Minor Scale

Anniyan did not find Harris Jayaraj at his creative best, as one would normally expect for a Shankar movie (maybe many don’t care anymore considering the actual movie challenged their sanity). One aspect missing from some of the songs, I thought, were solid intros, an art form that Rahman & Raja are masters of. And now we have another Harris Jayaraj album called Thotti Jaya, featuring Chimpu & his swooshing finger(s). My laziness quotient has exponentially increased over the past coupla months, so a detailed blade analysis (to use a Bosey term) of the album might not happen.

Of particular interest though is one song that goes Achu Vella Karumbe. It’s a paradox when compared to every other song in Anniyan in that it has probably one of the best intros I’ve heard in recent times. The first 12-13 seconds are amazing. Shankar Mahadevan starting off with Laailaiye Aaa coupled with the chord shifts that come with the background synth & the strumming guitar. But then it’s like HarrisJ has a serious attack of self-doubt and suddenly switches back to an all-too familiar rhythm and song structure that gives one a strong whiff of Mudhalvan. The song is catchy alright, but at the expense of sounding hackneyed. This easy compromise has been the bane of his music in recent times. This resorting to tested song styles that would ensure a flavor of the month hit. Exactly why he will, sadly enough, always be referred to as that extremely talented Rahman clone.

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Footnote: Thotti Jaya, otherwise, is a decent album with Yaaridamum and the vocals of Ramesh Vinayagam impressing the best, in spite of the forced lyrics.

This entry was posted on Thursday, August 4th, 2005 at 9:05 am and is filed under Music. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.