyricist?) and is quite hilarious in parts ('kamar to naapte hai magar hum kamraa kaise naape?"). But it might have been better off being just in the film and not on the album. The concluding instrumental piece is reflective and appropriate.

One reason why Udaan's soundtrack works is because the story and treatment seem to be tailormade for the Amits. Amit Trivedi is very good at the rock-folk milieu and is able to bring his own bag of tricks to it. I wonder how he will deal with more commercial ventures. One of the pleasures of listening to his albums is to hear very new voices. Who are these Neuman Pinto/Joi Barua/Mohan/Nikhil D'Souza? Now we've heard them and of them. But if he goes more mainstream, how will this work out for them? But I do wish Amit Trivedi didn't feature on every other song s- he's got a raspy voice suited only for certain types, and he might be overdoing it a tad.

In short, listen to Udaan.

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Image created using Wordle

Chandan Arora's "Striker" - music

"Striker", a film directed by Chandan Arora and starring Siddharth (probably the first Hindi film to feature carrom as its central theme?), recently released its music album. Among the many music directors to write songs for the album is Vishal.

The song is called Yun Hua, is penned by Gulzar, and is sung by Vishal himself.

(see the Wikipedia article on 'Striker' for more.)

cross-posted on the Vishal blog

Sanu ik pal chain na aave

Nineties vibrato Kumar Sanu pulls out the hamaare zamaane me.n rant in this interview:

I don't like the way music is treated today. I do not want to associate myself to any kind of music tampering. People don't know what music means these days. Singers only shout and then they become famous and their songs become hits.

I, for one, don't miss his voice and his arguments are easy to refute with Sturgeon's Law. But it underline how difficult the playback singing industry must be. Singers are at the mercy of music directors and usually, only one person is needed for a song. A significant Long Tail must exist, with "winners" i.e. popular singers or singers associated with current stars, taking the bulk of assignments. The 70s-80s were a prime example.

However, things seem to be different now. Many new singers (some from the endless carousel of TV 'talent hunts') have received prominence in the last few years, especially thanks to music directors like A.R.Rahman, S-E-L, and recently Amit Trivedi. The stranglehold of one-man-one-voice has dimmed with current singers unable to command the heights of the Kishore-Lata-Asha-Rafi era.

Not such a bad thing.

A.R.Rahman - Live in Pune

Despite the intimidating presence of Lata Mangeshkar (because of whom Rahman said everyone on stage was shivering and going off-tune!) in the audience, Pune's first ever Rahman concert met most expectations and exceeded some. The sequence was largely similar to the earlier (Kozhikode) concert in the "Jai Ho" tour. Asad Khan opened with his brilliant sitar piece from SDM's Mausam & Escape, backed by guitars from the likes of Rashid Ali. Rahman emerged next to sing the unheralded Jaage Hain (Guru). Interestingly, they went for Sivaji's Athiradi - a song many in this crowd understandably had not heard of, which was also true of Style a little later.

The newer movie releases in SDM, Delhi 6, & Jaane Tu... were best represented on the concert listing. But the classics got their share of voice too. Hariharan & Sadhna Sargam sang "Roja..." with the versatile Hariharan doing his bag of improvisational tricks. One of the two highlights of the evening was listening to Hariharan & Roopkumar Rathod sing Dheemi Dheemi, Tu Hi Re & Khaamosh Raat, with Rahman's superb piano playing. An album with alternative variations to such melodies would be a great idea. This semi-unplugged detour got better with them performing one of my personal favourites: Sarfaroshi ki Tamanna.

The other highlight was Neeti Mohan's Mayya Mayya. She sang, she danced, she blew everyone's mind. An astonishing performance, it's worth going a distance to watch. Phew.

A lady (very Puneri in her cynicism) kept saying Rahman's only going to sing three-four songs, oh, what a ripoff. Well, he's a music director who occasionally sings, doesn't he? Plus he isn't the best singer going around, but he can evoke sincerity & passion. Which is what he did with the likes of Khwaja mere Khwaja, Humma Humma, Dil Se, and Rehna Tu. Though I was mighty disappointed not to see the fingerboard out on show.

The female singers (Tanvi, Neeti Mohan, the lady who sung Dreams on Fire, and more) were good. Sadly, none of them were introduced, as was the case with the terrific instrumentalists. Was hoping for a Naveen solo, especially given his superb interludes. Stephan Devassy's playing for Masakalli was wonderful too. But the man on the harmonium and piano was terrific - would have loved to have seen more Rahman playing than Rahman singing.

The only blots on the evening were a couple of pestilential RJs from Radio Mirchi (the male one was in danger of being lynched, some unnecessary speech-making, and some poor camerawork & online editing. Hardly any instrumental close-ups or energy there. The show did feature local group The Wandering Souls during Aziim-o-shaan.

Great production values and with no unnecessary gimmicks, the show closed out with Jai Ho! and Vande Mataram (now the Rahman Bhairavi/mangalam, I suppose).

Twilight झोन

It is after-afterhours, and the ever-deepening sponge of despair that is Dev.D is out looking for more spirit to swab his lesions. He runs into a Beelzebub-like Chunni, who beckons him into a limbo hidden to the world by steel shutters. While he sits at the table, lights go off except for a spotlight. Under which a man, dressed in a three-piece suit, stands in front of a wall with LOADING PLEASE WAIT splashed on it. He peels his coat off, then pauses, almost as if he was waiting for permission, but no, he's just waiting for the music to catch up.

When it does, this dancer begins to move, as if imbued with the ghosts of Marceau and Jackson. He is rooted, but his limbs move geometrically, tracing staccato phrases in the air. Inter-cut camera circling Dev and demon. Another man joins the spotlight, they cross, and like synchronised swimmers before the sync-point, take up their places. Then they go, cutting into each other's space with mesmerising finesse.

Danny Boyle's credit swirls and eddies round Dev at a lower frame rate, as the gravelly voice makes way for a sitar. Dev goes off to drown - literally - his blood and his tears, in a place no one would see. He re-surfaces. There are now three players, lithe and fluid.

As the beats turn urgent, Dev rises and has a Snorricam bursting out of his chest. As the world around him staggers to stay on its feet, he is the fulcrum of our vision. In two ticks, he has stumbled into yet another unfamiliar world. This one's pink.

Pardesi from Dev.D - a superbly psychedelic experience.

The music of Delhi 6, mere yaar

Hardly a month into 2009 and there have been two outstanding Hindi film soundtracks already. While Dev.D burst into the room and grabbed us by the scruff of our necks, A.R.Rahman's latest, Delhi 6, fluttered in through the window with a fragrant breeze. Here's why.

A credits page to weep for
The album's credits has a power-packed batting order: Mohit Chauhan opens with a bang. Javed Ali & Kailash Kher at one down. The music director snatching a dreamy song in the middle. And then all the cameos: the uber-talented Rekha Bhardwaj. A blast from the past in the voice of Ustad Bade Ghulam Ali Khan. Amitabh Bachchan rounding things off. There's even Rajat Dholakia in the background as well.

Unusual, unpredictable, and largely unmatchable.

Dove, oh dear
It takes but a few seconds into masak kali to know this one is up there in Rahman's all time best, which is an astonishing feat even for the man himself. A splendidly onomatopoeic avian paean (take a bow, Mr. Joshi), Mohit Chauhan and the now-trademark accordion (played by Rahman) vie for top honours here. If ever there was a modern song made for Kishore Kumar (something Salil also observed), it was this one. Adding to nostalgia is the old device of the violin-backed lead-ins. I always wish I could find an instrumental dissection of songs - this one in particular.

The best explanation as to the meaning of the term masak kali came from Vibhendu: masak is a term for the roof (a.k.a the chajjaa). Thus, the eponymous pigeon is literally the the bud/darling of the terrace.

Another Rahman trademark is that of the Sufi song. So remarkable has he been in this genre, that a Rahman sufi/qawwali/devotional top 10 is merited. arziyaa.n would comfortably fit into the top echelons of such a list. Many of the others showered praise; this qawwali pleads for succour. Prasoon Joshi's notes for this song in the inlay (a nice touch that) say it was almost a year before he finished writing the lyrics for this tune. With phrases such as marammat muqaddar ki kar do, the time spent was well worth it.

Like khwaaja mere khwaaja, these songs are all about 'feeling'. The singers nail it. The ending with the Bulleh Shah kaafi mora piyaa ghar aaya is neatly placed.

Electric guitars and the rhesus factor
The title song is as far removed from the previous two as one can get. The French lyrics and drawn out female vocals, the electronic modulations, the clever hooks in lyrics and music - very snazzy. kala bandar is interesting: one is prone to dismiss it on a superficial level: we are quite conditioned by the mindless use of rap in Hindi albums. But the lyrics, loaded with some kind of political metaphor, deflect that simple interpretation. This song comes closest to the "the journey within" sub-title of the film. This causes some disorientation in our story expectations: along with the 'ramleela' scenes and the film sub-species of the returning NRI, are we in for a revisitation of the Swades territory?

Continuous delight
dil giraa dafatan taught me a new Urdu word (dafatan means 'suddenly', my dictionary informs). Ash King sings, croons, touches the falsetto ceilings, returns and dwells. The string section breaks out in a lush Celtic melody. There is no full takeoff - the singers soar and swoop. I wrapped my head round this to make sense. Many have spoken of how Rahman and Vishal subvert the traditional grammar of Hindi film music. This song is part recital, not full-blooded Bollywood song. As was rehna tu

The obvious faults in Rahman's Hindi diction are always overshadowed by the sheer sincerity in his singing. That he turns rehanaa tuu into rainaa tuu hardly matters when there are so many interesting elements dotting the canvas. Such as the guitar riff in the background, or the way the singing begins in the middle of the beat cycle, or the lyrics themselves (liked the imagery of people right-hand-in-right-hand).

My big complaint of the album was the lack of an instrumental track. But the 2 minute piece at the end of this song assuages this. Rahman's interest in The Continuum has been noted on this blog earlier and he chose a spectacular way to introduce it to Hindi film music. From what I know, the continuum is after all just an electronic synthesizer whose resulting instrumental feel can be controlled - say, strings or woodwind or others. Here, he goes in for an ethereal flute-theremine sound, playing it with great élan over 2 minutes in a Carnatic classical vein. Goosepimply stuff.

Special appearances
I've yet to get over the disappointment of finding out that Rekha Bhardwaj did not have any Rahman originals to sing. She features in two traditional songs ('supervised' by Dholakia): a smartly mixed folk song gendaa phool (intriguingly, a 'courtesy' credit to Raghuvir Yadav) and a bhajan. A similar effort is Shreya Ghoshal 'jamming' (as the inlay notes put it) with the voice Bade Gulam Ali Khan - a very interesting concept. Wonder what shape it takes on screen.

There's just 50 seconds of Amitabh Bachchan reciting a short ghazal called Noor, but that was enough to make me smile in contentedly. In 17 years, A.R.Rahman has never composed music for an Amitabh Bachchan film (discounting such narrations as in Lagaan or Jodhaa Akbar), and this guest appearance (in film and voice) is the first.

And so...
Delhi 6 is easily a career highlight for the composer and the lyricist. The album is not just figuratively heavy, but literally so, with an actual mirror on the front side! An 'in-your-face' rendering of the introspection referred to in the movie sub-title. A satisfying musical effort that awaits a similar outcome on-screen this Friday.

Pune Music Circle is a very regularly updated blog about upcoming music events of all sorts in Pune. Quite useful.

A.R.Rahman: not just Madras, Bombay, or Dilli

Is A.R.Rahman more of a Hindi film composer today than ever before? A post of mine at Passion for Cinema.

Mind culture

There came a point when I knew significantly more trivia about Bob Dylan, Pink Floyd, or Shakti, than much of their music. So it was only fair that I plough back some of my ill-gotten earnings into redressing this state of affairs.

So where does a newbie start but with so-called definitive collections? As long as I don't ask 'what need do I have of this' and 'that'.

RMIM Puraskaar 2008

Tired of the multitude of inconsistent (and plainly misguided) Hindi film music awards? The RMIM Puraskaars, an attempt to redress this imbalance, is accepting nominations for your favourite songs from last year.

The results from 2006 and 2007 should more than assuage any lingering doubts as to its musical tastes :-). The motivations behind such an exercise are available for perusal here.

One can nominate up to 30 songs (use this list of films from last year to jog your memory) and use the form at the end of this page. The poll is likely to remain open until the middle of this month.

Dev.D and Rule

People who know me will tell you I have probably never used the phrase "kick-ass" to describe anything. But there's a first time for everything. The music of Dev.D deserves that appellation. It's as if some rugby fly-half drop-kicked you right into the yonder sky. It's an enjoyable ride, by the way.

Amit Trivedi (music), Amitabh Bhattacharya (lyrics, along with Shellee and others), and Anurag Kashyap (director) manage to do three things: they exhibit a superlative range of genres, provide a solid texture (a mix of urban melancholy, mofussil brass, and quiet yearning), and most importantly, they demonstrate great faith in their choices. There are 18 tracks, and while some of them do falter, just taking the effort to put in 18 more-than-decent tracks (haven't seen that kind of depth and scale since Rahman's Bose) gives them many brownie points.

The list of my personal picks begins with the dulcet banaarasii Dhol yaaraa Dhol sung with great desire by Shilpa Rao and backed by Kshitij. Some of the turns gave me the kind of goosepimples that I usually get with some Rahman interludes. Raa.NjhaNaa is a small downbeat version of this song.

The album has many such doppelgangers - pairs of tracks taking gloomy/bouyant U-turns, hard rock/street music incarnations, or turning from joy to lament. The two Dev-Chanda Themes are especially interesting - the first is a slow bluesy hum (and a fine one at that) while the second is a very moody whistle with a touch of menace.

The album continues its excursions off the rails. There are a couple of Punjabi songs and a Rajasthani song mixed to club arrangements. Then there are a couple of songs that just don't seem to belong here. They're from some Indi-rock-pop album. It gets very difficult to mentally put this lot together - your mind has to make several leaps to reconcile them. What's uncanny about the soundtrack is how it keeps riding the waves of romantic exhilaration and cavernous dejection. Shruti Pathak's paayaliyaa is a great example of this.

Then come the songs voiced by Amit Trivedi - these tend to be garrulous (the harmonium-guitar fuelled duniyaa), scruffy rock (nayan, aa.nkh micholii), or dripping with melancholia (saalii khushi). He's off the sur in places, but that seems very calculated - or is it?

And at last, for the dhokhaa-daayak "emo[tio|sa]nal atyaachaar" songs. That phrase is so cheesy and so appropriate that it will turn into a worn-out cliché. Especially for the brass band version (an immaculate concept, if any), which on repeated hearings could so easily turn into hilarity by the time the movie hits the screens. That might actually work against the intended mood. Don't hear it too often if the song needs to retain its novelty freakness! The rock version is safer, with a great opening guitar riff and sung with throat-shattering gusto by Bony Chakravarthy.

Phew. Undoubtedly, there are a hajaar music influences at play in Dev.D's soundscape. I found myself thinking of fragments from several songs. In several places, the lyrics are both wonderful and with an original flavour. A loser's tale has seldom been more plunge-worthy. Whatever happens to his movies, Anurag Kashyap's track record in getting music that you can also touch and feel remains intact. In many ways, the follow-up to the collaborations with Vishal Bhardwaj is appropriate. Amit Trivedi's music is intertwined with Amitabh Bhattacharya's words in a wholesome concoction. Where did all these people come from, you wonder - these Labh Jajuas, Shilpa Raos, Shellees, Toshis and Aditis and Shrutis, Manis and Kshitijs, and most of all, these Amits? The efforts in composition, writing, performances boggle the mind.

An album so trippy, you find yourself on your backside often, staring into that strange sky. You bitch. Indeed.

A more detailed and appropriately awe-struck review here.

1.25 sessions at Sawai Gandharva 2009

I have been stepping up my Sawai Gandharva attendances in measured quanta - one session in 2005, a full day last year, and 2 days this year. Or that was the plan for this year, until I decided I had had enough this year after half of the last day and decided to retire hurt.

I've realised I don't really have much of an ear for the standard issue Hindustani classical concert. The template performance, with the lengthy warm-up aalaaps, made me fret. Or perhaps it was just the choice of performers. The trouble with Sawai is that the first few performances are either newcomers or slightly obscure musicians. In comparison to the big names, they don't seem to tailor their recitals in accordance to the audience's mood (or in response of the lack of one). Contrastingly, all the Carnatic musicians I've seen at Sawai have gone out of their way to engage with the listeners, either by useful explanations of what they're about to do, or by picking attractive compositions. It could be that they have to put their best foot forward, being mostly novel to the average attendee.

It could just be my South Indian ear, brought up on idli-dosai at home and pongal-coffee at the Chennai winter sabhas (which I hated to attend as a ten year old at the peak of my neighbourhood game). But those with me seemed to concur. I enjoyed the programme last year. This time, Ganesh-Kumaresh and Pandit Jasraj (who clearly knows how to recruit the audience on his journeys, and did some interesting harmonic bits with his pupils, whom he also sledged from time to time) were the highlights. Even the usually appealing Ronu Majumdar couldn't hold my interest.

Or it was the crowds. The Bhaaratiya Baithak (you sit cross-legged, Indian-style) is a pain in the arse, quite literally, and especially so when there's hardly room for the occasional stretch or back-lean. Your mind gets into a sitting-marathon mode and at some point you hit the wall. I spent the rest of the Sunday morning (lasted about 3 hours in the BB) standing. There's got to be a rethink about some of the organisation - the place is splitting at the seams. Or an extension of the shamiaanaa on either side is needed. I sat under the stars last year till 2 am and ended up with a massive cold in return for watching the astonishing L. Subramaniam and his son.

On the sidelines, there was an excellent photo exhibition featuring the latest Bharat Ratna, Pandit Bhimsen Joshi (who made an appearance and looked extremely frail, and so in no condition to repeat his short and sweet recital from last year). The highlight being a snap of a rather dashing Pandit Ravi Shankar.

Clamped up, I inevitably end up in a lot of soul-searching: what am I here for? Do I really "get" what the musician is trying to do? Am I, in Aditya Gadre's annoyed terminology, just a pseudo-fan (in its kindest interpretation). Are many of the people here just surfing the annual social waves or busy admiring the emperor's new clothes?

Anything to keep my mind off the pain that has oppresses the region from my lower back to the ankles like some mad despot.

This is a much kinder report by a Sawai debutant.

All that glitters and some free gifts

It's been quite a year for A.R.Rahman (and with two weeks to go, there still seems to be more left!). 7 film albums released this year (Jodhaa-Akbar, Jaane Tu Ya Jaane Na, the already forgotten Ada, Sakarakatti, Yuvvraaj, the much feted Slumdog Millionaire and Ghajini) and now Connections, his latest non-film album.

Not to mention awards: the LA Critics Association chose him for their pick for Best Score (the Slumdog again), and he has just been nominated for his first ever Golden Globe, in the august company of Hans Zimmer, James Howard, Alexandre Desplat, and (surprise!) Clint Eastwood. That's a trivia question prediction (until perhaps the Oscars list :-)). The Oscar march has truly begun.

Back to Connections. Karthik on his Milliblog points out how anyone not buying a Nokia phone with a certain kind of music service will just have to wait a while to hear the songs (in the legal way, at least). For now, you can check out the video for Jiya Se Jiya on Rahman's official site (warning: all flash content).

Which is where our friend Arnold, a.ka. Hugger-the-(not-so)-Horrible, should take note: the song features the concept of "Free Hugs" (read Arnold's first (zeroth?) hand report on the same). I wonder if I actually saw him in the video?

news courtesy the arrahmanfans yahoogroup

'Yuvvraaj' - music review

The CD booklet for Yuvvraaj says (brace yourself) - :

Imagine a film where: Salman is a dreamy singer...
Katrina is a leading musician...
Zayed grooves to a chaotic disco sound...
Anil Kapoor enjoys only classical music...

Clearly, Subhash Ghai possesses a one of a kind, not to mention dangerous, imagination. I tried very hard to pull off this impossible task, but couldn't. I don't know how much success music director A.R.Rahman and lyricist Gulzar had, but we'll take this album as their best shot. I've tried wrapping my head around this soundtrack for a while, but continue to find it a mixed bag. I blame Subhash Ghai - I think he's finally got to Rahman, whose clever ploy of working at odd hours kept the Guy out of harm's way during previous collaborations. This one must have been made in broad daylight, which Ghai channeling Laxmikant-Pyaarelal. The result is a very confusing medley of styles and songs, and a subdued Gulzar.

lat uljhi...manamohinii more (Vijay Prakash) is the stand-out. Rahman has often thrown in western orchestrations for classical numbers, which coupled with the singer's assured singing, makes this an excellent song. The contemplative zindagii zindagii (Srinivas) is so mellow that it is in danger of being disregarded by listeners. However, it is one of the few songs in the entire album to feature some Gulzar sparks, and so worth getting on the playlist loop.

For me, the Gulzar-ARR partnership has always been successful when they have connected on an elemental level of 'sound'. Unlike the Vishal-Gulzar duo, where the music reinforces word semantics in a snug fit, Rahman's music reacts best to the onomatopoeia of the great man's words. In this album, Mastam Mastam (ensemble) achieves this in its orchestrations and sonorous lyrics. This is in the vein of ooh la la lah (Minsara Kanavu/Sapnay) and shabbaa shabbaa (Daud), and worked for me.

The recipe of dil ka rishta (ensemble) , though rich in musical themes, is a throwback to Ghai's idea of a 'musical' , with every bit of the soundscape painted mercilessly. shaaNo shaaNo ("Beware Blaaze" alarm) provides a basis for similar complaints. tu meri dost hai (Benny Dayal) has a simple melody which only improves when Shreya Ghoshal and Rahman take over in the end, while in tu muskuraa has Alka Yagnik touching Castafiore-ian scales.

Stay away from mai.n huu.n yuvvraaj (can't imagine Beethoven doing a jig at finding his name coupled with Herr Salmon) and the shaaNo Remix (to be honest: didn't bother listening to this. Why do I want to?)

I suppose all this bias is because a wise man once said: always be suspicious of any film that contains:
1. Salman Khan
2. Zayed Khan
3. Subhash Ghai
4. Blaaze
5. Anyone 'playing' a musical instrument in the proud Bollywood tradition of torturing it into revealing its octaves by giving it a good massage
6. Katrina Kaif
7. Any film title with superfluous letters, especially an extra 'v'

Why the world doesn't acknowledge I'm a genius

Because I'm fiddling about at the wrong place and time, and this modern age allows no one the luxury to slow down and discern the maestro (i.e. me) standing amidst them.

Ok, I admit: that argument works only for violinist Joshua Bell.

Some interesting viewpoints on this experiment from Freakonomics. Link courtesy Niranjan.

The (already forgotten) music of Haal-e-Dil

Perhaps the fates that govern the musical birthchart of Vishal Bhardwaj ordain that several of his works are intended to be criminally under-heard. A more earthly reason for hardly anyone noticing the music of "Haal-e-Dil" could be attributed to it being an under-promoted film featuring a bunch of not-so interesting newcomers in an average script. This album is also one of those multi-composer efforts, featuring Raghav Sachar, Pritam, and Anand Raj Anand in addition to Vishal.

(I'll restrict myself to Vishal's double-header in this post, but a brief review of the album can be seen at Karthik's MilliBlog.)

Rahat Fateh Ali Khan re-appears in a Vishal song after that superbly rendered cautionary ode to love in "Omkara". "Haal-e-dil" begins with what sounded to my untrained ears as the digderidoo (perhaps just some electronic consort), and fits into the category of songs usually classified as "soulful". Also featuring the backing vocals of Shreya Ghoshal, the song is melodious and measured, with a hint of a Sufi influence. Typically for Vishal, the arrangements are interesting with a couple of eclectic interludes (is that a mandolin we hear in the middle, or just a guitar?). With Rahat leading the way, the elements of the song come together wonderfully.

The other Vishal credit on this album is a reprise of the title song, by Rekha Bhardwaj. It's a more modern, rock-ish version, rendered in characteristic fashion by the talented missus who can zig-zag the registers nicely. It does come in second to the Rahat version, but these Munna Dhiman lyrics (also a variation of the other song) are perhaps a touch better here ("tere kohre me.n dhuup ban ke kho jaau.n"). And there's some nice guitar backing all through.

In all, a cameo by Vishal and gang which, though it won't set any cash registers or weekly top 10s ringing, is worth a devoting a quiet moment or two if you can catch it.

(Crossposted at the Vishal blog.)