Music Review Ungli

This article was last updated on April 16, 2022

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USA: Oye! Times readers Get FREE $30 to spend on Amazon, Walmart…Expectations:

Not much, despite this being a Karan Johar production. The buzz for the film is almost absent, ditto for its music by a mélange of makers.

Music:

The album takes off with a Sachin-Jigar track 'Dance Basanti' (sung by Vishal Dadlani with some English lines by Anushka Manchanda). The smarty-pants lyrics by Amitabh Bhattacharya are very predictable, with lines like 'Poora nahin to chain mil jaaye pauna aadha / Aashiqon se deal tu karke dance Basanti'. The cacophonous mixing and instrumentation, however, also add to the predictability of this track and take it to a lower zone.

'Pakeezah' (composed and sung equally mechanically by Gulraj Singh) is one of those superficial songs that have lyrics that deliberately use impressive-sounding words like 'unns', 'jaaveda' and 'hashr' just for effect than lyrical substance, and meaningless lines ('Ishq tera mera rab se zyaada (???) / Tujhse hi yeh chahe pakeezah (???!!!)' deck up the 'metre' of the song with supposedly good but actually hollow phonetics.

The same composer-lyrics writer duo intends to do better in 'Aadarniya Ungli' (Vishal Dadlani-Neeti Mohan) wherein Neeti is reduced to an also-ran and Vishal does his usual stuff. Even the proverbial elephant's memory will fail to retain this song minutes after it is over!

'Ungli Pe Nachalein' (Dev Negi-Shipra Goyal) is a spirited if familiar number composed by Aslam Keyi with lyrics by Kumaar. The lyrics this time are clever without predictable limits ('Hum to hain poori botal aur / Tum to saare miniature'). The singers do their job as needed and the production is noisy as per dictates.

The only song that comes as a relief is 'Auliya', evocatively sung by Armaan Malik, with delectable passages on the keyboard and guitar and some nice, gentle compositional flourishes. Armaan renders with a gentle understanding of the lyrics and the mood and Salim-Sulaiman go placid in their interpretation of the needs of the melody.

Amitabh Bhattacharya's lyrics are splendid, with an arrestingly simple mukhda and fine work within the antaras as well ('O teri nazar mein suna hai / Kai zyaada darja duaon se hai koshishon ka / Ho jo raha hai woh anjaam hai / Koshishon ka ya haadsa hai').

Overall:

Functional music that, except for the impressive 'Auliya', need not have been there at all!

Music: Sachin-Jigar, Salim-Sulaiman, Gulraj Singh & Aslam Keyi
Lyrics: Amitabh Bhattacharya, Manoj Yadav & Kumaar
Music Label: Sony Music

Article written by staff at Bollywood Hungama. Read more