Milliblog Weeklies – India’s only multilingual, weekly, new music playlist.
Week 248: YouTube | Spotify
Back after yet another week’s break, though the break was more because of the lack of decent new music 🙂 This week’s quite good, though!
Ittefaq – OAFF & Savera (Hindi/Indipop): OAFF (Kabeer Kathpalia) & Savera (Mehta)’s music works only occasionally for me – a hit or miss. This one is a hit 🙂 I was more surprised by Siddhant Chaturvedi’s role in the song – he not only writes the song but also sings and dances to the music video (a single-shot video, if I got it right, which requires a lot more planning in terms of sets and choreography). It’s a terrific song, with enough swagger both in the melody and the overall production.
Kahe Kahe – The Yellow Diary (Hindi/Indipop): The dreamy pop of The Yellow Diary, and the utterly captivating vocals of Rajan Batra… what’s not to like? 🙂 A very calming melody, beautifully accentuated by Harshvardhan Gadhvi’s guitar.
Aasa Kooda – Sai Abhyankkar (Tamil/Indipop) – ‘Katchi Sera’ fame Sai Abhyankkar strikes again and how! The melody flows even more smoothly here and the way Sai incorporates a rather long’ish ‘Nee pesa light’a aasa kooda’ to end the Pallavi makes it really interesting. Also, unlike Katchi Sera (which I believe is a cult song already, by now), Sai Smriti has a more substantial part in this song she does stupendously well. The sax (Ashish) and mandolin (Viswas Hari) in the background adds tremendous appeal to the song.
Pande Pande – Once Upon a Time in Kochi (Hesham Abdul Wahab) – Malayalam: Hesham’s tune, and sound, brings to mind Rahman’s early repertoire… a lot! Specifically, I thought I was able to place the song in the soundtrack of Rhythm, alongside ‘Anbe Idhu’ (Kalakalavena) and ‘Nadhiye Nadhiye’. It’s still a gorgeous song, sung really well by Vidhu Pratap.
Maathu Sothu, Janatha City, Mana Mana – Kotee (Vasuki Vaibhav) – Kannada: Maathu Sothu makes great use of Armaan Malik’s vocals in a slightly different set-up, and along with the ‘Sakhiye’ chorus, the lilting song is an easy, likeable, foot-tapping listen. Janatha City starts very differently, but settles down to a catchy Indipop sound (with that ‘Kanchana re’ hook), and Sanjith breezes through the melody, doing particularly well in the higher pitch lines, as always. In Mana Mana, Vasuki does very well when the ‘Mana Mana’ hook lands, changing the song’s soft melody into a captivating pop sound, supported by good vocals by Ananya Bhat and Siddhartha Belmannu.
Sakkare Chakori – Raghu Dixit (Kannada/Indipop): It’s good to see the return of Raghu Dixit after a spate of film songs (mostly middling) and a film role (less said the better) to what he does best! He has the Grammy winning banjo player Béla Fleck for company too, now! It’s the usual, high-energy folk’ish sound that Raghu excels in, and this one just works in every way. The song has been produced in Tamil, Telugu, and Hindi too, but I prefer the Kannada original.
Kadal Poiye, Kadalanchi Sukha Undugey – Neerh (Alva Kuuto) – Tulu/Indipop: It is always really exciting to hear artists bringing out music albums in some of the lesser heard languages of India, thereby giving the language a better shot, again, at national awareness (albeit fleetingly). Tulu music artists Praveen Alva does that with this 4-song album, Neerh, setting all the songs in Tulu, and using water as the connecting theme. The whole album is a lovely listen, but two songs stood out for me. If I hadn’t seen the credits, I would have guessed Kadal Poiye as a Raghu Dixit song! It’s such a joyous celebratory folk sound that it is instantly endearing, with stellar singing by Praveen. In Kadalanchi Sukha Undugey, even as we are listening to Tulu, the sound transported me straight to the Scandinavian/Nordic regions. The vocal chorus adds a powerful layer to the soaring melody!
Jhol – Coke Studio Pakistan, Season 15 (Maanu, Xulfi, Ft. Maanu, Annural Khalid) – Punjabi/Pakistani Pop: Maanu and Xulfi compose an incredibly lush Punjabi melody here! Maanu’s lengthy lines in the first part of the song set the stage beautifully for Annural’s entry, and takes the song to a new plane.
