Oscar Thamizhan 'Isaipuyal' AR Rahman News/Updates

[Russellmtp]

I do not know and do not care about the 90s or 00s TFM page discussion background and I would rather ajay himself explain his statement rather than you jumping in to defend him. I responded to it on face value, whether an album is available in stores or Itunes has nought to do with how good it is. If there were people who praised an album without listening to it, that is ridiculous, goes without saying. All I am saying that need not necessarily be the case just because it's not available on Itunes, that's just jumping the gun.

As for the rest of the discussion, again, please speak for yourself. I have seen a number of ARR fans cite his awards or which TIME article featured which songs of his to argue that he is better than IR, rather than talk about his music. I completely agree with you that everybody has their own tastes and imposing arrogance on others based on likes or dislikes in music is ridiculous but I have seen this attitude from many ARR fans and not necessarily online but in face to face interactions. So, yes, I do think a lot of them are image conscious and anxious that ARR conforms to a certain image. I also feel that these days he is making an effort to conform to that image. These are my views based on MY interactions with ARR fans and Rahman's interviews. I was very fond of his music in the 90s but have lost interest in his recent work. I find it very disappointing and his tendency to say what people want to hear, to not even correct ignorant people when they attribute the very introduction of Western music elements in film music to him, much more disappointing.

So you can call my statements biased if you like and since we are not likely to find a common ground there, we'll have to agree to disagree. But I do not remember having ever called Rahman overrated so again please don't jump the gun. I had asked this question once to the older generations HCIRFs, "Would you rather IR had been upstaged commercially by Deva or Sirpi instead of ARR? Let ARR-coterie attempt to discredit IR, it is not going to change my opinion of either composer. " But maybe I shouldn't if all you guys want to do is paint all IR fans with the same colours. I mean, how does it matter, if you are not even going to read what I have said and have already made up your mind. But I do believe that of late, there is a desire of some people, either ARR fans in influential positions or people who fell out with IR, to discredit his contribution to music just because they don't like him. One ARR fan even claimed on baradwaj rangan's blog that IR was arrogant to compose fusion in a style not attempted by other fusion masters. Er, that's called genius. You can interpret such desperate attempts to discredit him the way you like, I interpret it as insecurity, period.

Well, hello, you are the one who is trying to paint all Rahman fans with the same colours. You seem to think that all Rahman fans are image conscious because the few you have met are. The ones I have met simply love his work. Please ask yourself, how would you feel if someone says that you love Raja only because he is very pious and not because of his music? I take it as an insult. We all know what we want. Rahman's humility (or the lack of it) does not help (or hurt) us in any way. It is his music that gives me joy. It may be 'garbage' to some. Raja's music may be 'garbage' to some too. But, you don't go around telling someone what they are hearing is garbage. It is no different than saying that they are eating garbage.

Most of the Rahman fans I know have immense respect for Raja and his work. I, personally, think that without Raja, Tamil film industry would have shut down in the 80s. There will always be some Rahman fan who attempts to discredit Raja and the other way too. But, we are not talking about that. I was only trying to explain Rahman's recent statement. He said musical taste has changed since the 80s. What is wrong with that? Why pour vitriol at him for a factually correct statement? Where in the interview did Rahman claim that Raja is irrelevant now? Raja has been composing for more movies than Rahman every year till date. Do you think Rahman does not know that?

You didn't call Rahman over-rated, KR did. Your reply to his post seemed to suggest you condone it.

Re: me jumping in to defend Ajay, hey, all Rahman fans are the same, aren't we? We all think alike, do things alike, perhaps, we even look alike no, I wasn't trying to defend ajay - he needs no defending - I read his post and your reply and thought it was obvious what he was trying to say. Thought I will give a history of TFMpage to put things in perspective. If you don't care about it, that's fine, please feel free to ignore.