In the spirit of catching more eye-balls, spamming this thread with a post made in another thread:
(smart strategy, piggy back on app's dedicated fan-base that visits this thread.)
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Last song to catch my fancy:
vurukulayi godavari from Abhilasha.
Abhilasha, I have always neglected as a poor cousin of Challenge, what with Yendamuri, Chiranjeevi and the director(whose name I forget) combining yet again.
It doesn't help that the primary memory I took away on first watch were, well, Radhika in tights, Silk-Smitha-ish thigh-cut skirts pop-dancing away with the unruly mop-ped Chirugaaru, with his trademark (weird for non-fans, genius for fans) dancing moves.
Radhika - for all her general acting talent - isn't really my idea of a glamorous pop-star, a role she simulated again for Kannan vandhu paadugindran, thereby spoiling the song for me.
Therefore, I suppose I can be excused for mentally mapping Abhilasha as that album with Chiru-with-his-gymnastic-tricks "banti chamanti" and Radhika-prancing-for "vela paala ledhu"(in tamil SPS crooned this tune as "aadai kondu aadum" for some other movie - not, I think, a remake of this one).
When you assume like that, it is only natural that you end up as what they say happens to you and me when we assume.
So, then, this song shoots like a meteor into my life recently. I have heard it before - just not paid enough attention.
It is a grand number, with wind instruments ruling the roost raising images of wind-surfing on a placid river. One true test of Raja songs for eternal life is what we in this parts have put together as "escalating melody". I am not sure who coined it(I fancy it might have been myself) but it describes the song perfectly.
The grand wind-instrument opening leads to SPB, joyfully, as he only can, crooning the opening lines with mirth and excitement. As Janaki joins with a fitting riposte, SPB moves into heart-warming territory with "...shruti telupe murali", Janaki returns that with interest in "chigurakku...siri muvva ravali".
So far so good. Like a Fed-Nadal point, robust exchanges. Then SPB delivers the knock-out punch with an intoxicating, dreamy "rasa mayam jagathi".
But the real matter lies in the saranams. As I mentioned, it is here that the escalating melody shows up. It is one of those SPB-only-possible moments, as the tune, like a Anil Kumble floater, takes very minor twists and turns, and each turn holding a very subtle emotion. It is far tougher, as countless batsmen from the 90s will agree, to face up to such minor variations than with the big-turning, clearly demarcated emotional roller-coasters.
Thus goes SPB
naa pEdha hridayam // Robust declaration, but a typical lover-ish self-pitying reference to "my poor heart"
nee prema nilayam // "is your playground for Love". Moon-struck offer. The tune is same as previous line but you have to show a shift in the emotion
nAdhaina brathukE E nAdO nIdhainadhi // The subtle breaks SPB uses to punctuate this sentence are breathtaking - nA...dhainA brathukE..pause..E nAdO... is sheer genius at work. ("My life became yours ere long")
neevanna manushE I nAdu nAdhainadhi // Wonder, and joy at the culmination of the love and togetherness.
And here again, SPB has a knock-out punch to finish the stanza:
oka gundE AbhilAshA
padhi mandhikki brathukainadhi.
I just cannot get enough of the last two lines as SPB packs so much into them - I am infact, so broken down in emotion and sheer amazement at the art, that I would need the help of those reading this to listen to the song and help me list down what all SPB covered in those two lines. (suresh, raagas - pls help with links)
Intriguing lines, too. Until now, it is a personal ballad speaking of their love. These lines really raise my curiosity?
oka gundE AbhilAshA
padhi mandhikki brathukainadhi.
- "One heart's desire gave life to 10 people"
Why would it, I mean? Is he referring to the living made by sundal-wallahs, bribe-taking policemen, cinema halls selling tickets etc as among the 10 people who make a living from a heart's desire, as they do benefit from lovers' desire to be together?
Nah! More likely a reference to the film's theme, I guess. Raagas/suresh can throw more light.
Abhilasha is about a young lawyer, trying to highlight a loophole in the law, in a bid to legislate it out of the law-book. He arranges a fake murder, planning, reasonably enough, that he'll go through the legal rigmarole, and eventually, reveal all in the film's climax, thereby exposing the loopholes in the law. Only, the fake murder turns out to be anything but fake and he is forced to be on the run.
Would those lines, then, refer to the hero's desire to abolish this loop-hole in the law, which presumably, would benefit atleast 10 people?
Not really sure, and not really sure why such a sentiment makes its way to a love-duet.
Such, then, are the pleasures of Raja-triggered nostalgia, thought-coordination, and musings.
I'll leave you without a link(which will surely materialise soon if I know my suresh/raagas well enough as I presume I do) but with SPB, bringing his full hand of magic tricks, lapping my ears with wave after wave of the addictive, escalating melody
Also, if one resigns to the fact that movies had / have / will have such a character in them anyways, then there's no question that she has no parallel - including most heroines who too tried to do the same thing on screen. So, my irritation was not against a person but the irrelevance of the kind of character she represented to such a great song.
Originally Posted by PARAMASHIVAN
First time, I am hearing this, infact "pEsa koodathu" was the only song I remember from AV, as it was a mokka film, I have not remembered much of the song!
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