| Song: Valliya Nayagane Album: Colours Type: Fusion Artist: Kunnakudi Vaidyanathan, Zaki Hussain Rating: 5.0 Valliya Nayagane is a stunning, 15 minute instrumental track. A fusion of Carnatic, Western Classical and probably Hindustani music, it takes you on a beautiful journey. My favorite thing in this track is the harmony between KV’s solo Carnatic violin and the Western string orchestra. The jugalbandi of the violin and the tabla is nice as well. This piece sounds a lot like another awesome track, Gopika Vasantham (His Highness Abdullah, 1990, Malayalam), because they share the same raga Shanmughapriya (I Googled!). Trivia – A.R. Rahman played the keyboard in this album and was credited as A.S. Dileep Kumar. |
| Song: Hold On Album: Shango Type: Pop, Rock Artist: Santana Rating: 4.3 Hold On manages to be mello and upbeat at the same time. It’s got more pop and less blues and Latino than an average Santa song. |
| Song: Ehsaan Album: Dil Kabaddi Type: Bollywood Singer: Sachin Gupta, Jaspreet Singh Music Director: Sachin Gupta Lyricist: Sachin Gupta Rating: 3.3 OK melody but the heavy synth and percussions don’t gel well with it. |
| Song: Khoon Chala Album: Rang De Basanti Type: Bollywood Singer: Mohit Chauhan Music Director: A.R. Rahman Lyricist: Prasoon Joshi Rating: 5.0 This brilliant song from a stellar ARR album is an illustration is of why Prasson Joshi is one of the best lyricists in the business today. I specially love this phrase – “Sawalon ki ungli, jawabon ki mutthi”. ARR’s crescendo and Joshi’s words have the ability to move mountains. Mohit Chauhan may have found popularity with Tum Se Hi (Jab We Met, 2007) but it was with this song that he announced to Bollywood that he could no longer be ignored. |
| Song: Yehi Wo Jagah Hai Album: Yeh Raat Phir Na Aayegi Type: Bollywood Singer: Asha Bhosle Music Director: O.P. Nayyar Lyricist: S.H. Bihari Rating: 5.0 This is one of the many O.P. Nayyar songs that show that the man was a lot more than the Rhythm King he was proclaimed to be. What melody, what singing! |
| Song: Believe Album: Believe Type: Pop Artist: Cher Rating: 4.8 I love Believe, it’s a great, great pop song. But I also have a grouse against it. It is this song that made the music business take a fancy to auto-tune and boy, have our ear drums been pummeled since then! |
| Song: Main Agar Kahoon Album: Om Shanti Om Type: Bollywood Singer: Sonu Nigam, Shreya Ghoshal Music Director: Vishal – Shekhar Lyricist: Javed Akhtar Rating: 4.7 A nice melody set on a waltz beat. I remember Sonu saying in an interview that to succeed in Bollywood, a good voice was not enough, that singers needed to sound stylish enough to match the image of the Bollywood hero/heroine. In this song, he shows us what he means by that. Although Shreya has a nice little cameo, this is Sonu’s song all the way. |
| Song: Mana Janab Ne Pukara Nahi Album: Paying Guest Type: Bollywood Singer: Kishore Kumar Music Director: S.D. Burman Lyricist: Majrooj Sultanpuri Rating: 5.0 What a delightfully light and breezy song! If there was one music director who understood Kishore Kumar’s raw talent before Aradhana, it was S.D. Burman. If the son popularized the use of everyday objects to produce music, it was perhaps the father who started started it off by using a bicycle bell in this song! |
| Song: Main Shair To Nahin Album: Bobby Type: Bollywood Singer: Shailendra Singh Music Director: Laxmikant – Pyarelal Lyricist: Anand Bakshi Rating: 4.3 Not a great song musically, but the simple lyrics and hummable melody made it a big success. |
| Song: Saiba Album: Guzaarish Type: Bollywood Singer: Vibhavari Joshi, Francois Castelino, Shail Hada Music Director: Sanjay Leela Bhansali Lyricist: Vibhu Puri Rating: 3.9 A really good listen with vaguely Flamenco sounds. Really, really good singing by Vibhavari Joshi. Amazed I haven’t heard more of her. |