Music Review One By Two

This article was last updated on April 16, 2022

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USA: Free $30 Oye! Times readers Get FREE $30 to spend on Amazon, Walmart…Expectations:
There are raised expectations after S-E-L's excellence last year in both D-Day (a truly underrated score) and the celebrated Bhaag Milkha Bhaag.

Music:
It's an easy escape route in the name of trendy appeal for the metro yuppies (a miniscule proportion of the ocean of Indian youngsters who consume music today): amalgamate Sufi and Rock, have arrangements overpowering vocals, especially if singers are new or weak, and include words and metaphors that the listener will be impressed by – especially if he cannot fathom their meaning!

Many composers today, sadly, also fail to realize the difference between jingles and a situational film song. The former has a catchy hook that arrests attention for a minute or less, the latter possesses solid substance in words, composition and packaging (Indian or Western, along with expressive vocals). The growing number of filmmakers and actors who are either indifferent to music or apathetic about what they get as long it has a hook and a groove, does the rest of the damage.

Who loses? Primarily, it is the listener-consumer who must have an endless supply of his drug – good Hindi film music. He is starved of what he is addicted to. Next, it is the parent film that becomes a train without an engine (a great soundtrack) to propel it to its box-office destination!

Few scores in recent times have evoked a re-realization of these truisms than this album with a super-talented but growingly indifferent composer trio, a hugely versatile frontline lyricist and a producer who is also a dedicated actor with a stamp of his own.
Nothing lingers after multiple hearings of this album, not even the 'fresh' (sic) word 'Khushfehmiyan', which becomes a track in two versions, one unplugged and thus less noisy, both rendered by Shankar Mahadevan. Shankar gets his vocals alright, but the song is in a very trite zone, sounding like so many such songs by multiple music makers in the construction of the mukhda as well as antaras.

Arijit Singh it is who elevates 'Khuda Na Khasta' despite the incomprehensible lyrics, except for the succinct line, 'Yeh zindagi jua hai / Kisko yakeen hua hai'). His straight and supple rendition works – again in an over-familiar zone that has more than a hint of Rock On!!!.

What Arijit does to that song is done even better by Anushka Manchanda's funky-n-spunky rendition of 'Kaboom', a track with some smart lyrics. However, the song's rhythmic catchiness is limited to its playing time. Siddharth Mahadevan's 'I Am Just Pakaoed' is enough to pakao the listener. The loud rock-guitars, the screechy vocals and the relentless grooves leave us impatient for some calm and melody. If Siddharth wants to build a career as a playback singer, this kind of gimmicky cacophony, even if aptly situational for the film, should be eschewed with focus.

Clinton Cerejo's 'Baat Kya Hai' and Thomson Andrews' 'Shehar Mera' are in done-before terrain as well, with the latter sounding like a club number from the vintage era. However, the innate appeal and soft melody of the latter makes it a comparative winner.

Overall:
An acute disappointment from Shankar-Ehsaan-Loy after the hopes they generated from the excellence of D-Day and Bhaag Milkha Bhaag last year.

Our Pick:
'Kaboom', 'Shehar Mera'

Music: Shankar-Ehsaan-Loy
Lyrics: Amitabh Bhattacharya
Music Label: Yash Raj Music
Article written by staff at Bollywood Hungama. Read more

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