Monday, January 12, 2009

Another Feather In Rahman's Cap

If you've been following my blog closely enough, you'd know that I am a huge fan of A. R. Rahman's music, his voice, his patriotism. I think there have been only two phases when I grew to like an advertisement so much that I used to be on the lookout for it, glued to the couch during the commercial breaks, and getting up for snacks and little chores when the movie was back on. One was when Vivek Oberoi did his first Coke commercial with Aishwarya Rai. The other was when Rahman composed the theme music for Airtel for the first time. I think, if I listed out my favourite hundred songs of all time, around seventy would be Rahman's compositions. Okay, I am not actually going to make that list and verify the statistic. But I have always loved his music, from Roja to Dil Se to Bombay to Rangeela to Vande Mataram to Bombay Dreams to Jaane Tu... Ya Jaane Na to Saathiya to The Legend Of Bhagat Singh to One Two Ka Four to Nayak to Pukar to Taal to Swades to Water to Yuva to Guru to Meenaxi, and to the Golden Globe winning Slumdog Millionaire. Roja was actually the first original audio CD I bought myself, some twelve years ago. I rarely, if ever, watch award ceremonies like these, but I was just channel surfing and landed on World Movies at the exact moment that Rahman was walking up to the stage to accept his award. Obviously I had to stop channel surfing right then. And then David Duchovny walked up to the stage to present the next award, and he got me interested enough to watch the rest of the ceremony. When Danny Boyle went up to receive his award for directing Slumdog Millionaire, Anil Kapoor stood up and did a little dance which was sort of in the style of Bhangra. I was hoping he would do it again when everyone went on to the stage for the Best Motion Picture - Drama award, but he disappointed me there.

For those of you who haven't checked out the soundtrack so far, start with the O... Saya track. It does not have too many words, but it has Rahman's music, his voice, his magic. Dim the lights, relax, and play this one on repeat. If you're more a fan of just his music, or prefer instrumental tracks, execute the above instructions with the Mausam & Magic number. If you're looking for something more Indian, Jai Ho is the track for you. It has the added unbeatable plus point of featuring Sukwinder Singh's voice. And if you're looking for something a little less Indian, check out Dreams On Fire. Suzanne has done a great job with the vocals on this one.

I really want to watch this movie, if only for the background score. I hear only the Hindi version will be released in India. That kind of disappoints me, because I would have liked to watch it the way it was originally made - in English. But I will still go and watch it on the big screen, even if I have to go by myself, because something of this magnitude needs to be enjoyed on a grand scale.

4 comments:

Unknown said...

A great achievement for AR Rahman. He is the pride of India!

Akash said...

Congratulations Rahman and thanks to make every Indian proud :)

actinium said...

Congrats to Rahman...bt d intl accolades are quite late. at d expense of offending many, i couldn't help bt point out that Rahman has done a (lot?) better job in past than Slumdog Millionaire.

Bhavya said...

actinium:

I would have to agree with you on this. But you know, the kind of music that appeals to Indian sensibilities and that which appeals to the international audience are not always the same. When you listen to works like Bombay Dreams, Between Heaven And Earth, and Slumdog Millionaire, you can tell that it's pretty different from a Taal or a Roja. Interestingly, when Rahman did Bombay Dreams, he supposedly said something of this sort: In India they sometimes want me to be John Williams, but here they want me to be A. R. Rahman.