Originally published in The Hindu.
Jaaneman aah – Dishoom (Hindi – Pritam)
Even though Jaaneman aah’s first claim to fame is Parineeti Chopra’s turn as one-song item-girl, there’s more to it, actually. It’s an intriguing Pancham-meets-Tamil-kuthu combination that gets its kick as much from the sudden, utterly uncomfortable shift in tune for the ‘Ishq mein saare’ line, as it does from the insanely catchy kuthu rhythm. And then there’s that Pancham-style ‘Jaaneman aah’ call-out. If you ignore the banal lyrics, this is good, raucous fun!
Dekha hazaron dafa – Rustom (Hindi – Jeet Gannguli)
If Pritam produces a masala kuthu in Dishoom, his ex partner, Jeet (of Jeet-Pritam fame, once upon a time) produces the extreme opposite in Rustom’s Dekha hazaron dafa! It’s a gentle, lilting, dulcet melody that gains tremendously from Arijit Singh and Palak Muchhal’s fantastic singing. Jeet layers the waltzy tune with a lovely flourish of strings and chorus.
Tu hai – Mohenjo Daro (Hindi – A R Rahman)
But for the fact that Hrithik Roshan, with a unicorn-style single horn in his turban, doesn’t sound anything like A R Rahman (who is singing this song), this is a lovely song. It has that typically Rahman flow that starts with an unusual opening, and goes on to be even more free-flowing. That means it demands your concentration to follow the melody particularly as it progresses to the antara, with marvellous singing by Sanah Moidutty. Perhaps anticipating this, Rahman adds two more variants of the same tune, in Sindhu Ma and The Shimmer of Sindhu!
Ee santosha – Adbutha (Kannada – Judah Sandhy)
There’s a beautiful and planned economy of sound in the orchestration of Ee santosha that is particularly alluring. Judah Sandhy, already in his second third soundtrack after Lifu Super and Badmaash, ropes in Tony and Lahari to sing this one, and the duo handle the lush melody pretty well, particularly latter, in the anupallavi. Judah keeps the backgrounds minimal with a nice combination of guitar and a dash of tabla, opting to layer the interludes with more.
Enakkenna aacho – Muthina Kathirika (Tamil – Siddharth Vipin)
Muthina Kathirika’s Malayalam original, Vellimoonga, did not have a duet where the leading lady is left wondering what the hell happened to her. In the Tamil version, Sundar C happens to her, if you still wish to know, besides ‘love’, of course. Even for this most mundane of scenario, it is good to note that composer Siddharth Vipin try something new in the form of the gentle rhythm that is instantly appealing and the ‘Parakkiren’ line that smoothly segues from the tune preceding it!
