This is the 2nd film of director,"Rakesh Mehra", who earlier made Anu Malik to come up with phenomenally different score with his debut "Aks". I still rate Aks as one of the very few best albums of Anu Malik because he gave a very unconventional score, steeped in contemporary-techno sound.I shall cover that album in another post.
For Rang De Basanthi,Rakesh Mehra ropes in Aamir Khan for lead-role,A.R.Rahman for music and Prasoon Joshi (ad-maker) for lyrics.Though the title reflects a period-film-revolutionary feel(bhagath singh song),the film actually is very modern and has lot of hep-look.The music reflects exactly the same.
Ek Onkar-- it is a short song, a punjabi Bhajan infact. just a recitation of some stanzas.
Khalbali-- its a techno song...no great tune...Rahman sings it with two new singers.The song is too repetitive and doesnt boast of any compositional skills.after some time, it simply irritates.
Khoon Chala-Khoon Chala is a short song, but a slow one...sung by Mohit Chauhan, who was the lead singer of the band "Silk-Route". this song begins softly and rahman gives anthemic feel as the song progresses, with his instrumentation.However, the song doesnt linger in your mind for long..
Lalkaar is another short one..but it is not a song..it is a recitation of poetry by Aamir Khan..backed by chorus.
Lukka Chupi--Rahman does the unexpected. He,as a singer, teams up with Lata Mangeshkar.This song is a "mother-son" song.The song has nice guitar strumming..with even the tweaks of guitar. Tune is good. Its typical rahman-experiment..with just one charanam instead of conventional pattern.Nice orchestration..bass-work..tabla and all..everything about this song is good, except the vocals. Since, its mother singing for/with son, probably Lata Mangeshkar suits (picturised on waheeda Rehman) it, but rahman spoilt the song with his vocals.He sounds like Lucky Ali with his terrible nasal twang and overly accentuated Tamil/South-Indian Accent (the way he sings "nayaa nayaa"..in charanam).Probably the only song of rahman, in which he screwed the song with his own vocals.The ending of the song is interesting though..rahman raises the tempo by classicalisation with swaras and Lata ends it with completion of crescendo.a better song of the album.
Paathshaala--this song has two versions, one of them being a remix.this is ultra-techno-heppy song..which is aimed at discotheques...not a single word is audible clearly during 1st hearing (u will eventually get the lyrics during 2nd or 3rd listening)except "apni tho paathshaala..masti ki paathshaala..."..laced with some people yelling "lose control" and "be a rebel"(in its remix version)...this song might become a rage with youth...college going chaps and all..after repeated hearings, even you might hum this tune bcoz its hummable..however, the bottomline is that the song is meaningless and doesnt qualify as a composition..All we need to compose songs like these is a computer with a good music software.
Rang De Basanti title song is typical punjabi bhangra song with techno stuff thrown in, sung by Daler Mehendi.Chitra makes a guest appearance. There is nothing different about this song..same punjabi string sounds..but overlapped on synth sounds.and i dont like those punjabi beats with single string stuff and all..hence, this song didnt appeal to me.
Roobaroo--this song again has simple guitar strumming and very simple tune..this song has lot of Indi-Pop kind of sound...nothing extra-ordinary but you will eventually like this song, compared to all the others in the album...the song at times, reminds you of "Smiyaai" from kandukondein..because of the multiple-vocal effect used for a jingle-like tune..this song again might become a hit because its too simple ..for the college-youth to sing/play with a guitar in hand...
Tu Bin Bathaaye-- This is the only romantic song of this album...the main melody, which is reminiscent of some hindi oldie, keeps playing and slowly instruments are added one by one...Nice rendition by madhushree...Though the tune sounds very simple without many variations,even in charanam(again single charanam only), it has that likeable quality because of that Breezy feeling stamped to it...The last saving grace of the album.
The album is certainly not rahman's one-of-the-best.It reflects his increasing-dependence on technology/computers to compose music and most of the music is synthesised using loops and other effects. except for few guitars and string section in 1-2 songs,i dont see any acoustic stuff at all.It may justify with the theme of the film but it doesnt showcase the compositional genius of Rahman.Given such resources, anyone can experiment with sounds and can come up with a score like this one...Some argue that techno albums cannot be that classy.My example would be "thiruda thiruda"(thee thee theeyani song is still ahead of present-times..its very techno..but laced with wonderful ideas) or even the more recent "Yuva"...
Also, unlike all other rahman albums, here, the soul is missing..there are many albums in which his hard-work is underlined by the raagas used,the innovative ideas interwoven, and the over-all feel he paints to the sound of the album.He infact makes an album into a beautiful pot-pourri of various genres of songs.Rang De Basanti lacks those elements and turns out to be just another techno-album on the block, which may become instant hit during film's release..but would be definitely forgotten 2 years down the lane...
Rahman!Its time for some retrospection.
5 comments:
I kinda like the rang de basanti song...may be its the weird scale...hehe..or it could well be the elf in me.
The singer pandhshree or madhushree who sang tu bin bathaye has a beautiful voice. Yes it does remind one of an old song... but the way it is constructed is similar to "waqt ne kiya" - i mean how the lines are constructed - it has similar gait.
anna, the sax (or oboe) in the first iterlude in "tu bin bataye" seems like that in "revival" of Vande mataram...
Ravi-->I liked Tu Bin Bathaaye bcoz i felt he tried to give that breezy touch, like he did for Thenali song..but compartively, Thenali songs scores above.
Can any of you give me the raaga used for Lukka Chupi..it sounds familiar,especially the way takes off with charanam.and the guitar strumming is similar to the same of Gurus of Peace song.
I would say it has a lot of notes corresponding to bilawal and its child-ragas-- gaud-sarang, Bihag, and chhaya-Nat(?).
Well to put it another way, its good stuff from Rahman, certainly not his best but good. The criticism on ARR for his techno sounds is unreasonable. He has been the only guy till date exploring the nuances of techno music in India. The music of a movie by definition has to match the movie. I believe that apart from Ilayaraja (whos well past his heydays) ARR has that effect on movies that can lift the overall mood. Swadesh, Dil Se, Lagaan and a lot more to name. I believe that ARR is a better BGM composer than Ilayaraja. The ability to interspread all kinds of musical elements seperates the two. RDB is a good album and seems to be more movie specific. You wouldnt want a bhairavi ragam as a pop song would you? I have a feeling that it suits the scene pretty well. After all the movie sells only if the music sells and vice versa.
Post a Comment