Wednesday, December 15, 2010

The angst of Amit Trivedi and Amitabh Bhattacharya


If you thought Nayan Tarse made your world go round than 'Zaar Zaar Aitbaar' will spin your world around twice over! The song 'Aitbaar' from Amit Trivedi's recent album called 'No one killed Jessica' is an amazing example of a new language of music that we as a generation are getting introduced to. It starts with an oriental instrument, a little bit of rap follows, the electronic mood settles in and then to launch the song comes Vishal Dadlani, Mame Khan and Bob and with them the sheer madness of screaming in mike and yet make it sound resonating!

Now, if I made my father hear this he would instantly take out the earphones from his ears and put it aside and then ask for an Aspirin! Well, a few years ago I too might have done that - but Amit Trivedi is getting me introduced to this madness of electronics, rock and god-knows-what-is-it-called - 'head banging?' (ahem not sure) am not sure though! But hear the song here and try to imagine the sheer angst with which it is composed. The idea of getting hurt, the idea of your faith getting trampled, the idea of faith becoming the edge of a knife and murdering you inside out! - oh man!
Hear it on mind-blasting volume!


Just yesterday I told this to my colleague while we were traveling back from the shoot: 'The mood of the song you are hearing on your earphones has to be directly proportional to the speed of the vehicle you are driving!' (it could be vice-versa too and could be as true) And its then that everything suddenly starts making sense, life starts giving you a picture of yourself -flashbacks, moments, words, memories, people, incidents and a whole lot of stuff that you would not have imagined it would come to you through that particular song!. It always happens to me. It could be any random song but remember if the mood of the song, the speed of the vehicle and the visuals that pass-by come together it can lead to amazing fruitful results like a tear, or maybe a smile and maybe- anger!

And now read the following words:
darr ka shikar hua aetbaar
dil mein daraar hua aetbaar
kare cheetkaar baahen pasaar karke
nashtar ki dhaar hua aetbaar
pasli ke paar hua aetbaar
choosay hai khoon bada khoonkhar banke..

jal bhun ke raakh hua aetbaar
ganda mazaak hua aetbaar
halli sa chaakh* hua aetbaar
raste ki khaak hua aetbaar
galta, pighalta hai, khalta hai raaton mein


Such is the angst in the words of Amitabh Bhattacharya that a 'Ganda Mazaak' suddenly makes you cringe from within! Wow - Ganda Mazaak - hasn't life done that to all of you at a particular point - and if not? wait - it might be just around the corner. Trivedi and Bhattacharya struck gold with DevD and believe me that 'Nayan Tarse' has always been the numero uno song that represents DevD so very well. The idea of loss in love - Stuff that smashes your ear drums and yet makes you 'love...', mind you - 'love the idea of loss!
How many songs could do that in last few years and thats why Amit Trivedi the man, is a very very interesting guy to keep a track of.

Now, for a fact: the songs composed by Trivedi are not so easy ones that you could humm along as you drive. His compositions are difficult to sing and to sing without any music to support. They can't be sung on college stages, amateur music competitions or in front of family members for the guests to be impressed. Their pattern is something that I am still trying to figure out. But make a list, except Iktara: Songs from DevD, Udaan, Aamir to No One Killed Jessica - all of them are amazing to hear but can't be sung easily. And that's what makes him so special.

I have a plan from January: the so-called new year resolution: To start running in early mornings and am sure Amit Trivedi's music will help me a great deal in sweating it out and how about to start the day while returning from the run and start typing all that that came to you during that run!

Whoa!
Bye-Bye Assisting bollywood!

P.S: Hear the song again from 1: 33 onwards: that music piece: Is that a SlumDog-A R Rahman influence?

© Copyrights 2009 www.bhaandgroup.blogspot.com. All Rights Reserved. Hardik Mehta

5 comments:

bhargav said...

Have you wondered why the head banging music rushes your blood or pump you up and the Jagjit singh guzals on a rainy evening relaxes you or in my case makes me go of to sleep.

Well the reason stays with a little technological aspect of the music and a little in the way our bodies function. When you are running or super hyper, your heart is beating at around 130 to 150 beats per minute and when you are relaxed, your heart beats drop down to around 60 to 72 beats per minute and when you are sleeping it drops down even furrther.
So the technological aspect is that the fast music normally is at around 150 bpm and slow jagjit gazals or instrumentals are at around 55 - 60 bpm or below.

Now when we hear this songs, our brains immitates the beats and tries to match it up with over heart rate. So.. If you are in the relaxed mood, chances are you might not like head banging metal fast paced songs since your brain is trying to send signals to the heart to match that bpm and other part of the brain is trying not to move out the comfort relaxed zone.

And when you are super hyper you dont want a song or a music with a dropped down bpm ...

So hence, when you would have given the headphone with the song you were mentioning 5 years back to your Dad ( Uncle ) he would have taken the headphones out since after a certain age people dont prefer the rush in their heart rates. :) :) :)

You are getting there brother, now that you are enjoying the fast paced heart pacing metal music.

-- Peace out Bro..
Bhargav

Anonymous said...

after 1.33 mins it's not slumdog influence, it has been directly lifted from chandralekha of ar rahman (chor chor/thiruda thiruda. the film was super pathetic yaar, amit trivedi was the only saving grace.

Sandman said...

I never thought I would find anyone analyzing amit trivedi's music so much. Its nice to read your blogs man. Do you have any posts just specific to dev d? i have to tell you something. when i listened to dev d for the first time, I felt like I had found a reason to live.

Vivek said...

Damn dude, I'm SO happy someone found this song good enough to write about.

After I heard it, I was surprised nobody was talking about this monster of a track. Why the hell did this song go almost unnoticed and why does it remain one of the most underrated songs of the last five years?

Thanks for reassuring me that there are people out there listening to this stuff. Because prevalent ugliness is unfortunate, but beauty unnoticed is a tragedy.

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Now, if I made my father hear this he would instantly take out the earphones from his ears and put it aside and then ask for an Aspirin! Well, a few years ago I too might have done that - but Amit Trivedi is getting me introduced to this madness of electronics, rock and god-knows-what-is-it-called
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