Here is my opinion about the Rockstar. Before anybody jumps out of his/her seat to comment that who the hell is this person commenting on a movie of this stature, let me share my idea of blogging. Its my blog and I shout here… and more over India is a free country… and when we love our stars so much unconditionally, we have every right to tighten the screws also a bit when we see an evident blunder.
Before starting this review I heard the music a LOT of times and read quite a few other reviews too from Internet and finally was very happy with the scenario cuz couldn’t find any real criticism on at least first two search pages of Google.
My first impression of the movie from the initial teasers was that it sure is going to be a movie to look out for… cuz the get up… the passion in such a polite and soft-spoken personality like Ranveer was a welcome change. The only movie I hate him doing is ‘saanwariyaa’… otherwise he has been a re-incarnation of my icon, the King Khan. I know it is a big thing to say, but the romance one could feel in SRK days was almost gone and found wanting of a personality that could carry the legacy. I mean look at ‘Bachna ae Haseeno’… and you can see the SRK of 1990… the charm, the wet eyes… and then look at him in ‘wake up sid’ and ‘ajab prem ki gajab kahani’… and one could see the SRK of ‘Kabhi Haan Kabhi Naa’… and come ‘raajneeti’ and you realize that we have an SRK in the making. So all in all, a true star is in the making and with this getup in ‘Rockstar’ there was no turning back of my hopes from the movie.
Of late, I’ve been a VERY late bird(I was an early bird in my school days, I used to visit the cassette shop almost daily to check if music of any new movie has come), and so was late to have the great news that in the movie that I was looking forward to had more in-store for me, even before the release. I was blown away to watch the latest teaser featuring the track ‘sadda haq’. I immediately went online to check out who on the earth has come to the Indian music scene to bless the audience here with some powerful music(cuz its been quite some time since we witnessed the Pakistani youth brigade led by Atif), and guess what it was a dream come true to see the GOD himself compose the music for the movie. GREAT. What more can an ‘insane ’ ask for. A R Rahman… yippie… finally we can break the shackles and feel free and fly along with some powerful music.
That’s it. As soon as I search google and serach the music review of the film. The dream is over. All that seemed so perfect for an early winter release was messed up… atleast by the looks… the album seemed as if it was a mohit’s album. OK, so personally it’s not that I don’t like mohit as a singer, and infact I’ve liked his works from the good old days of ‘Silk Route’ and when ‘boondein’ happened with smash hits like ‘dooba dooba’. But his song ‘tum se hi’ from ‘Jab we met’ just irritated me like hell. I was so irritated and shocked to see that this was the sound of lead singer from ‘Silk Route’, the band I loved so much. I mean, the complete fuckin’ song sounds same, no ups lows, GOD knows what the real music lingo is for that but monotonus like shit… YEAS SHIT… no matter what, whom, when, where, how… it smells and looks shit… same is the case with mohit’s songs… just bullshit monotonity… take away ‘masakkali’ from ‘delhi-6’ and ‘pee loon’ from ‘once upon a time in mumbai’ from his portfolio and listen to all the shit that he has delivered, all bloody sound same… 10 years from now I’m telling all of them will become like cheenie people… all the same… we wont be able to differentiate who is chin po and who is pin cho…
Ok so enough of foreplay… let’s get to business… for me, the stage was set for an amazing combo… a good looking movie and an unusual getup for an Indian movie star, to go with some really powerful music… For once I even thought that it may be of the league of what I missed in form of ‘Paanch’ by Anuraag Kashyap(Kalki’s husband…lol… OK… OK… we all know anurag kashyap for other reasons too, yeas he’z the one behind some legendry works of recent times ranging from Black Friday, Dev D to Gulaal to Shaitaan in recent, and That Girl in Yello boots due for release). I mean it needs SOME music, singing and performance to get anything close to ‘main Khuda’ by KK and KK(both KK’s are menon and both are really special in their own league). I mean when I saw ‘sadda haq’ it was almost reminiscence of ‘main Khuda’, the power that KK(singer) put in the rendition and the goose bump performance that KK(actor) gave… could immediately be connected to Ranveer and AR Rahman’s ‘sadda haq’. But as soon as you try to put in mohit, the aura just fades… I strictly feel that his voice is OK for smaller budget films… or maybe he might be good with one here and there in mahesh bhatt’s movies… cuz mahesh’s movies, though have a bold point to make but still are soft in presentation… I mean a violent movie with scenes of gore like murder 2 can also accommodate songs like ‘phir mohobbat’… hez a maestro at getting out special from people… so if mohit works for Mahesh bhatt then its still OK… cuz bhatt can deal with him… but with ‘Rockstar’… I personally feel he has simple and plain fucked up the album… just like farhaan messed up ‘Rock on’ when instead of resorting to pros like KK, Atif or sukhwinder he decided to go ahead by himself and really messed them up… but for me he was still far far better than mohit… hez an intelligent worksman and hence he was atleast able to pump in the passion though his voice was sounding weak and hollow at times but still he was atleast able to generate the Rock mood. But with mohit… he sounds as if hez a looser and is singing in a bus or train or in front of a temple, asking you to accept his song and his voice and talent… instead of pushing… exerting his sound on the scene… he seems wanting for recognition… now come on… its not being rude… when we pay to buy a cassette or a CD… we are not expecting to hear a plea from the singer… instead what we want is the singer to push us to go out and buy his next album, without listening to the track, out of shear brand loyalty… that is what AR Rahman is… that is what KK is, what Atif is or for that matter what Mahesh Bhatt is… we don’t need to think twice before buying their music… we just buy it… but with mohit the scene is that he comes bundled with when you buy a ‘delhi-6’ for AR Rahman, or a ‘once upon a time in mumbai’ for ajay devgan. And atleast for a movie like Rockstar, you don’t want any charity or welfare, you need power, exertion… you need a ‘PAANCH’ like power…
Personally for me… it’s a two statement review for the music:
1. A R Rahman is back in form
2. Mohit Chauhan has sounded too monotonus majority of the time and hence has fucked up the album
And yeas it is very much possible that the music might do well in terms of numbers, but it can never become a ‘sitaron se aage jahan aur bhi hai’ from ‘dil se’… I mean you watch ‘dil se’ and you are bound to get goose bumps when sukhwinder and AR Rahman create magic in this song… This is what we expect of AR Rahman… that even after 15 years… the echos of that song in our minds raise our heart beats… leave aside me… I toh get goose bumps even today when I remember this song and SRK being beaten up and thrown up mountains, and when mini and SRK are blown or the background chants of ‘jai bharat, jai bharat’ when the terrorist training camps were shown… for me, I admit ‘Dil se’ was special(the only movie I watched in theatre multiple times other than KNPH… hehehe… I watched both these movies atleast 4-5 days consecutively and 8-9 times in total in theater), but then I guess this is true with AR Rahman’s music for ever… I mean how can a person as sufi as someone who produced a ‘vande maataram’, ‘piya haji ali’, ‘mustafa mustafa’, ‘Yeh Jo Des Hai Tera’, miscalculate upon such a stage… Mohit is just not the person.
So, enough of anti mohit campaign(this article seems more of an anti mohit agenda than Review of Rockstar music)… let us discuss the songs and my comments…
- Phir se ud challa – Mohit Chauhan: opening sounded a bit like the mood of ‘yuhi chala chal from swades’, but surely missed the sounds of Kailash and Udit. A good composition and lyrics too were soulful… but mohit has let down, for some funny reason he always sounds crying… aaaieeennnnn aaaaaaannnnnn… +composition, – singing(KK-sukhi-kailashwould’ve been better)
- Jo bhi main – Mohit Chauhan: the crowd sounds are special but… KK would have been perfect for this one… it’s his kind of song… even a Farhaan akhtar would have done better… don’t trust me… just listen to ‘tum ho toh’ from ‘rock on’… the song here, ‘jo bhi main’ has great mood, feel and crowd… but the soul is missing… cuz the performer is not singing his heart out… instead mohit is just reading out the lines given with his trade mark lousy aaaieeennnnn aaaaaaannnnnn… +mood, +composition, +feel, – singing(KK was the only person for this song… and yeas if any farahn could’ve done it better, cuz he has shown in ‘tum ho toh’)
- Katiya Karoon – Harshdeep Kaur: these kind of songs have become almost a synonym of AR Rahman hindi movie album off late… and infact nothing even comparable to ‘sasural genda fool’ nothing special
- Kun Faya Kun – A.R Rahman, Javed Ali, Mohit Chauhan: The GOD himself takes charge and leads the way… and amazing composition… right up there if not comparable to ‘piya haji ali’ and ‘khwaja mere khwaja’ amazing… one of the saving grace of the album Winner
- Sheher Mein – Mohit Chauhan, Karthik: sounds the funky types, comic types like Eminem(of course not rap or hip hop), karthik sounds OK but mohit is again is shehar meiinnnn… aaaieeennnnn aaaaaaannnnnn… nothing special
- Hawaa Hawaa – Mohit Chauhan: A typical AR Rahman like song… from his days of Telugu dubbed movies in hindi… like ‘gentleman’ and ‘kadhalan’… a singer from south or Rahmans’s team would have done it far better… nothing special
- Aur Ho – Mohit Chauhan, Alma Ferovic: amazing compilation and without doubt Mohit’s best in the album… + composition(sukhwinder would have just pumped extra special life in this… something like ‘aaja sanam’ from ‘khilaaf’ or even something of the league of ‘satrangi’ from ‘dil se’ by sonu)
- Tango For Taj – Instrumental: just another composition… no way what one expects from AR Rahman when it comes to instrumentals or background scores… remember Bombay theme, ‘sitaaron se aage jahan’ from ‘Dil se’, I mean Rahmans’s instrumentals speak more loud and clear that the tracks with explicit lyrics… but here… its a diwali ka fusssssss patakha…nothing special
- Tum Ko – Kavita Subamaniam: a typical kavita rendition… nothing special and comparable to ‘boondon se baatein’ from ‘Thakshak’ or the likes… nothing special
- The Dichotomy Of Fame – Instrumental feat. Balesh, Kabuli : again a letdown for an instrumental by AR Rahman… nothing special
- Nadaan Parinde – A.R Rahman, Mohit Chauhan: a maestro stroke as we expect when we listen to AR Rahman with an OK performance by Mohit(would have loved to hear a bit more of AR Rahman in the song and would have been great if Mohit was replaced by sukhwinder)
- Tum Ho – Mohit Chauhan, Suzanne D’Mello : an OK composition but could have been better if for once we could have some other singer… remember Benny Dayal from ‘kaise mujhe tum mil gaye’ in ‘Ghajini’… this is what a fresh voice can do at times… it can work wonders and give an OK song like ‘kaise mujhe tum’ or this one a completely new perspective nothing special
- Saada Haq – Mohit Chauhan, feat. Orianthi, Clinton Cerejo: Clearly the winner… a great great sound… it has the canvas of AR Rahman… somewhat like songs from ‘yuvraaj’ had… it feelsBIG… the sound… the passion… the lyrics… is just amazing… but when you listen to it more closely on a head phone you can clearly make out mohit being singled out… he bloody is again howling… hez just pure shit nonsense… put a KK or even more a sukwinder and listen to the composition.. it is bound to blow you away… a superb composition… that too an extent has covered up Mohit’s mess and is a clear #1 for the album Winner
All the best Ranveer… AR Rahman… sadda haq and rockstar… GO and conquer hearts…
