The Golden Era of Dr.IR and Dr.SPB

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#297 ஏலேலக்குயிலே
(பாண்டி நாட்டுத்தங்கம் , 1989 , உமா ரமணனுடன்)

ElElakkuyilE of pANdi nAttuththangam, with UR

A film I know only by the songs. Had to browse to find out who the hero & ini were (Karthik-Nirosha, possibly a follow-up after agni natchaththiram success). And, if one goes by this blog post of Murali Kannan , the movie was a hit. There's an interesting thuNukku about the year 1989 in this article :

ஒரே ஆண்டில் சந்தேகத்துக்கே இடமில்லாமல் ஐந்துக்கும் மேற்பட்ட பெரு வெற்றிப்படங்களும் 10 வெற்றிப்படங்களும் அமைவது எப்போதாவதுதான் நடைபெறும். 1989ல் அப்படி ஒரு நிகழ்வு நடைபெற்றது (அபூர்வ சகோதரர்கள், வருஷம் 16, ராஜாதிராஜா, கரகாட்டக்காரன், புதியபாதை, புதுப்புது அர்த்தங்கள், மாப்பிள்ளை, பாண்டி நாட்டுத்தங்கம்.....).

It's not difficult to see how many of the mega hit movies were non-IR (only one in the above listtu) And what a variety of scores for these movies. IR was the true one-stop-shop for music during this time period and he offered all kinds. Whether classically rich (V16) modern sounding (VV / A-S) or nAttuppuRa albums (PNT, Karagam). Interestingly, each of the nAttuppuRa albums had their own distinct flavor as well. As one can hear, the songs of PNT had different "sounds" and construct compared to Karagam.

This one is a racy song, with SPB & UR competing with each other in pouring a lot of energy! rAsA has some unusual 'rough' percussion sounds in the saraNam and one could even mistake this song as a product of some other composer if more attention is paid to only that aspect. Also, the jin-jinnAkkudi stuff and such not-so-rich-sounding chorus could turn off some IRFs I love this song, however, which is helped greatly by the melody and the singers!

Since there were abundance of hits during this time period, I didn't initially pay attention to PNT songs (never recorded or had the cassette BTW) and these weren't listened with a lot of enthu during bus travels either. I think motorcycling brought down the bus travels too during this time and the opportunities for such listens were dwindling. That made the first occasion when I did "connect" with this song quite memorable.

I posted earlier about how Cbe, Pollachi & Palakkad form a triangle. Interestingly, there are a number of "interconnecting small roads" between the two main roads from the TN towns to Kerala. There is one going from a place called Kanda koundan chAvadi on Cbe-Pkd road to KozhinjAmpARai on Pollachi-Pkd road. Then there is another connecting these roads starting from a place called Kanjikkode on Cbe-Pkd highway to the same KozhinjAmpARai. There are a few villages with name ending as pARai on the Pollachi-Pkd road. There is one village called pARai itself (also known as elappuLLi and that's where mellisai mannar MSV is from). Then this big village - can even be called a tiny town - called 'kozhinjAmpARai' which is in the border of TN-Kerala and one of the main hubs for vegetable movement from TN to Kerala. There is also another place called 'kOzhippARai' and I happened to have a few distant relatives of father there.

This kOzhippArai is located on the country road (single lane, tarred) from Kanjikkode to kozhinjAmpARai. It is also on the KK chAvadi to kozhinjAmpARai road. There is a sugar factory close by in "mEnOn pARa" (Chittoor sugars) and these are lovely roads during the rainy season to travel...beautiful trees, flowers, wind-mills - lovely route with very few buses. During one of those bus-rides, the songs of PNT were played and I paid very close attention and simply loved them! So, three of those songs with SPB will be featured in this thread starting today, 297 / 298 / 299