Heard the music of Guru and I am both spellbound in parts and disappointed in other parts. Quite a contrast of feelings to go through within one soundtrack. As a passionate Rahman fan myself and knowing what an impact Rahman's music has had in the past with Mani's direction, I have been anticipating this day of release of Guru's music when it was first announced.
Please understand that Rahman is almost like my own "Guru". As a keyboard player myself, I look up to him not only as a musician, but as a human being, a man of humility, grace, passion, compassion, and spirituality. Please take what I am about to say as something that is painful to admit even to myself. First of all, with Guru, 3 tracks are spellbinding, magical, classics, whatever you call it - Tere Bina, Ay Hairathe, and Jaage Hain. Two tracks to me are strictly ok to good - Barso Re and Mayya, and two tracks - well, I can't believe these two songs are on a Mani-Rahman soundtrack - Baazi Laga and Ek Muft (although Ek Muft will probably grow on me, esp once I see how it is picturized. A very good friend of mine who is a member of this group and who wishes to remain anonymous shared some observations with me, which I was too afraid to admit to myself at first. Please understand first that I am not one of those who wants another Dil Se or Taal. I am for one glad that Rahman likes to move in new directions and set trends. But, of late, he has been on another trend too, which does not rub well on me. Rahman is going against the grain of his natural style. He likes to experiment in new directions and I love that about Rahman, but the magical spontaneity and natural ease of composing has been missing. It's almost as if Rahman is changing his entire mentality of composing on purpose for some reason, even though the effort is always there and brilliance is there in flashes. In fact, his compositions seem a lot more "effortful" of late and that slick and brilliant spontaneity is not as evident and even absent a lot more. One person made a comment on another board saying that today, Rahman seems to be "trying too hard". One observation is that in recent Rahman soundtracks, there is overall a relative lack of arrangement depth and elaborative musicianship that characterized his earlier works. The bells and whistles are not quite there, and frankly, his arrangements in many of his recent soundtracks have sounded "muddy". Those crisp simple arrangements with ethnic beats and simple melodies with lush strings and softer mid tones are lacking more, replaced by technoish rhythms with a muddled sounding accompaniment section. I have also noticed less use of true acoustic instruments and a de-emphasis on expansive musical interludes, replaced by only chords or one line improvizations (exception - Swades). I believe that Rahman has not "lost anything", and the proof is in many stand out songs in recent soundtracks like the ones just mentioned in Guru, RDB, MP, and his consistent brilliance in Swades and Bose (two exceptions to my point). His BGMs are also amazing. Take Guru for example. I can understand that songs like Baazi Laga nd Ek Muft are situational numbers and they probably suit the director's scenes well. But, they sound so ordinary, as if any other MD's compositions. Sorry if that sounds harsh, but I really feel that way! Baazi Laga is frankly skippable! And listen to Barso Re, it's catchy, but it just sounds so plain jane. Even with situational numbers, Rahman can do so much better. Why is he going against his natural grain of brilliance and elaborative musicianship and lush arrangements in some songs, but not in others? This gives a soundtrack a stark inconsistency that is confusing and also limits its potential. Once again, in previous soundtracks, each and every song would feature his brilliance, and thus, his soundtracks became commercial blockbusters. When was the last time a Rahman soundtrack was a true pan India stand alone blockbuster? Been a while, hasn't it? RDB, for instance, was a hit musically, but only because the movie was a huge hit. Yes, the songs were good, even great at times, but not mindblowing. And I don't fault Rahman entirely either for recent lack of commercial success relative to his own success in the past. In recent years, piracy has put a huge dent in commercial potential of musical products too. Please don't misunderstand me. My comments are only relative to Rahman's own previous standards and successes. He is no ordinary MD as we know. His genius is unbound and I expect a lot from him in each and every track. When I listen to a song like Ey Hairathe, tears come to my eyes because there is the true Rahman.......the true and beautiful and powerful Rahman and magic and brilliance that I love and adore and I so badly miss in a consistent way. I surrender to the possiblity that it's my expectations that are at fault too. But, I sincerely believe in my heart that Rahman for some reason is going against the tide of his natural brilliance and spontaneity and trying to abandon some aspects of his core, which I so miss. Thoughts are welcome, but please don't accuse me of being anti Rahman or not a true fan, or any other untrue thing. I am a Rahman fan forever and I am expressing my deepest most honest thoughts to you. I ask you to please respect that, disagree or agree. Thank you for reading.
