New Sounds of Bollywood

By Rinky Kumar

Published: Volume 15, Issue 11, November, 2007

Mumbai Salsa. The title of a recently released musical sums up the new global Indian Cinema. Rock, hip hop, salsa, lounge, trance, Indian folk and Sufi elements are permeating Hindi film music, offering listeners some unforgettable ditties. Rinky Kumar finds Bollywood dancing to hip new tunes

The year is 1979. A fresh-in-love couple exchanges shy glances and sings about living in the moment to legendary music director R D Burman’s melodious tunes. The film is Hrishikesh Mukherjee’s comic classic Golmaal; the lovers in question are Amol Palekar and Bindiya Goswami. Cut to circa 2005. Hip in bling, Abhishek Bachchan and Priyanka Chopra are crooning Right Here Right Now to the hip-hop beats of Vishal-Shekhar in Rohan Sippy’s Bluffmaster. The situation is much the same but the music couldn’t be more different.

From India’s first full-length 1931 sound film, Alam Ara to Farah Khan’s Om Shanti Om, music has always been a major attraction in Hindi cinema. Today Bollywood is dancing to new tunes that complement kitsch lyrics, racy beats and a cool-dude attitude. In a bid to catch Generation X’s ear, music has gone global and opened its doors to diverse world and Indian influences. It is now an eclectic mix of reggae, hip hop, lounge, rock, Sufi and folk music. With so many diverse new influences, there is no distinctly filmi sound anymore. Music director Shekhar Ravjiani of Vishal-Shekhar fame attributes the trend to the increasing exchange of ideas between Indian and international composers. “Just as foreign artists are using a lot of Indian instruments, we are using their kind of arrangement. We are learning from each other.”

A new breed of music directors – Pritam, Mithoon, Vishal-Shekhar, Shankar-Ehsaan Loy and Shantanu Moitra, Aadesh Shrivastava – who grew up listening to R D Burman, are now infusing varied sounds in a bid to offer something new to listeners. Mithoon puts the trend in historical perspective, “Since film music began in 1930s, it has constantly evolved. People are always looking out for change. If I’ve grown up listening to some genres, I would not like to use something similar in my music, I would want to create different compositions.”
Many insiders don’t view this phase with much surprise. Singer Shaan, who has been the playback voice of virtually every hero in the last few years, feels Indian film music has always represented the latest global trends. “The 60s were synonymous with rock ’n’ roll, the 80s, when pop was making waves all across the world, were synonymous with Bappida’s pop music. Today if the mainstream Hindi film music is drawing on hip hop or reggae, it’s because these are the flavours of the world.”

Another important factor that has helped the globalisation of Bollywood music is the infusion of English, Persian and Punjabi words into Hindi lyrics. Words like ‘my love’, ‘darling’, ‘it’s rocking’, ‘where’s the party tonight’, ‘it’s the time to disco’, ‘mauja-mauja’, ‘maula’ have now found their way in filmi music. “I think today we can introduce any kind of genre in Hindi movies, just by changing the orchestration. Earlier we were lyrically bound; mostly Hindi and Urdu phrases were used. But of late, a lot of English, Punjabi and Farsi words are being used,” says Pritam whose latest creation Mauja Mauja from Jab We Met is creating a buzz.

Composer, lyricist and singer Vishal Dadlani opines that cinema and its music reflect the times we live in. So the lyrics have been updated to the way the urban Indian youth communicates, which is usually Hindi interlaced with a lot of English words. “But when the scene demands emotional, content-driven lyrics, we go back to the traditional form and use Urdu words,” he adds. Speaking at a broader level, the growing NRI audience for Bollywood films and the emergence of small-budget, multiplex cinema, have also encouraged and enabled directors to experiment with different genres.

Music directors like Pritam and Mithoon are delving into their formative influences to create the kind of music that they like to listen to. A die-hard rock fan (he was a member of a rock band in college), Pritam introduced rock ballads in Anurag Basu’s hit Life in a Metro. Rock is a generic term for the range of styles that evolved out of rock ’n’ roll. It’s a musical style that arose in the U.S. in the mid-1950s blend of black rhythm-and-blues with white country-and-western. An avid lover of the electric sitar –which gives the tone of a guitar but the Indian note of a sitar – and the flute, Pritam used the guitar and live drums extensively to give the film’s songs a typical rock sound and feel. “Metro had exactly the same kind of music that I like. The movie’s basic theme was city blues, which I had to portray through music. The songs were like ballads but I infused the rock essence just to give it a whole new fresh sound. Usage of English words, orchestration and new voices made the songs novel.”

Chartbusters like Alvida, In Dinon, Oh Meri Jaan were perfect examples of rock ballads. Apart from this, he has also experimented with diverse instruments and dabbled with different sounds in his other projects. Pritam introduced elements of Latin music in Dhoom, his first big hit. He used a lot of nylon string guitar, better known as flamenco, in Salaam-e (Dhoom) as well as Touch me (Dhoom 2). Apart from this, songs like Baila baila (Khwaish), Sholon Si (Shabd) had strong guitar-violin accompaniments and distinct salsa beats. Salsa is a diverse and predominantly Caribbean rhythm that is popular in many Latino countries. “For the title track of Dhoom 2, I was inspired by Brazilian percussion. We used a live percussion ensemble of some trash cans with oil cans, empty biscuit cans and ashtrays!”

The talented composer considers Metro and Dhoom 2 close to his heart. “I experimented with varied genres in Dhoom 2, especially with Crazy Kiya Re and Dhoom Again.” An ardent admirer of R D Burman and an avid fan of western and Indian classical music, blues and rock, Pritam is now exploring folk and earthy tunes in Vivek Agnihotri’s Goal.

Twenty-one-year-old Mithoon, who created ripples with his first hit Tere Bin sung by Atif Aslam from Bas Ek Pal, likes to use urban, contemporary sounds. A great fan of lounge music, most of his hits like Maula mere Maula (Anwar), the title track of Bas Ek Pal, Tere Bin (Bas Ek Pal), Bin Tere (Aggar), Woh Ajnabee (The Train) have been in this genre. A film’s mood and setting play a key role in influencing his creativity. The musician, whose Tose Naina Lage and Maula mere Maula from Manish Jha’s Anwar provided listeners with a spiritual ecstasy, says, “Anwar was based in central India, the main theme was the aura of divine spiritual love. The songs had to reflect this. Both the tracks were different in terms of orchestration and sound impressions.” On the other hand, other songs like Woh Ajnabee and Bin Tere from Aggar had a very contemporary feel, as they were set in the present day and dealt with infidelity. Mithoon is now experimenting new sounds in Onir’s remake of Chasme Baddoor.

Another duo known for novel tunes is Vishal-Shekhar. The composers used hip hop influences and gave us foot-tapping numbers like Right Here Right Now and Meter Down (Taxi No 9211). Shekhar explains that though hip hop has been around for quite a few years, it is being explored in cinema only now. Hip hop is a genre of African-American music of the 1980s and 1990s in which rhyming lyrics are chanted to a musical accompaniment. It is usually composed of two elements: rapping and DJing. “Today, it is being used along with the tabla. Its rhythm pattern is similar to the Indian dholak pattern.” The composers, who tasted success with their debut film, Pyaar Mein Kabhi Kabhi, consider melody a crucial component and constantly experiment with form and structure. They strive to create music that has an eternal, timeless appeal. The duo is influenced by electronic and organic forms where they use live instruments or an orchestra while recording a song.

Vishal-Shekhar recently introduced surf music in the title song of Anubhav Sinha’s Cash. The film turned out to be a box-office dud but the title track and songs like Mindblowing Mahiya and Saiyyan saiyyan continue to enthrall revellers at pubs and discotheques. Shekhar describes surf as a part of the hip-hop genre, only with lots more energy. “It has been used in more than 20-30 hip-hop songs abroad. The credit for Cash goes completely to Anubhav Sinha. He had asked us to compose six dark club bangers. We jammed a lot, played many grooves and came up with these tunes.”

The successful troika of Shankar-Ehsaan-Loy has also been consistently experimenting with different genres. If Koi Kahe from Dil Chahta Hai was the first trance song of Hindi cinema, Woh Ladki Hain Kahan sets itself apart by its Celtic influence and Main Aisa Kyon Hoon (Lakshya) had hip hop undertones. Their recent hit, the title track of Johny Gaddaar, uses rock elements. Shankar Mahadevan attributes their creations to the changing flavour of music. “Today the entire scenario is changing. Composers as well as listeners are increasingly being exposed to the West. Our songs are being screened on music channels right after international chartbusters. So sonically, our compositions have to be on par with them.”

The trio listens to a wide variety of music right from Marathi bhav geet to jazz. They have also used a wide range of never-before-used instruments in their compositions, like the bagpipe in Salaam-e-Ishq and the harmonica in Agar Main Kahoon (Lakshya). But guitar, piano, drums, dholak and tabla continue to be their favourite instruments.

While many music directors are going global, others are exploring untried sounds from traditional Indian classical and folk music. After composing tunes for innumerable commercials, Shantanu Moitra gave listeners a taste of Rabindra Sangeet in Pradeep Sarkar’s Parineeta. As a 13-yr-old, Moitra would take a bus every Sunday from Chitaranjan Park in Delhi to Chor Bazaar, hunting for old world-music records. “I would pick up any record whose name and language I didn’t understand and listen to it. It helps that I’m a prolific listener and a travel buff. Since I hailed from a lower middle-class family, for me the world was outside my house. I played this game as a kid; I traveled to exotic places like Lisbon, Connaught Place, Himalayas, through music.”

Interestingly, Moitra attributes his love for folk music to its visual quality. “When we listen to Baul music, we visualise an old man clad in an orange robe wandering along the banks of a river playing the ektara.” The Bauls of Bengal were a mystical order of musicians in 18th, 19th and early 20th century India who played a form of music using a khamak, ektara and dotara. The word Baul comes from Sanskrit batul meaning divinely inspired insanity. Moitra agrees that this is a good time for composers as all kinds of formats are being welcomed in Hindi films. Each director is trying to follow his heart and coming up with an extremely distinct sound.

Parineeta and Eklavya are Moitra’s favourites. “Parineeta’s music had all the elements of a typical Uttam Kumar-Suchitra Sen romance, the hallmark of vintage Bengali cinema. The Chanda Re song from Eklavya symbolised the ektara tune synonymous with Baul music.” A huge fan of world and folk music, Moitra is partial to the acoustic guitar, piano, ektara and wooden instruments and is inspired by Salil Choudhury. “His songs remind me of my childhood, the India that was and his music was predictably unpredictable.” Moitra’s next two projects have completely diverse music. While Khoya Khoya Chand has music reminiscent of the 1950s, Laaga Chunari Mein Daag’s tunes are quite contemporary.

Hundreds of years after being relegated to the background, the mystical Sufi music of the 14th century is also making a resounding comeback. A unique musical style that transports listeners to spiritual ecstasy, Sufi is acquiring a steady fan following in Bollywood. Chartbusters like Piya ke rang deeni (Dev), Chaand Sifarish (Fanaa), Mann Ki Lagan (Paap) and Jiya Dhadak Dhadak (Kalyug) have had a distinct Sufi influence.
Contemporary singers like the late Ustad Nusrat Fateh Ali Khan and Abida Parveen from Pakistan, Shubha Mudgal and Kailash Kher have all contributed in revitalising this unique spiritual genre. Several compositions like Teri Diwani and Saiyyan from Kher’s private albums also show a Sufi influence. “It is the music of submission and surrender that bonds humans to God and transcends all religious boundaries. It can best be described as poetry in its purest form which uses minimum instruments,” Kher enthuses.
With global and Indian influences permeating filmi sounds, the adage that music knows no boundaries has never rung truer. As Pritam sums up, “It’s not that we have introduced any new sounds in Bollywood. Rather we are here because music trends have changed.”