OK Jaanu – Music Review (Bollywood Soundtrack)

Songs at the end.

Succumbing to the current remix (read Badshah) trend in Bollywood, Shaad Ali too enlists the services of the rapper for OK Jaanu. The remix entry for this soundtrack comes in the form of Badshah and Tanishk Bagchi’s recreation of Rahman’s own Humma Humma. And I am well-aware that I belong to a pretty small minority when I say I enjoyed the remix! Though there probably wasn’t a real need to replace the richly orchestrated Parandhu Sella Vaa from Tamil, the choice of song is still smart – another bedroom song from another Mani Ratnam movie. And while the remix strips the song of a lot of its original arrangement, the composers also don’t add the cacophony that is the norm for remixes these days. They just retain samples of the original shehnai portions and let the melody of the song take centre-stage over their lounge-ish backdrop; melody that Jubin Nautiyal and Shashaa Tirupati deliver very competently. Since the traditional sufi piece Maula Wa Sallim was non-Tamil to begin with, Rahman reuses the song as is in OK Jaanu, featuring his son A R Ameen’s voice. Sounds ethereal still, and the tinny quality in Ameen’s voice still rankles. Mental Manadhil from OKK becomes the title track in Hindi; composer does away with the female version and sticks to the one with him in the lead, Srinidhi Venkatesh playing chorus. And like it did in Tamil, the song…