IR New Albums - Old responses (5 Aug 2006)

[kiru]

I just replied to Ahmed about IR and malayalam in another thread and at his prompting I listened to 'pon mudi ..".
Unfortunately, you guys are almost right about 'Ponmudi".. Not much freshness, in the tune or in the orchestration. Too many cliched phrases for instruments and tunes. ammaiyennu has a sEthu hangover, oru chiri kandaal's prelude has been heard earlier.
Still, I think the album is good, but no Kochu Kochu Santhoshangal beater. One good thing is, I see IR confidently using the drum machine and the orchestration especially wrt rhythm programming has no rough edges and the whole song gives the feeling of IR having done it patiently and confidently. This is usually not the case with certain tamil releases. Using the drum machine and not resorting to tabla is a must for being commercially viable these days. IR has been consistently using the drum machine in malayalam effectively to back his melodies. So this is a good development (including the use of electronic bass).
It is quite one or two songs from ponmudi will be popular hits.


Unlike you guys I dont expect major hits from IR in every consecutive album. The reasons are numerous. But I am unable to listen to other MDs (I mean newer) work. I go back to older albums of IR.