Delhi Belly Music Review: Republican songs of an Anarchist nature

Delhi Belly’s soundtrack, if it wasn’t about its colloquial text friendly lyrics, would not have struck a chord, do you think?

Consider some expository song names; dices rolled ‘Bhaag D K Bose, Andhi Ayi,’ the gesticulating ‘Nakkadwaley Disco, Udharwaale Khisko,’ the inflammatory ‘Jaa Chudail,’ the coquettish ‘I Hate You,’ the adamantine ‘Switty Tera Pyaar Chaida,’ which more than being carefully worded songs, are also common phrases to be heard, and seen, and texted by hoi polloi.

Have you not seen a nakkadwaley disco, udharwaale khisko sticker at a paan shop’s masthead, or have you not sent people random texts exclaiming your present state of furore such as I hate you, or rebuffed a friend’s advice in a time of great distress – jaa chudail, or danced to the metronomed tune of – tera pyaar chaida ringing in your head when you desperately wanted to suck somebody’s face?

For Ram Sampath, these everyday occurrences have found a new rhythm on the music deck – he’s arranged these songs with astute tuning into our heads as to allow the soundtrack to constantly evolve – even as we sometimes fail to grasp the lyrics, adding our own ‘something-something’ when we sing-along, these are republican songs of an anarchist nature.

Bhaag D K Bose, a cleverly django-ed track, is the indisputable soul of Delhi Belly, but there are others to be had too.

Keerthi Sagathia’s Nakkadwaley Disco uses a qawalli base to spoof the genre so much so that you begin to respect the form – how under-utilised it has been this far in Bollywood. There’s so much that can be said through it, which is where this one scores over any other qawalli you could have come across aaj kal.

Chetan Shashital’s Saigal Blues is a flagon tipped beauty. K L Saigal saab, if he was around, should give these boys his aashirwaad. Fantastic slide guitar riff-raff.

Sona Mohapatra’s use of ‘untrained’ singing style in Bedardi Raja is shimmery-sexy. You put her in a room with music motifs circling, twining around her, and she croons her way to the top of the heap – a smooth climber herself.

Jaa Chudail is Tarantino meets bepop meets Suraj Jagan venting his spleen on something The Beatles would happily trip on if they have to beat the sh*t out of a Maharishi dressed in robes and long white locks, in heaven, or hell.

Tere Siva – sung by Ram Sampath and Tarannum Malik is a sedated ballad that meanders into Euphoria territory, thankfully without the catatonic sounds of that band’s blare-out- loud bunkum. It does look out of place in the soundtrack’s crazy rollercoaster ride.

Keerthi Sagathia returns to ambush us with Switty Tera Pyar Chaida, a folksy Punjabi pop song. The devil is in the detailing, this one being its mad exchange of hinglish platitudes.

Aamir Khan reads out nonsense declarations over the I Hate You track, for your ears to split – its twiddly chorus girls cheer-leading the ‘I hate you’ refrain over Keerthi’s tabla meddled voice and Sona’s come-hither cries. Alternating between a ditty, qawalli and spaghetti, you will just have to sit motionless and listen in to this one, trying to fathom what this song wants to be.

And that is what most of Delhi Belly will be, if you allow it to be what you make of it. S#!t happens.

Source: Buzzintown

http://www.buzzintown.com/delhi/article-review–delhi-belly-music-review/id–3196.html