Pick of the week: 1 Mar to 5 Aug 2006

RR thanks:)

RC thanks for catching the typo. aedho ninaippiile padam peraiye ange pottuten

SN23 i mentioned it as KJY/PS not (KJY, PS) :)

My pleasure baroque

The genre of light-classical songs has almost disappeared from TFM. The recent few attempts are nothing but jokes, with their loud synthetic beats that make me reach for headache pills. MSV, Shankar-Ganesh and Vijayabhaskar chose VJ for all of their difficult classical based compostions from the mid-70s to the early 90s. The combination of technical perfection, impeccable pronunciation, expressiveness and the majesty of VJ's voice has never been matched since. Nityasree has a lot of potential but is being wasted in the technical circus called today's music, taka taka taka jam. By the way what is up with that highspeed mridangam uruttal in that song taka taka taka jam? Did not mean to digress here.

Thanks for the great choice "konjum malar manjam", Ramki.

Pick #168

http://tfmpage.com/stream/songs/ethanai_ss.rm

Song: ethanai azhagu
Film: Sivagamiyin Selvan
Singer : SPB
Lyrics: Vaali?
Music: MSViswanathan


Song sent and requested by RC. The hindi version 'roop tera' was sung by KK. MSV must have had a tough time to not get inspired from the all India famous 'aaradhana' songs. Each and every song in tamil sounded very different from the original. Personally i liked the hindi version better than the tamil(and ofcourse the film aaradhana was miles ahead than SS..it is tough to even imagine the bloated SG in the role of an young and charismatic pilot that rajesh khanna did with his own charm) .
I think Latha made her debut in SS. What was the tamil version of 'baghon mein bahaar hai'?

Ramki,

Isn't this a solo? I believe Sivagamiyin Selvan's songs might have been recorded even before Vani started singing for Tamil movies in 1973.

The tamil version is 'Aadikku Pinne Aavani Madham Varuvadhu Undu.. Aamam..' by TMS and LRE, no where near the 'Baghon Mein Bahaar hai' song like the Roop Tera song!

However it is not fair to compare these songs to the hindi songs which heralded a new era of Kishore and RDB. Having said the songs were played often on Ilangai and AIR.

However MSV did give 4 good numbers
a. Iniyivale -- Korah Kagazka Ye Man mera
b. Ullam Rendum -- Mere Sapnon ki Raani
c. En Raajavin - Chandha Hai Tu
d. MSV Asiri Song

Mela Thalam a la 'Gungu Naara Haira Bhavru' did not impress me either.

Thanks for reminding the era.
Bala

Not too fair to compare, but since you brought it up, my vote goes to 'ethanai azhagu' for the feel and 'mood' of the situation. SPB just rocks. Tune, melody-wise, 'roop tera' is easily better.

It was an honest attempt by MSV without copying even some shades of Aaradhana songs.

En rajavin roja mugam is very pleasant in its way. Especially that humming part at end of each charaNam.

I think Ulagam sutrum vaaliban was the first movie for Latha, but SS got released bit earlier.

Terrible cast of Sivaji, AVM Rajan, Latha (Vanishri exempted) and over-do for nothing, lead to a disaster of SS. The same thing happened when Mother India was remade in Tamil with Sivaji and Vanishri.

Piece of info on this POW. The entire song sequence was picturised in one single shot (4+ mins). Do not know how many "takes" it took. It seems the entire crew applauded the innovation of the director & lead pair. At end of the song, Sivaji will push Vanishri(looked very sexy in this song without Jaakettu) into bed and bounce on her :-)

Ramki

"MSV must have had a tough time to not get inspired from the all India famous 'aaradhana' songs"

However KVM got inspired by ''Gungu Naara Haira Bhavru' ' and gave the 'Enga Veetu Thanga Therukku indha madham Thiru vizha' (SPB/PS duet) in Anurodhayam.

Bala

"which heralded a new era of Kishore and RDB"....Balaji, ArAdhanA is by SDB (the father Burman), I think...

Sure Sir, Aradhana's MD was SD Burman.
RDB was assisting his father SDB in this film. 'Roop Tera' was always credited to RDB by trade circles and so are one/more songs in this film. However the pleasantness of the other songs had the SDB feel, at least to me...

Whatever may be truth, success of Aradhana and the super-duper 'Roop tera' song gave a lift to RDB's career and SDB slowly reduced his assignments (age could be a factor too!)


Bala

Thankyou all for posting your thoughts on ethanai azhagu

Pick #169

http://tfmpage.com/stream/songs/putham_sd.rm

Song: putham puthu meni
Film: subha dhinam
Singers : PSuseela, BalaMuraliKrishna
Lyrics: vaali
Music: KVMahadevan

Thanks to JN for the song. (I apologize for the poor quality, i did my best to remove the noise).

On Jan 1st of every year, the very first song VB airs on ungaL viruppam is 'aandukku aandu thedhikku thedhi' by SG. The song is so popular, atleast on newyears, that it shadowed the another good song. Todays pick.
A beautiful duet by KVM(though i read that the song was actually tuned by TGLingappa for someother film. He later let the director of SD to use the song).
PS does a great job. She just breezes through the song with her sweet young voice and almost makes BMK voice just bearable.

Another popular song from SD is 'verenne ninaivu unnai thavira'(PS,TMS, ALR)