Blog by Arvind Srinivasan

Review : Jaya TV Hariyudan Naan

2010-10-31T08:33:00.002-05:00

Hariyudan Naan for the week of October 28-30, 2010 up in my musical blog

Copyright : This work is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-Noncommercial-No Derivative Works 3.0 Unported License

Review: Hariyudan Naan

2010-10-23T19:16:00.003-05:00

A new post 'Hariyudan Naan' on Musical Blog. Enjoy and share your thoughts as always.

Copyright : This work is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-Noncommercial-No Derivative Works 3.0 Unported License

Comic : Foreign Policy Credentials

2009-03-15T14:03:00.000-05:00

Comic : Joe the Plumber

2008-11-23T22:12:00.004-05:00

See this, and this.

Copyright : This work is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-Noncommercial-No Derivative Works 3.0 Unported License

QR Code

2008-11-18T15:34:00.002-05:00

This sounds incredibly exciting - QR Code, a Japanses invention, is basically a 2-D bar code.

"...QR Codes storing addresses and URLs may appear in magazines, on signs, buses, business cards or just about any object that users might need information about. Users with a camera phone equipped with the correct reader software can scan the image of the QR Code causing the phone's browser to launch and redirect to the programmed URL..."

And according to this post by Andrew, the real world implementations are slick and wonderful.

what would be do without innovation ?

Copyright : This work is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-Noncommercial-No Derivative Works 3.0 Unported License

Comic : Business Case

2008-11-16T13:46:00.006-05:00

Copyright : This work is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-Noncommercial-No Derivative Works 3.0 Unported License

Suresh MENON's insights on casteism in sports

2008-08-15T19:53:00.003-05:00

Suresh Menon - one of the regulars on Cricinfo - has now turned into a commentator on casteism in India - shunning his profession of a cricket commentator - for reasons best known to him.

His recent potshots at 'middle class origins' of the Fab-four (Dravid, Tendulkar, Laxman, Ganguly) while explaining why Sehwag is not considered as great as the above mentioned gents is in absolute distaste.

I think India has found a great candidate for Nobel price for the 'best find' category - that Sehwag's 'Jat working class background' is what prevents him from being spoken in the same breath as the others.

Phew - Cricinfo - your editing sucks ! How could you let through such raves and rants of unstable minds ?

Suresh MENON- What initially was so disgusting has now turned into a source of amusement and entertaintment. I hope you can provide much more of your 'expert insights' on why other players dont get recognized. Keep up the 'good' work !!

[Movie Review] Dasavatharam

2008-06-17T13:45:00.003-05:00

By now, you'd have read this first line in reviews, a zillion times - 'The movie starts of with 12th century..." - whats with that People !

Anyway, the movie starts of with.. ;)

The more I think about this movie, the more interested i get about the movie, and how Kamal wasted a superb opportunity to make this movie work. First all the negatives.

Negatives

Cheesy Graphics - Vittalachariar movies had better graphics - all the rave about the tsunami, and 12th century river was a big load of ....

Contrived violent sequences, absolutely unnecessary - may be the masala element ! - I guess people misunderstood violence as 'via-lens' :P

As someone else said it, panchavatharam would have been as good. Nambi, Japanese, Avtaar Singh, Khalifullah and Boovaragan did not further anything in the movie.

Ridiculous make-up - I'd rather have them wear a 'macham' / mole to distinguish one from other than the so pla-sticky looking getups. As Balaji mentioned in his review, with his acting, Kamal did not even need any makeup for us to pick out which role he plays.

Mallika Sherawat - good riddance half way through

Music /Rerecording - call me sensitive, but it was too LOUD period

Now that we got that out of the way, here are some of the good things about the movie.

Good Things

Interesting storyline, could have been scripted better

Even though 10 avtaars were not needed, they have been decently connected

Amazing dialogs - wow Kamal DOES have such high wit quotient

Highly researched character etches

Very good acting, ofcourse by Kamal

Some of the thoughts I had as I watched the movie were

Shankar is one person who could have handled this wonderfully

Kamal could have played Asin's role as well - would have been interesting

With probably 10% of the budget, (i.e. remove make-ups, throw away ridiculously bad CGs, and cut violence) the movie could have been a big time, fast paced, laugh-filled entertainer.

Many events could just be 'narrated' ? i.e. Nambi - The movie could have as well opened saying that chozha raja dumped Perumal statue into the ocean in 12th century. What difference would it have made ? Instead they are used to showcase that Kamal can act in 10 different roles, and can shoot a big budget movie. D'uh if you did not know Kamal can act 10 different roles and pull it off with great aplumb, you won't be convinced after watching this movie either.

I liked the movie, but for the headache it gave me, and the gore violence sequences, and the moronic theather that brought back Indian memories (no AC for most part of the movie).

Verdict

The negatives outweigh many of the positives is the bottom line. But if you have the ability to 'overlook' the negatives - it is definitely worth watching - just for the performance of realistic Balram Naidu :)

p.s : Does any one know how this character played out in the Telegu version ?

Bull'ish Proposal

2007-10-11T14:17:00.000-05:00

A woman used craigslist, ny - to look for wall street husbands making more than $500k/year.

Apparently, she made her 'business' case stating that in NY $500K means nothing. In an interesting response, ".. "plain and simple a crappy business deal."

"Your looks will fade and my money will likely continue into perpetuity ... in fact, it is very likely that my income increases but it is an absolute certainty that you won't be getting any more beautiful!" the banker wrote.

"So, in economic terms you are a depreciating asset and I am an earning asset," he said. "Let me explain, you're 25 now and will likely stay pretty hot for the next 5 years, but less so each year. Then the fade begins in earnest. By 35 stick a fork in you!"

"It doesn't make good business sense to "buy you" (which is what you're asking) so I'd rather lease,.."

So the seeker's economic interests were undercut by the provider's economic interest ! - c'est la vie :)

(courtesy: http://news.yahoo.com/s/nm/20071010/od_nm/newyork_husband_dc)

Mysterious Girl

2007-10-05T14:22:00.000-05:00

Chapter 1 : Manning learns to walk.
Walking at a pace slightly faster than a slow-mo replay of babies learning to walk, was Manning on the treadmill. Where he hails from, his name is a little bit longer - Manikandan.

He was surprised at how most people that he has worked with over the years, seem to be remarking that Manning needs to hit the gym. He was told six-pack abs was the way to go. Poor thing, no one told him that six-pack did not mean 6 packs of trail-mix cereal bars.

The gym experience was not as exciting as he thought it would be. No one at the gym would talk to him, he would stare at everyone only to realize that all were busy with their headphones. And then it happened.

Chapter 2 : Harry met Sally.
Full moon on the treadmill, yes, he was convinced. It took a while for him to realize it was indeed a very beautiful looking desi female. With an air of no-nonsense, the smile of a mona-lisa, a cute dimple, a bright smile and to top it all, no headphones on.

All of this meant only one thing to him, he should try to strike a conversation within the next 6 months, and manage a smile in the next few weeks. He knew it took a lot conviction. Smiling was second nature to him, except that he could not when she was around.

He believed in baby-steps, ironically. He would give it some time, and the chemistry would set in, for laws of physical attraction to work. His mathematical abilities signalled a very high statistical probability of getting a smile in return. It did not matter he never managed to clear any of these subjects while schooling.

Days went by, with Manning slowly mustering the courage to steal some glances unbeknownst to his angel, but not before he was totally convinced that she would not jump out of the picture on his cellphone, to slap him.

Chapter 3 : Harry nears Sally.
That day, he was really assured, as calm as a storm, that he would go near her. The steps took a long time coming, yet after 15 minutes, he was still where he was. Damn it ! these treadmills he thought !

The next day, he made sure, he was not anywhere near a treadmill - and he was not that far away from her. She seemed unflustered at a desi male approach, only to realize this guy walked past her, without even stealing a look. Hmm ! that is surprising she thought. Little did she know how Manning was turned into a nervous wreck just crossing her, and he was sure, that the act of looking at her in the eye was light-years away !

Two weeks later, he was quite comfortable walking across her, stealing glances, smiling at her without any reciprocity, and even staring at her. She started feeling the creeps. She was boiling over on the inside, but never did her facade of a smile give way to her emotions. She was carefully watching his every move thinking of how to counter him.

Chapter 4 : Interesting Weekend
His weekend was a disaster. A friend from 5-6 years back, came over to drag him out a conference where 'e-Business' was the theme and a VP of one of the largent commercial bank was to talk on how to achieve market penetration. He had warned his friend about any Amway'sh pyramid schemes. But little did he know how valuable this conference was.

The audience were urged to stop working and start their own business. The business of adding people to a pyramid. The business of making money for your upline (person ahead of you in the pyramid), of making money out of gullible people, of making people buy products at a price higher than any other comparable products in the market, of convincing them that the reason for such higher prices is higher quality. They spoke at length about 'free enterprise days', to listen to which, you had to pay atleast five or six-20 dollar bills. They spoke about how to develop your business by talking to people about starting their own business. The speakers at the conference proclaimed, this would be the most unforgettable day in every attendee's life. It sure was.

Manning was drained, frustrated, irritated and was almost gonna bash up few Indian cricket players for their performance. But, her face, the very thought of her, calmed him down, while at most other times, it would stir the tummy within.

Chapter 5 : D-Day
On monday, he had realized this was his day. The day he'd waited for all this long. The day when he was to go strike a conversation with his angel. When he got to the gym he looked around for his angel. Not to be found. He told himself, good things had to wait. He was rehearsing his lines over and over again. He also carefully considered his exit plan. After all these weeks on the treadmill, his legs were good enough to run away should she decide to explode. He knew the layout, the distance it would take for him to be safe. The number of blocks he had to scurry. All of it seemed perfect. The most oppurtune moment it was.

And there she was. Walking right past him, casting a spell of fragrance, leaving him debilitated. The drop of sweat from his eyebrow woke him up. He walked up to her, more like a disco dancer shaking his leg, only that he was not one. And yes, now he was within her striking range.

Chapter 6 : Da-moment
This was the moment. Manning was right in front of her. Only the words in his mind separated her from him. However, some powerful glue, was preventing his vocal chords to move. He still managed, "Hi, can i talk to you about something ?"

She could sense Manning's approach. The eerie feeling of yet another desi male approaching her. What could be different ? They are all the same. She seemed to be signalling someone. Before Manning could realize what was going on, He-man was standing in front of him.

Chapter 7 : He-man
She had discussed with her weight-trainer couple of days ago, over her cup of frappucino with double whip, about some help she may need to ward off a potential troublemaker. The trainer was all for it. He could swat a fly in the time it takes for you to think about it. He could crush an ant, in the time you could spell it. The airmass displaced while he walks past causes couple of treadmills to lose their bearings. All she had to do was wink, and this real six-packer would be beside her in a moment. She knew this would work like a charm against Manning. He-man he was.

Manning realized the folly of his move, but only a little bit too late. The whole word seemed to come to a grinding halt. But not the treadmills in the gym. All his exit routes seemed non-existent. He had to do something. He had to, for the love of his life.

Chapter 8 : He-does-it
He did it. His lips moved. His vocal chord produced few words. And then there were none. She had disappeared. So was the he-man. So were the guys in the hearing range.

Back home, he was narrating this story to his friends. None of them could stand the suspense. What did you do ? Hope this is not potty humor ? Did you say something bad ? How could you make a weight-trainer disappear ? Why would he-man runaway they kept pestering him.

Manning's eyes twinkled. It had mischief written all over it. With a smug face, after what seemed to extend a brief pause to an eternity, he blurted it out.

Manning had said, "Do you know how McDonald's business model works ? Can i talk to you about Amway ?"

He thanked Amway for saving his life :)

The End.

Guess the question ?

2007-09-12T21:47:00.000-05:00

Guess the question, if this is the answer...

“I personally believe that U.S. Americans are unable to do so because, uhmmm, some people out there in our nation don't have maps and uh, I believe that our, I, education like such as, uh, South Africa, and uh, the Iraq, everywhere like such as, and I believe that they should, uhhh, our education over here in the U.S. should help the U.S., uh, should help South Africa, it should help the Iraq and the Asian countries so we will be able to build up our future, for us.”

if you did, you should be the proud owner of the title 'Miss Teen America'

if you did not, too bad, you will have to settle for good grades in English.

p.s : The question was 'Why do you think more than one fifth of americans are unable to locate their country on the map'

phew - beautiful indeed ! Watch the entire video here, courtesy Youtube.com

2000 uses and counting...

2007-08-31T00:51:00.000-05:00

Now, come'on we are not talking about the popular toilet flush tablets :P

Did you know WD-40 (the common household mechanical lubricant) has 2000 and more uses ? Thanks to my colleague, you can read up all the uses here

The ones that i like the best are

Remove lipstick from carpet - ROTFL
Remove make up from carpet
Remove adhesive from bird's wings

Moral Policing - Part 2

2007-08-28T16:42:00.001-05:00

If you have not read Moral Policing - Part 1 , please do so here.

Now comes the sequel.

This cop pulled his drunk wife twice and gave her a ticket. Wow, way to go people ! :) Yet again, I should say am impressed about the morality expressed, implying the subtle human'ness in everyone.

One wonders whether the routine in-fighting at home had anything to do with this ticket.

Budget Dental Clinic

2007-08-13T20:01:00.000-05:00

Bizzaro, the comic strip, by Dan Piraro is funny on-and-off. But last friday it was ROTFL

Here is the link to the "Budget Dental Clinic" (Courtesy: washingtonpost.com)

p.s : Notice the small live "fire cracker" on the table, to the left of the doc ;)

Now, for the artist in you, can you think of a comic strip for "Budget Mental Clinic" ;) :P

Numbers Don't Lie...

2007-08-09T20:10:00.000-05:00

... goes a popular saying.

Numbers Don't Lie...so do WRONG numbers, i'd like to add :)

CrossLoop - help a remote pc user !

2007-08-09T11:08:00.000-05:00

... from the previous post, CrossLoop is a product that lets two users connect over the internet tunneling through firewalls and let one user control another (ofcourse, with consent, and explicit action)

Will help many trying to help their parents, and less-tech-savvy friends in helping them out !

Here is the site

Microsoft, IBM, and Digital

2007-08-09T11:05:00.001-05:00

Video interview by Scoble, the popular tech blogger, talking to Tom Rolander, who was the flying partner and good friend of Gary Kildall of Digital - the duo that let go of the oppurtunity to become Microsoft !

A Long video 1 hr , the whole build up until minute 30, is important to understand the events that unfolded later.

Interesting bits - how Gates did not want OS business to start with, when the first API was born etc...

Here is the video

Paris Quoteworthy...

2007-06-27T14:49:00.000-05:00

'"I used to act dumb. It was an act. I am 26 years old, and that act is no longer cute," Hilton told ABC News' Barbara Walters. (Watch what might be next for Hilton Video)'

Source : CNN.com

In the seemingly never ending saga about Paris, this triggers yet another question about what is better for her to do. To be cute or act like dumb ! ?

Update: OMG, this lady can act ! - I saw snippets of her interview with Larry King Live, and man this is not Paris !

Update 2: Rumor mills have it that Kamal is interested in pairing with this wonderful actress for a movie 'parisodu vilayadu' ... and another with actress sadha titled 'sada'avadaram - is it not exciting ?

Extra mile towards golden Happiness...

2007-06-03T11:42:00.000-05:00

is often not worth the cost is the point made in an excellent post by Dilbert'ian Scott Adams here. Makes much sense the more one comes to think of it !

Sighghghghghghg.

Moral Policing

2007-04-18T22:27:00.000-05:00

This is not about Shilpa Shetty, Richard Gere, Choco Jesus, Khusboo or PMK.

It is about some cop deciding to write himself a ticket, coz he violated the rules ! I should say am impressed about the morality expressed, implying the subtle human'ness in everyone.

Oh well, one wonders whether these tickets count towards the monthly-ticket-goal :D ?

Spelling B

2007-04-04T23:06:00.000-05:00

We have all been amazed one time or another, at, how all these young kids in the Spelling Bee competition - manage to spell all kinds of words, spoken and not, known or not, with the ease of spelling their name.

Now, it is time to be amazed by how people NOT spell, a famous name, correctly. Before you must know who it is - let me give you some clues.

According to people who looked her up, she is a brat, brut, brit, grit, prit, brot, birt, bitt, drit, brent, rit, sprit, bright, brine, britannia (well, i made the last one up ;))

Any guesses ? Scroll a li'l bit down...

Check google's spelling correction statistics for Britney Spears

Looking at the statistics, some of the interesting observations are - how no one got her last name 'spears' wrong !! and how some people thought she owns spears (britney's spears) and how people have so many typo's looking for britney - after all they are not focussed at what they type or are they ?

Time Management

2007-04-02T18:13:00.000-05:00

Time is a factor of one's priorities.

Need more time to do things in your life ? look no further, but into your priorities !

I know most common reply would be, but how can it be ? i want to do so many things that i love to do - but dont find time - and my answer is, you may love to do them, but right now, you need to do the things that you are doing every 24 hours, or so you have chosen :)

Magnetic Untouchability !

2007-03-07T19:54:00.000-05:00

This is not a post about the much touted problem of untouchability. But it is about how to encourage untouchability - amongst cars ! - "Dont touch/rear-end me !!!!!!"

There are many silly ways one can think of preventing common rear-end accidents - most of them rely of James Bond'ish equipment - pepper spray, smelly gas, gabtun tamil, cellphone ringtone etc - all on push of a button, that would cause the driver behind you to slam the brakes.

But why not have a magnet ! - make it mandatory on front and rear-ends of cars - voila - "dont touch me" will be the language spoken by those magnets ;) - the problem that i can see immediately being, if the momentum is high enough to overcome the magnetic repulsion, it will cause a shear on the car and hence cause side collisions :| - so why not drive magnetic cars !! :)

before anyone attempts to patent it or make money out it - remember, i own the idea :D

Sleep and Save yourself !

2007-02-12T18:17:00.000-05:00

If you are awake to read this, bad news, you may have heart problems.

If you are asleep, you can't read this, but hey that is the good news !

A new study has shown that napping has beneficial effects that could save your heart :)

p.s : The funniest bit in the article is "..It's likely that women reap similar benefits from napping, but not enough of them died during the study to be sure, said Dr. Dimitrios Trichopoulos"

ROTFL

Next Worst Thing...

2006-11-05T11:00:00.000-05:00

We all have our own ideas about what is the worst thing that human kind has known. So no discussions around that topic.

But, the next worst thing, is always kind of open to debate. So i nominate 'Reply to All With History' in email for the award.

What say guys ?

FlexiMusic Wave Editor

2006-10-27T21:00:00.000-05:00

I came across this interesting software called "FlexiMusic Editor". FlexiMusic Wave Editor is an easy-to-use audio editor for professionals and home users (for Windows). It provides a powerful and user-friendly editing environment for novice users. You can edit and record music, apply effects and filters, adjust stereo channels, save audio to all of the popular formats and burn songs to CD. It includes many features for audio editing and converting.

Do check it out !!

Debut of Conspiracy Theories

2006-10-18T21:00:00.000-05:00

Humorous Conspiracy Theories - My new blog about outrageous, exaggerated takes on some day-to-day events. Enjoy

Debut of Musical Musings

2006-10-12T21:47:00.000-05:00

Musical Musings My new blog about anything musical - raves, rants, reviews - come'on - what else dya expect a blog to be huhh ;)

Check it out...

RFIDs and India : A Trick missed ?

2006-10-10T21:23:00.000-05:00

Here is an interesting article in BusinessWeek.com that talks about how the RFID technology is yet to take off in Asian countries. Some of the factors outlined are cost, non-availability of airwaves due to irregular standards and patents preventing standardization.

First thing that surprised me in the article, was how there was no mention about India - are we to assume, that it is a reporting error/bias or is it virtually non-existent ? - I'd tend to go with the latter.

Second, if the same countries like South Korea can manufacture chip at throw-away rates, that when added with profit etc, is still down-right cheap in US - why is it that it becomes costly in their own country ? What drives the cost.

Third, irregular standards that is not surprising giving the lack of foresight and planning in the Asian region

And finally, patents preventing standardization - are corporations missing a trick by following the American route - or are we still hung up about capitalization ?

Thoughts ?

[C Says...] Umm...Smells good

2006-04-11T17:57:00.000-05:00

How about mint-flavored-passive-smoke cigarettes ;) ?

C also wonders at the stupidity of the rule that all cigarette manufacturing companies should advertise about the 'quit smoking information' on THEIR website !!!! - how dumb can one get ?

It is like telling people who are trying to diet, "Hey we have many tips on dieting - please come visit our site pizzamut.com and click on a link "How to stop eating pizza" - right next to the cheese-dripping, "order a pizza now" link :P

In the past, C had said...

See C's Origin

Can you hear me now ? good...

2006-04-07T19:34:00.000-05:00

'Can you hear me now ? good..' is an often heard commercial from a popular wireless cell phone provider. How would it be, if it were to be aired for an email service provider ? - can you hear you my email ? can you hear my voice mail ? :-)

NowPos is the first voice mail provider, that lets you do that. NowPos, founded and run by Ayyappa - and good buddy of mine, i have been associated with for over 4 years now, has changed the way you look at email in a radically different manner.

You can send a voice mail to any of your contacts - whether or not they have a NowPos account. They can choose to listen without sign-up - but why would you wait to sign up - when you can now interact with your near and dear ones vocally as opposed to verbosely typing up stuff.

It really takes me back by 6-7 years when there used to be this service called Navin mail (?? or something similar) - where you call up a local number in India and leave a voice mail for the recipient in USA and they'd be able to listen your voicemail by dialing up a toll-free number.

This concept trumps that idea by a long way. The next question on all of your lips would be, alright how do they make money ? Right now, as you might have guessed, it looks like they play ads before the voice mail similar to all the online radio stations like Raaga etc - and that forms a steady revenue stream.

They've already been featured on all major magazines including Forbes, Rediff, Hindu etc.. Listed as one of top 20 broadband innovations in Asia Pacific of 2005 - think it is definitely worth a try.

Considering that this an all-desi product, i think we all should give it a try and support such new innovations by people like Ayyappa.

It is still in beta mode, if you need any invites for signing-up do let me know.

Disclaimer : All the names, references of companies are for linking purposes only, no content replication intended - and all registered Trademarks apply.

'Pun'ny Headline

2006-03-21T23:40:00.000-05:00

Warning : Sense of humor/wit is a prerequisite - don't try this at home - AND don't ask me to explain :)

From Hindu.com - "Cong. to move cautiously on tie-up with DIC-K: Chandy"

ROTFL - politicians deserve this pun.....

[Song Watch] Duet

2006-03-04T17:23:00.000-05:00

Back with music review after a long time - was looking at my draft and found this was stuck since oct ! - long gap by any standards - standing testimony to even one of the few things that i love to do (music,analysis) suffered by the blog de' interest syndrome ;)

Duet
A very non-K Balanchander with so much masala-mass entertainer elements, rumored partly due to the fact that Prabhu (hero) - was acting in his 100th movie. Nonetheless, KB's love for ARR's music and the maestro's loyal weave of his magic wand to produce lovely melodies for KB's banner continued...

En Kadhale - SPB

Summary: A simple, soulful song with minimal rhythm, set in a dreamy ambience, conveying the pangs of pain from the separation of lovers. Amazing rendition, lovely chords and wonderful lyrics form the core of this song

Details: SPB opens this song with his legendar voice. His silky, golden voice lends such melody to the song. Sax, being the theme of the movie, is used as the 'duet' singer of the song. Lovely chords join in to complete the pallavi.

Sax interlude which is short, but beautiful takes you right to the stanza. SPB and higher octaves are guaranteed to produce the goose-bumps that you sorely miss in the new-gen of singers. Piano and bass guitar adequately back the stanza. The standout section is 'Ini meeLvadha' (2.12 - 2.27). Lyrics - Vairamuthu seems to have had a field day 'Amudhenbhadha, vishamenbadha, illai amudhavishamenbadha' (Translation: What am i to call you ? - as sweet as nectar, or a poison or a poisonous nectar ?)

Second interlude provides the interesting, context based composition - where Anjali (herione) appears, and the hero, playing the song, gets carried away and renders 'Anjali Anjali' (reviewed later) and recovers his composure to continue with the song. Beautifully interwoven that section is ! Second stanza is no different than the first, including, how SPB simply distances himself from other singers strolling this earth with his rendition !

Quite minimal bass & chords section (relative to ARR standards), supportive rhythm, nice dreamy sections also adorn the song. The tune and SPB are tailor-made for each other. I'm quite positive that no other singer could have done such justice to the emotion and diction evoked by power-packed words of Vairamuthu.

Rating 4.8 out of 5

Sax Theme Sad

Simple bass (wood?) forms the ideal backdrop for a free-flowing alaap by the Sax (KadriG ?). Nice and short, still wondering what made them title it as 'sad' :-? :)

Rating 4.2 out of 5

Duet Title Melody - Kadri Gopalnath

Summary: Theme/Title melody of the film 'Duet' played out by the peerless KadriG with a sad slant to the tune, slowly begins to grow on you and has you hooked-on to the end. Lovely instrumental section. ARR must do more of these kinda pieces !

Details: Hearbeat kinda lub-dubs welcome you to the song. With female chorus setting the stage with some humming, KadriG dons his wonder-hat and belts out AWESOME rendition of the ragam Kalyana Vasantham ( A: s G2 M1 D1 N3 S, Av: S N3 D1 P M1 G2 R2 s) - a janya of 'Kiravani' melakartha. The alaap can compete with most carnatic performances second-for-second. The splash of waves of water (thematic) and the birds chirping away, set the tune for some early morning context.

Starting at 1.48, the song takes an upbeat turn - percussion joins in the mela, with the KadriG upping the tempo. Female chorus singing swarams to back the twist and turns of the song forms a beautiful combo. 2.07-2.15 showcases, the maestros command over the ragam, what beautiful brighas that are made out ? Bass and chord provide so much emotion to the theme, starting at 2.45- 3.01. Just when ARR has you awestruck, the song tapers off suddenly !. Tease and stop seems to be the keyword ! - Guess, we will have to live with the tease rather than the absence of it ! ;)

Awesome composition and rendition !

Rating 4.8 out of 5

Kathirikka Kathirikka - Sujatha

Summary: Enterprising, catchy and foot-tapping casual song. Lyrics are very amusing taking potshots at the 'fat' (chubby) Prabhu (hero), starting with age-old cliche of 'Endha kadayila nee arisi vangara' to 'Othayila nee nadantha oorvalam pogudhenu...' (When you walk-by-yourself, people call it a procession). Sujatha comes out all aces with this song.

Details: Bass backs up alaap of the first line Kathirikka. The rhythm gets interesting with the shakers/bells that are part of the horse-rides or bullock-carts along with a liberal dose of Ganjira sounding percussion. Amazing bass and guitar riffs support the pallavi with Sujatha emoting very well. Especially, when the words 'moochu muttanum' (breathless) where she literally sings those words breathless bringing a nice-touch of reality singing ;)

ARR pulls out his typical rhythm-alaap for an interlude - simple, but keeps the momentum going. Stanza is on predictable lines, more conversational but sweet, filled with minimal chords (guitar?) and nice work on bass continuing.

Second interlude continues from where the rhythm-alaap left off in the first. But then, ARR has other ideas. He plays around the words 'Kathirikka' using a female chorus providing nice variations to complete the second interlude. Stanza follows the first stanza to a 'T' and the final sections of the song provide a nice crescendo.

Classic example of no-frills, simple, sweet, easy and casual song - very well sung.

Rating 4.5 out of 5

Mettu Podu - P. Susheela, SPB, Kadri Gopalnath

Summary: Carnatic based melody, sees the return of the queen-of-yesteryears P.Susheela, the combo of SPB and KadriG producing very loveable melody. Mridangam and Drums form an awesome pair producing very foot-tapping tune. Good use of chords, nice bass riffs (mute?), and nice selection of instruments (which has always been ARR's forte) like Veena, makes this song appealing to everyone.

Details: Susheela opens the song by singing the verses from 'thirupugazh/thevaram' (not sure, pls be kind enough to correct me). Even after all these years, she still has the knack for singing and beautifully does her part. Ragam Anandha Bhairavi (A: S G2 R2 G2 M1 P D2 P N2, Av: S N2 D2 P M1 G2 R2 ) is written all over the song. Interestingly, after this album, there were a spate of songs based on this ragam :-)

Against the roaring beats of the drums, SPB starts off with 'Thangame...' KadriG opens his account as well. Starting off at 1.56 - there is this interesting instrument, which shows up occasionally at the background, playing some wonderful sections, goes quite unnoticed in the larger scheme of things :-(. Chords and Mridangam are so apt and increase the melody value of the pallavi. Once again, i have to, but, register my surprise at how sweet/musical mridangams do sound when played at ARR's stables !

The first interlude is so beautifully done with guitar/veena combo (Kaapi'sh touch ?). I simply just cant stop loving that section between 2.47-3.04. Amazing ! =d>

Stanza is an interesting structure of 1-2 between the Sax and singer. Mridangam and drum continue their lovely, musical journey with some adorable company from chords and the reappearance of the 'mystical' instrument. Watch out for the section starting between 3.38-3.48 when the piece is simply awesome, with every passing line, the song seems to gain on melody.

Second interlude, is KadriG all the way with awesome alaap of Anandha Bhairavi, this time around, the mridangam more free-flowing and chords to back it up. The Kaapi section once again brings the song to the second stanza, which is a very similar to the first one.

Song extends to shower you with some lovely interchanges between SPB and KadriG on the sax. Yet again, you can listen to the music produced by the mridangam and bass shows up for a brief period to bring this superb song to a close.

Right from the word go, till the end, there is not a moment of slack, lovely rhythm, wonderful tune, nice instrumentation, awesome singing by SPB and KadriG - Perfectemo !

Rating 5 out of 5

Kulicha Kuthalam - SPB, T.K Kala

Summary: A simple folkish song, with SPB at his playful best. Catchy rhythm, and selection of instruments reinforce the theme of the song. TK Kala, seemingly caught ARR's attention with her voice (she used to be a regular with DD's troupe) - that she unfailingly finds a spot with any of ARR's rural based attempts (check out most of ARR/Bharathiraja combos- why dont they pair up any more, produced some good melodies) , does a decent job. Quite a faced-paced song.

Details : Gummi (Dandiya?), claps and jalra along with drums (emulating a ganjeera ?) forms the core rhythm and sets off the song. SPB starts sounding in his 'festival' mode right from the word go. Lyrics are based on "perfect-pair" themes, needless to say, hero-herione including themselves amongst the other perfect's ;). Before you know, you land up at the pallavi - which witnesses ARR lending his voice, quite similar to his attempt at Chinna Chinna Asai (Roja).

Charanam is a logical extension of the pallavi, and ARR irresistably brings out his chords which makes the section Koozhukku mor molaga (2.06) sound very pleasing (and makes the stomach growl too ! - mor molagais - yummy !! :-D ) The second interlude uses a chant like arrangement to kick start a flute section and tops it off with lovely veenai. The second charanam is no different than the first one.

This was a typical masala song, with not much scope or value for experimentation, and ARR takes the safe route out. Bit disappointing

Rating 4.2 out of 5

Vennilavin Theril - KJ Yesudas

Summary : A love-lost song, showcased, ARR's inclination to experiment with his orchestration - memory serving me right, one of his first attempts at using hordes of violins. KJY who was seemingly active at that point in time for ARR (Raakozhi - Uzhavan) renders the song with his usual elegance. Good work on the bass and chords makes this a quite complete song.

Details : Violin piece, that forms the core of the song, opens this song. KJY starts the vocals and nice female harmony/chorus helps accentuate the pain the hero is supposedly undergoing. The running bass, rhythm arrangements, shakers all form a critical combo that keeps up the tempo of the song. For those interested in lyrics, check out MIO for the same.

Quite an one of kind ARR experiment, definitely successful - could have been more variations in the song itself.

Rating 4.3 out of 5

Anjali Anjali - SPB, Chitra

Summary : A must-hear melody, super selection of instruments, lovely arrangements, chords, lyrics, and amazingly emotive vocals. One of maestro's All time best melodies.

Details :Sax plays out the opening lines of the song with Chitra following the sax. This intro alreadys sets you up in a cheerful mood. Some of the bass riffs reminds you of Kanmani Anbodu (Guna - IR). Some improvisation on the sax paves way for SPB's rendition. Guitar and bass follow the lead vocals with nice chords. Chorus like echoes of SPB's voice adds to the beauty of the lines poove un padathil... The first interlude is just a walk-through of the song's opening and just serves the purpose of setting up the charanam.

Boy, is it worth a wait or what ? - Maand ragam ripped inside out it is ! Starting at lines thirumagal thirupadam the piano rolls form a nice backing tacking the song to a wonderful crescendo at 3.29, the song returns to the few lines of the pallavi, without actually landing at Anjali - a nice setting after hitting the high octaves.

Chitra, seemingly unable to wait to get her chance to showcase, throws in her weight with a wonderful alaap of Maand - She is at her best when she does such alaaps that lets her demonstrate her improvisation skills. The charanam however, makes her sound strained at the higher octave, may be it should have been in a lower one ! - but the interesting addition to the instruments is the tabla which is a amazing - the Loy Mendosa style of 1980s.

The third interlude (yes, this is a long song - 8 odd minutes :-)) - is Naveen putting his hand up to add to the top-class performers. Whatever flute-like instrument (piccolo ?) it is, it is too cute and lovely. Amazingly done, only as he can, Naveen later returns to the closing stages of the song with super alaap backing to the rendition - just too good !. (The same way ARR does in Netru Illadha Matram - Pudhiya Mugam).

Must hear !

Rating 5 out of 5

Naan padum Sandam - SPB
A nice and easy song, with SPB and Sax forming the 'duet' for a song, that bases it theme on duality of everything. Quite a fusion genre song - with very good improvisation by the Sax (Kadri G ? - no credits available on the web) - Very soothing relaxing song - ideal for a sleep-time play list :-)

Rating 4.4 out of 5

This movie announced ARR's arrival on the stage with melodious, classical-based song quite apart from the popular fast-paced rhythm number that he was more known for. The alliance with Kadri G, was so successful that they repeated their magic with one more Carnatic based number Sowkiyama in the movie Sangamam. SPB was another major contributor with his inimicable enthusiasm. This album, is a must-have in any music lover's collection.

Overall Rating : 4.6 out of 5

For Archives of music reviews, click here

Taxman cometh...again

2006-02-14T15:46:00.000-05:00

I had this post done last year. Found it is relevant and current in its entirety. So re-posting it. However, one minor change/tip, just check out TaxActOnline.com - dont think they have income restrictions for Federal Free eFile...

Yes, it is taxing time for everyone. April 15th is the last day to file your federal taxes. State filing dates may vary. Virginia waits till May 1st.

Alert : Last minute procrastinators - You may choose to file at the last moment, but make sure you have all the information and correctly to say.i.e. make sure your W-2 has your SSN,Name exactly as in your SSN card. Make sure you have all the 1099-NT from the banks and they tally with what you have.

Some important tips :

Federal taxes can be e-filed free. Visit www.irs.gov to get more details
VA state taxes can be e-filed free as well. Visit tax.virginia.gov for more details
Most states offer free tax filing via their sites. Check out our state's web site
You can visit your local post office, public libraries or the website to download forms and instructions to fill the same.

It is advisable to calculte with paper & pencil (into the downloaded/pickedup form) and tally it with any website that you may choose to use. Keep in mind to not fill in your ssn when you are doing scrap work (safety precaution)

Remember, it is your responsibility to file taxes and get/pay any thing that is due. Any unclaimed refunds beyond 3 years will be forfeited.

Do not hesitate to ask for any help that, someone around you, can help you with. Or comment on this website.

Nothing stops with information - it has to turn into commentary ! ;)

Wow, what a way to make people lose their money. First, they deduct taxes at source, then they deduct more/wrongly. Then you have a limited time to fail and claim. And if you fail to be accurate in your claims, you will be penalised, even if you are due a refund ! Sad to note that most countries around the world use this mode.

Excellent money minting policy !

Super Bowl Ads

2006-02-06T10:08:00.000-05:00

Supposedly amazingly imaginative, supremely creative, breath-takingly awesome ads that are unbelievably costly ($2 million for 30 second spot) are aired during Super Bowl (NFL) championships. This time around, even though i found none that really was jaw-dropping, will leave the judgement to you folks...

Here you go is the link for the ads

Student Heroes...

2006-02-01T22:57:00.000-05:00

We salute them, We celebrate them and We adore them.

Before you think, this post is about the sincere determined revolutionary leaders, let me set the expectation straight - it is about Heroes who have been students :) :P

These student heroes are sincere too, sincere sigamanis as they are called - because they do many things single mindedly - tease, fight and love , rag, launch 'rockets', and when not doing the afore-mentioned, beat up villains - who mysteriously will never be college students (Thank god !!)

Think of all the heroes who have been through this rigmarole...At a time, when their grandchildren expect to run around with them in the garden, these people run around with heriones singing ooh-laa-laa. Sometimes they defeat their age-defying makeup by even lifting the heriones for a ring-a-ring-a-roses (dont attempt this at home ;) ). Amongst their best friends would be one of Janakaraj, Charlie, Dhamu, Vivek, Vadivelu, Goundamani, Senthil, or any other evergreen student actors.

Lipstick is amongst their best friends too ! - with censors still ruling the roost, you can never doubt the source of lipstick to be that of herione's ;) It is learnt that the close up photos of hero's lips are used to teach KG students about the spectrum of colors. It definitely helps in also leaving a lip-mark on the herione for her to spank one-real hard slap - which will trigger the love between the two ! (phew) (dont attempt this at home too ;) )

They always are on the leading edge of stunt-executions though. Never failing to come up with a desi version of Matrix or Crouching or Silambattam they send hordes of people, sometimes ranging of the order of millions flying to the next village with a whistle ! (For people with lesser GK- the jet stream of air from the heroes whistle would simply blow these goondas off their feet OR the hero never brushed in his lifetime ;) )

One important element to such a hero, is his mother, who in reality would be as old as his daughters' college mate and a sister who would be the same age group as his grandson.

On a related side-note is that, there are heroes who have been college teachers with heroines running behind them. But, in reality, the student hero is so much older anway, that he can romance his teacher ! ;)

No salutations to the student heroes would ever be complete without referring to 'collective power of students' - which is the only way to ensure, the hero remains a hero !

Let us face it, they are student's heroes too ! ;)

[Discussion] Line/Queues - my view

2006-01-23T20:10:00.000-05:00

Quite some time back, i started this thread, a discussion thread, hoping to get people to 'voice' their opinions on certain topics that are intriguing (atleast intrigue me ;) )

You can find the original topic here . Many of you had very interesting perspectives and thoughts about them. I guess it is time i brought mine to the table as well.

Here is my idea of a line/queue. The need for a line/queue arises because the service that more than one person is trying to procure can not handle more than request at a time. Hence the need for a mechanism to regulate the requests so that one can be handled at a time. Unlike in the world of automation, where even if requests are re-prioritized, there is no "protests" or atleast no "emotion" :-)

Having said that, when you stand in a line, you agree to the guarantee that you will be serviced in the order that you came in - not by any whims and fancies of any random individual or not by any other means. Even if you talk about a different lines, e.g. Balcony seat vs front bench in a theatre, the line to each of these doors still guarantee you the first-come-first-served basis position

When someone "allows" another person in the line/queue, it essentially means "altering" the position of every individual in the queue. I find it interesting that i never included one question in my list, - when the "allowing" person is actually young/handsome would you object ? ;)

Without lengthening the lecture anymore, i think "add" a person to the queue is "manipulation" of natural justice of the position, while "swap" is "manipulation of a lesser order".

Why so ? - think of a case, where you chose line1 as opposed to line2 because the person ahead of you has just 10 items in the check out cart. Now this person swaps with someone else who has 60 items in their cart - even though such a swap by natural justice is legal, your decision based on the "factors" at that time, that made you choose line1 has now been betrayed. Hence it is manipulation of a lesser order.

With all of these in mind, here are my answers without any emotion attached to them :)

1) Are you allowed to 'swap' positions with elderly/disabled - or you simply have to give up
Swap yes. Give up depends on the people in the line behind you, you dont own the right to alter someone else's position in the line.

2) If you are actually behind someone who is (doing the)swapping their position with someone else - will you object ?
No you are still guaranteed your position - but can still be aggrieved if the situation worsens as described above.

3) If someone has just one thing to do - a checkout with single item as opposed to a cart full - will you let them go forward ?
Same as Q-1 - depends on the people in the line behind you and their choice.

4) What if the guy ahead of you, instead of 'swap'ing - allows the senior person to come ahead (now you are two positions behind in the queue) - is there a case for valid objection ?
Yes, very valid objection indeed

5) What if the 'allow one more' happens to be not an elderly person ? - would you protest.
Vociferously indeed ;)

6) What if the 'swap' happens to be not an elderly person ? - would you protest.
Depends on the people/line

7) If you are seated on a bus/train and want to vacate the seat for someone elderly (or otherwise) - can the person who is actually next to the seat object ?
Hmmmm toughie this one - I guess we all agree that for the most part, swap is quite reasonable. So is this a swap ? or is this a 'give up' ?. Before there is any speculation of that sorts - the bottom line in this case is two things, standing next to a seat is implicit line/queue for the seat, but, since swap is always reasonable, the person occupying the seat can always choose to/not-to swap on a case-by-case basis.

There ends my take on line/queue - dont know how much in-line it is with others ? thoughts ?

[C Says...] Sense

2006-01-16T22:53:00.000-05:00

Humans have 5 senses and still produce non-sense !
and...
Humans perceive the non-sense via some sense !!

Makes sense ? !!!

Happy New Year 2006

2006-01-01T21:33:00.000-05:00

Wishing you all a very very Happy, Peaceful, Healthy, Prosperous, fun-filled and exciting new year of 2006. May this year bring more good to the surface of the earth than ever before.

p.s : I hope to be back in action sooner than later - thanks for all the kind and well-wishing enquiries :)

[Discussion] Line/Queues

2005-11-15T07:47:00.000-05:00

New series of discussions - There are no rules - no laws - more of how context drives everything

First one is Lines/Queues.

We all stand in Lines/Queues for one thing or the other. We see some senior citizen/disabled person also standing way behind in the queue.

1) Are you allowed to 'swap' positions with elderly/disabled - or you simply have to give up
2) If you are actually behind someone who is (doing the)swapping their position with someone else - will you object ?
3) If someone has just one thing to do - a checkout with single item as opposed to a cart full - will you let them go forward ?
4) What if the guy ahead of you, instead of 'swap'ing - allows the senior person to come ahead (now you are two positions behind in the queue) - is there a case for valid objection ?
5) What if the 'allow one more' happens to be not an elderly person ? - would you protest.
6) What if the 'swap' happens to be not an elderly person ? - would you protest.
7) If you are seated on a bus/train and want to vacate the seat for someone elderly (or otherwise) - can the person who is actually next to the seat object ?

i.e. What is the meaning of a 'position' in a queue ? - what rights does a person in the queue, have over the position they occupy ?

Thoughts ? any more questions ? bring them on - lets get everyone to think aloud :-)

[Sports Watch] India's New Ways...

2005-11-09T09:01:00.000-05:00

Grin Grin Grin.

Indian Cricket team seem to have found new ways and it sure is giving the die-hard cricket fan, many a thing to gloat over.

Too many things have happened in too short a time-frame to apportion the credit. However, it all has to start with two people. Chappell and Ganguly. Without getting into who was behind the entire 'wash-dirty linen-in-public' episode, the issue is now behind everyone.

Ganguly excluded from the Indian team was the first surprise. No one can simply discount a batsman with 10000 one day international runs in span of 9 years as one 'who can't bat'. At the same time, no one can say he is now the same Ganguly that scored all those runs :-)
Dravid as captain. So long been the bridesmaid, now the bride. He is thinker, hard-worker, keen student of the game. Often considered a softie, he has now proved, he is a tough-nut to crack
Even though, i have not seen the matches myself, the word that is out there is how Indian team has been fielding - young blood seems to have brought in the change. Timber rattling noises seems to be the order of day. No one worth their salt can say, Ganguly, Laxman, Kumble and Nehra, can be half-as-agile as anyone in the current team ;)
Aggression is the keyword
Batting is becoming more and more a team effort
Lesser and lesser dot balls every match - Can't be, but, glad
Bowling still wears an unsettled look to it.

Having said all of these, there are still many things that a fan needs to be cautious about.

Batting even though seemingly found contributions from every quarter, can one expect to see such consistency on fast-bouncy wickets ?. Expecting that to start with is a tough ask, but in the longer run yes. A newbie Aussie team, can't take on the likes of Kumble and Bhajji on a spin-minefield either :-)
Bowling sure needs much more consistency - Bhajji is in the middle of extremely wonderful spell with tight and economic bowling. Pathan, Agarkar, Kartik, RP Singh have all taken 4 wickets each or more in all of these matches. But, quick review of commentary can immediately tell you, still many balls are sprayed on the middle and leg - consistency is the key word. More than two bowlers need to take wickets and be economical
No improvement on the yorker length balls during slog overs - except for one match, our bowling was never tested in the slog over arena.
Will the team fare with same aggression if they are part of a slump or when they are 0-2 down in a series ? Can they handle such pressure ?

Despite all of this, i can't hide my glee about being in such a situation 5-1 against the ICC's 2nd ranked team in the world. None of the wins seemed a fluke. All of the wins wore 'aggression' on the sleeve. When was the last time India chased 190 and still under 35 overs and against a top-rated team ?.

Hope such positive and forward-thinking selection policies based on 'performance' and focus and strategies based on 'process' will take of 'results' as Dravid-Chappell combo has been claiming all along.

That brings us to the question, when was the last time one hired a CEO for a quarter fiscal year ? When was a principal hired for a semester ?

Why does an Indian cricket captain has to bid his time one-day at a time ? - When will a cricket captain be appointed for longer than couple of series' ? The know-all BCCI seems to know the answer !!

I started off saying 'new ways...', and not 'new 'winning' ways...' - primarily coz it is too early to be proclaiming the coming-of-age of new-look Indian team :)

Still, Grin Grin Grin

Diwali Greetings

2005-10-31T22:03:00.000-05:00

Wishing you all, your family, near and dear ones a very Happy Diwali/Deepavali and also a fun-filled and prosperous season ahead.

p.s : As most of you are already aware, am on hibernation mode ;) will try to bring my blogging habits back to 'normalcy' - soon :D

[Breaking News] Dilbert starts blogging too...

2005-10-27T13:11:00.000-05:00

:-) We'll have to see how Dilbert fares as a blogger ;)

Dilbert blogs

Power Play !

2005-10-19T19:29:00.000-05:00

I am a Programmer, and I developed an application

I coded it with the ability to think
I authorized it to make copies of itself

I made them talk, walk
I gave them senses to enjoy the rest of my creations
I also removed them after a shelf life

It made innumerable copies in no time
They started bonding with other applications
They started destroying other applications
They created operating systems

They have done so much good
They have done so much bad
They have altered their hard-disk
They want to get rid of their shelf life

Some claim their operating system is the best
Some claim they are the source
Some claim to control the operating system
Some claim there is no operating system
Some claim they have seen the operating system
They talk endlessly about themselves

For, they can do all they want, till I pull the plug (a.k.a) re-boot

[C Says...] Desi

2005-10-15T21:59:00.000-05:00

I am a Desi..I make fun of my fellow country men & culture.

See C's Origin

[Song Watch] Alaipayuthe

2005-10-03T19:18:00.000-05:00

Alaipayuthe - by Maniratnam starring Madhavan and Shalini was about post-marriage blues :-) It was a moderate success in tamil and the hindi remake (Saathiya) was a resounding success. Initially, this movie was conceived with just the title song (carnatic) Alaipayuthe in the movie. But then, as always, Mani gave in to the temptation of using ARR. Wise decision :-D one would say. Lets get to the review without further ado :)

Click here to listen to the album

Yaaro yarodi - Mahalakshmi Iyer, Vaishali, Richa Sharma

This is an amazingly mellow song for the likes of a marriage song. The combo of three singers produce a kinda catchiness to the song, and at the same time, take the pronounciation out for a walk :-(

Thumping of drums and chanting of 'dum dumakka dum'. Richa starts off with yaaro yarodi. A harmonium kinda (french horn?) instrument begins to follow the singer. Interesting use of 'shakers' throughout the song (e.g. 00.48-00.49 - the sound is similar to washing your clothes by hand, and kumuku'fying it - almost a series of quick presses of the cloth with water hitting the washing slate - i loved it :-) ). The highlight of the pallavi is the section between 1.17-1.20 and the subsequent improvised repeat at 1.27-1.30 Simply Adorable !

The return to pallavi is marked by lisp'ish singing - sometimes i get irritated when i listen to it (is it just me? :-( ) . The first interlude is brief a nadhaswaram piece that takes you right into the stanza. The flute segment is quite cute, the style is very reminiscent of BG pieces from MMKR.

Stanza starts with thangathukku verkudhu and the alaap (2.35 -2 .44) that follows the first line is simply awesome. So is the alaap piece solli kudunga (2.54-3.00). The stanza eases into the second stanza. The second interlude is beautiful with chirping flute piece and wonderful chords backing poongodikku kannalam.

The second stanza is pretty much the same, watch out for the alaap pieces similar to the first stanza. Very melodious indeed !. The closing sections are interestingly layered with yaaro starting at 5.12 and another yaaro starting at 5.16 - forming a self-imposed harmony (Gurus out there, any technical term for this usage or pattern ?)

Overall easy and melodious song, marred by pronounciation. The chords through the song are very apt and underlines the mood very well and a bit underplayed.

Rating 4.3 out of 5

Sakiye a.k.a Pachai Nirame - Hariharan, Clinton

ARR and Clinton, harmonize Sakiye Snehithiye which sets in motion the beautiful melody line for the song. Naveen, ARR's aasthana flautist plays the line with superb backing by guitars and violins (?) and chords - what a dream ambience ! Can't wait to get to the start of the song...

Hari starts off with pachai nirame - he sings it so softly, that it feels as if he is singing to a kid :-) - very brief pallavi - and the flute/guitar combo steps in immediately and a female harmony adds to the melody and you are into the stanza. Kilayil kaanum continues the melody of the theme with simply rhythm but then the instrument that ARR uses frequently to signify rain, speeds up the song even further. The song takes a turn at 1.52 for the good- but the violin piece that sets it up is even better (1.49-1.52). These two-line style repeats itself and ends up at Sakiye - Just note the use of bass guitar between 2.38-2.52 - it is a song in itself - amaaaazing !

There is no second interlude but for the above mentioned Sakiye lines and second stanza is very similar to the first one, with Hari improvising very well. Third interlude, if it could be called that, is simple and cute. Iravin nirame marks the third stanza, which is very similar to the previous ones except that it ends up with different lines for the section marking pallavi.

This song has awesome lyrics by none other than Vairamuthu - about likening the different colors of nature to the attributes of herione (now that is a new idea for Blogolala - any takers ?).

Powers Chords and bass guitar can be found through the section of the songs - sometimes underplayed - but amazing, melody oozing, candy floss song. Only ARR !

Rating 4.8 out of 5

Alaiypayuthe - Kalyani Menon, Harini, Neyveli Ramalakshmi

This classical carnatic song based on raga kAnaDa is reproduced as-is with just the rhythm and bells and nice tampura. Would like to add this song and ragam, has been always on the top of my favorite list of ragas, since my childhood days and just that now more ragas have been added ;)

Couple of pronounciation errors yet again, kinda diluted by three people singing it :-(

Rating : unrated :-)

September Madham - Asha Bhosle, Shankar Mahadevan

Typical fast, dance number with awesome bass and heavy arabic influence in the main melody line. Catchy rhythm, acoustic guitar, youthful rendering by Asha and Shankar mark the highlight of the song.

The picturization of this song was a let down, imho

Rating 4.1 out of 5

Snehidhane - Sadhana Sargam, Srinivas

Srinivas starts off with 'Netru' in a false voice and is backed by a chorus and slap/bass which sets up the dreamy start to the song.

Sadhana comes in with her easy and lovely style singing Snehidhane and one notices the use of superb chords right away to wonderfully convey the romance element in the song. The pallavi seems to take many turns, all providing with wonderful bursts of melody. Idhe azhutham (1.10) and vazhvin (1.20) and vazhvin (1.26) all are unexpected changes in the direction of the melody - no one is complaining though :-). Note the total vaccum of musical instruments between 1.26 - 1.30 where the melody carries the burden.

Sarangi marks the first interlude with tabla and payal adorning the piece. It is pretty much along the lines of the main melody of the song.

The first stanza, is yet another, turn of melody. Wonderful is the only word that can be used to describe the feeling. Beautiful chords and amazing work on the bass sustain the first stanza, which traverses the realm of dream-sequence :-) . The tune returns to its main melody theme, yet again at 2.41 - which brings you beautifully back to the pallavi - what lovely chords !

Second interlude is the chorus singing of Netru - yet again the bass work is simply amazing. The second stanza is more or less the same as the first one, but the there are very small of sections of cutsy improvisations ( at 4.35 - a whistle like) that bring cool'ness

Very adddddorable and lovely song - seemingly formed the inspiration for the song Vaseegara (Minnale - not a copy, a beautiful song in its own stead)

High points are the chords and bass work ! - awesome, very good voice of Sadhana, pronounciation could have been better.

For the raga enthusiasts, there seems to be some mix of natabhairavi and mohanam (briefly in the stanzas) in this song :)

Rating 4.8 out of 5

Kadhal Sadugudu - S.P Charan, Naveen

Simplicity is the name of this song. Take a piano and a bass guitar and shakers for rhythm, and produce a song of this calibre - Mark of a genius !!!

Charan (SPB's son - you can almost hear SPB at places ;) ) and Naveen (the inimicable flautist) get started with Kadhal Sadugudu. The pallavi is just awesome, especially at places like Alaiye (00.35-00.45) - notice the bass guitar riff at 0.51 - COOL and nakila nakila (00.55-1.05)

Song is basically developed on the theme from pallavi. The first interlude is nothing but brief piano section to setup the first stanza, the chords help the transition.

Neerattum Nerathil opens the stanza, is just the beginning of what leads to a wonderful crescendo of the song. You can observe how, the melody and pace of the song is slowly built up by the intensity of the tune and chords and the use of the piano. Starting En Kannil (2.01) the chords, bass and piano converge to start giving you the preview of goose bumps that you'll encounter when u get to En Vazhvum En Savum Un Kannin Asaivile (2.11-2.16) - Breathtaking ! - Here is where, the song missed SPB :-)

Second interlude is non-existent, and ARR gets the stanza started in a hurry. But for some minor variations on the piano plays, it follows the first to a T, but does not fail to give you another round of goose bumps ;) (3.33- 3.38)

The return to pallavi witnesses some more instrumentation and some good work on the bass yet again at 4.09-4.11

Very short song (4.30) by ARR standards - yea a grouse, with such a wonderful melody line, the song could have been longer :-)

Bass and piano hijack the song from the start to end - Wonderful and simple melody !

Natabhairavi (s r1 g2 m1 p d1 n2) seems to be the overriding ragam in this song :)

Rating 4.6 out of 5

Evano Oruvan - Swarnalatha

Howling winds welcome you in this melancholic song - with superb instrumentation and heavy arabic influence. Swarnalatha is a perfect fit with this son. Her forte is her ability to emote and intonate very well

Strings section starting sets the sad mood for the song (00.45-1.00) - reminds you some of the opening-credit-scores in older day (50's) movies. Kiravani (s r1 g2 m1 p d1 n3 S) it is !!!

Pallavi is cute, with certain pieces seemingly more sad than others. Thavam pol (1.18) and avan oodhum (1.39) being the clinchers. Very minimal instrumentation.

Interlude, sees Naveen in action - this time with the flute (1.53-2.08) - the tune seems to plead you to enjoin the sadness - such emotion ! and the opening strings section repeated completes the interlude.

The stanza is basically an extension of the pallavi with nice santoor/harp like backing and strings section and flute chirps in to support the lines. Continues to be simple and sad :-D. The second interlude is the highlight of the song. It begins with the repeat of the opening string section. A brief pause, adorned only by the rhythm ( 3.38-3.45) and suddenly a faced-paced string arrangement races your senses 3.49-4.05. This is typical ARR arrangement, but once again, the tempo and the ragam reminds you of some older day scores (not a copy, just similar).

Second stanza is no different than the first - but the lyrics - man Vairamuthu rocks - Andha Kuzhalai pol azhuvadharku - athanai kangal enakkilaye (4.59-5.07) - meaning, can't cry as much as a flute, since i lack that many eyes - in reference to the bamboo holes :-)

And the flute draws the curtain on the song. Very soulful melody.

Rating 4.5 out of 5

Endrendrum Punnagai - Clinton, Pravin, Srinivas, Shankar Mahadevan

One of the two add-ons to the orignial album - is a short, but a fast-paced, dance number. Typical rock number - with good work on the guitar, simple rhythm, nice chorus, and lotsa synth work - mark this number. Maddy starring this bit was a raging hit :-)

Rating 4.3 out of 5

Mangalyam Thanthuna Clinton, Srinivas

Second add-on - is more of a free-form of Endrendrum Punnagai with chanting of Mangalyam thanthunaane na - the famous words with which many TFMovies end ;)

Rating 4.2 out of 5

The album emphasised more on the melody aspect, without compromising on the mass-appeal factor - and came out successful. As with MR & ARR combo, the songs were all raging hits - and this is definitely a must-have in your collection.

Overall Rating 4.6 out of 5

Other Music Reviews

[Book Watch] Fountainhead

2005-09-27T22:34:00.000-05:00

******SPOILER ALERT*******

Fountainhead by Ayn Rand, as a novel has had mixed luck with me. First time i picked it up, few pages was all it took, to decide i wont read it :-)

But my buddies persisted and i decided to give it a try and man, was i a lost soul for the better part of two weeks. While i read the book, it was one of the most addictive books i've ever read - but it pushed me further into depression. The small print and the size of the book made a fast-reader like me, crawl like a road-roller racing against time, prolonging the depression.

The story is about 'the ideal man', Howard Roark - an architect, with modernistic ideas - a man, who does not know how to emote, who does not feel anger, happiness, but just lives on. He wants all his work to be purely his. Not a pencil stroke of dilution from his original construction plans. He does not care about the money, nor the reputation involved - it is either his way or highway.

Peter Keating, is the embodiment of successful men by corporate standards. He manipulates everyone in his way to get to the top. He gives up some many things he loves - his love-interest, his passion for painting and, his morals - to reach the top. Only to be controlled by Ellsworth Toohey.

Ellsworth Toohey, a critic, reviewer, is manipulator par-excellence. He manages to control a vast majority of the population with his socio-religious-communist view, preaching self-sacrifice, altruism and use that card to get his needs satisfied. He cultivates collectivism - cult by volume. He attempts to steer the world in the direction he wants via the masses a.k.a his followers.

Dominique Francon, is a beautiful woman (apparently - 'heriones better be beautiful', is a theme that has been adopted since time immemorial :P) - who is potrayed as the female equivalent of Roark. She displays very little emotion. She and Roark speak without speaking. She rarely permits herself to indulge in the emotion that a normal woman is expected to.

Gail Wynand, a media mogul - controls everything via the ever-powerful media. He holds a vast empire of magazines, real estate and commands enough control within the powers-that-be to let life-of-the-country run, the way he wants. He is the ruthless, merciless, amoral, rich business magnate.

Story in a nut-shell - Roark stays at Keating's place, from where both go to the same architecture school. Roark is expelled, for refusing to do things the conventional-way. He insists on modernism in his work - while the school would have none of it.

Apparently, not just the school - but the world. His work fails miserably, building after building, contract after contract. Keating, the topper, takes the help of Roark, every single time, and is supremely successful in his career. He is backed by the likes of Toohey and Dominique - both writing for Wynand publications. Along the way, Keating meets Dominique, who also happens to be the daughter of the owner of the company he works for - decides that marrying her would mean control of the entire company.

Dominique meets Roark, and they fall in 'love' - if it can be called that !. Toohey decides to prevent Roark's success at any cost - since he believes in collectivism. Dominique agrees to the strategy because, Roark's work is too good to be let appreciated by the masses (!!). Dominique marries Keating to get him the success, that is supposed to bring Roark down (so that masses dont get to appreciate Roark's work !). Subsequently, Toohey decides, he will throw spanner in the life of Keating by, introducing Dominique to Wynand.

Wynand asks for Dominique's hand in marriage and succeeds. He falls madly in love with her. He discovers Roark, and immediately adores him as his hero. Slowly but surely, Roark starts getting more attention, albeit, not publicly endorsed by Wynand. Toohey does not like the developments. He arranges for Keating to be de-throned and installs some of his yes-men at the helm. Toohey also builds up worker's union against Wynand publications.

Keating now almost a pauper, needs a project desperately to redeem his lost status. He approaches Roark for help - and Roark agrees to help on one-condition - 'Keating would have to make sure, his design is accepted and implemented as is'. Keating accepts the condition and takes Roark's help. Toohey arranges for dilution of the design via more architects and the modified building is up and running before Roark comes to know of it.

Roark, not happy with the development (flaw in his character potrayal ?) - blasts the building and surrenders himself to the cops. Wynand, for the first time, comes out in support of Roark - all his people revolt against him. Public stop reading his magazine, he loses support, money - everything in trying to support Roark. Dominique publicises sleeping with Roark, Wynand unwillingly divorces her, his publications character assasinate Dominique - and he builds back his empire.

Roark delivers a climactic lecture, as is the wont of heroes, and gets acquitted the moment he stops his lecture. Toohey is fired, Roark marries Dominique, and everyone lives happily ever after.

phew - the nut-shell is not very small apparently ;) - the one reason, i chose to explain the story is, if it takes so long to write, it needs much more time to read :-D

I liked the development of characters and situation -not the narrative so much. The story ends highly unlike what has been preached through the book. The philosophy is cool - 'The need of the individual comes before the need of society' :-)

Verdict - needs patience, needs stamina, needs perseverance - to complete this book -Not recommended for light reading.

See more Book Reviews

[C says..] Tennis Racket

2005-09-26T20:49:00.000-05:00

I am a Tennis Racket. I am asleep when it is cold outside. At other times, i chase tennis balls around and slap them hard.

See C's Origin

Cost Cutting

2005-09-18T11:42:00.000-05:00

The term 'Cost Cutting' was made famous post-dot-com-bust era. Everyone has heard it been used, sometimes, closer to heart, sometimes farther away from it. What would be life, if we can't make fun of it and have a few hearty laughs at the expense of 'Cost Cutting'.

A multi-million dollar company - ( yeah which company will be run for less than a million, the CEO's salary would eat most of it :P ) - suddenly, faces the heat from the board/investors. These are the first few steps they will take

* They will convene a board-meeting at the costliest hotel ever known to mankind and decide 'Cost cutting' is the only way out.

* To set the cost-cutting process in motion, the first item that will save them millions of dollars is...... pen. Yes, the number of pens that will be available will be cut-down. You will have 5-10 pens for about 100 people in an office. Ofcourse, there is a good reason for this move - are you not using 'e'-verything ? why do you need a pen ?

* If you don't need pen, why do you need papers ?. There will be this circular that will be printed on the costliest color-printer based stationery, which will break the news that, printers will not be equipped with papers anymore. However, you are free to bring your own papers to print out what you need.

It will be announced that, the initial cost-cutting measures will give the company much needed savings, that the senior management, will now declare a raise for themsevles.

* Few months, later, the board convenes yet again in the costliest hotel ever, and takes a 'hard' look at the numbers and decide the cost-savings is not good enough and decide to hire a consulting firm to help them identify measures of cost-cutting and agree to pay them $500k. The consultants would come in and identify, many more items in the stationery drawer that need not be around, like, stapler, clips, glue, files, folders etc.

* Toilet tissue usage will be rationed as well. Higher your grade, more tissues you will get. Usage over-and-above your quota, would be directly deducted from your salary.

* Restrooms breaks will be clocked.

* Trash cans will not be provided. You have take care of throwing out your own trash.

* Fresh air savings scheme will be introduced to reduce the A.C/Electricity costs

* Musical chairs will be introduced for desks. To cut down on cost of playing music, the division boss will take care of croon'ing and he will never stop ;)

* Mouse pads will be auctioned off.

* Only ONE machine will have internet connectivity for the entire company. That desk, will obviously not have a chair.

* Telephones will be replaced with throw-away plastic cups tied together via shoe laces. Yes, you silly - you will have to supply the shoe-laces. Ofcourse, you can't talk to anyone but your colleague next door.

* You have the option of, deferring your weekly salary, interest free until Y3K. And you have to personally appear to collect the same. To compensate for the non-availability of weekly pay, you will be offered a loan with low-interest rate of 10%.

Few more things will happen, including hiking the severance pay of the CEO, because his services are needed during the crisis and they want to retain him.

Ultimately, the company will go bankrupt and the high cost of human resources will be blamed for the disaster.

The business model of the company, 'eTrash' - check the status of your trash can at home, anytime online - was sound enough ! and it was too bad, the employees let the company down.

P.S: While you are busy commenting, let me go check whether someone has already patented this idea :P

Disclaimer : Any coincidences to companies living or dead is purely accidental and unintentional. If it did, I admire your company's cost-cutting strategies - are you hiring ?. If it did not, i can run the cost-cutting-office for you, on one-condition, that whatever you plan on saving, you should alteast give me 200% of that :-)

Support CRY

2005-09-17T10:30:00.000-05:00

If you are, in, or around, these locations - Pittsburg, Chicago, Southern California, RDU or Boston, please support by joining the CRY Walk.

You can also support the walk through Walk Pledges.

Follow this link to CB's blog for more information

Sania, Federer, Agassi, Ganguly ...

2005-09-11T19:03:00.000-05:00

What was the first thing that hit your cells when you read the title ? If it was Ganguly being the odd man out in the list of names- you rock dude(tte) ! - you *are* the die-hard Indian cricket fan :P

First, Sania Mirza, the lass creating ripple of jaw-drops, made it to the fourth round of the US Open Tennis Championship. There are two ways of looking at it. One, no indian tennish player, male or female, has been as successfully consistent in making it to the Grand Slams rounds. 3rd at the Aus. , 1st at the French, 2nd at the Wimbledon and 4th at the US Open. This in itself is a 'first' for Indian tennis and add to it the gender factor - no wonder she is a celebrity !. She is nowing knocking on the doors of the Top-30 list which is a real great achievement. Second, way to look at it, yes, so what ? - It may be a rare thing for Indian tennis. Don't players from world over, small countries or otherwise succeed in all walks of life, sports included ?. Why is it that it we, as Indians, should be so proud of someone making it to the initial rounds successfully ?

IMHO, the middleground, as always, is somewhere in between. [:p ;) ] She should be duly credited for breaking the shackles, and duly encouraged to perform and reach higher goals. (p.s For the record, I had initially made-these couple of posts about Sania (Sania1, Sania2)

Second, Agassi. Just hats-off to this old-work-horse-warrior. Just amazing, to look at how he has managed to remain so focussed, fit, determined and dish out such quality tennis at such an age. His game was simply awesome. The commentators have now taken a stand, that he is the best-ever returner the game has known. I guess, i have to agree looking at the way some of the returns were made in today's US Open finals ! - I had hoped that he would win US Open this time around and end his career on a high-flying note, but that was not to be. May we see more of this man and his wonderful tennis !
(p.s For the record, I had initially made-this posts about Agassi)

Third, Federer. So far, i had not seen Federer play tennis, in-line with his reputation of the best ever. That was primarily coz of one Aussie named L.Hewitt - who happens to forget his tennis, when Federer seems to be anywhere on the planet. But today was different. Man, this guy can hit a winner from anywhere on the court, and best while it is his forehand. His back-hand was still very questionable, but even then his shots were real good. His serve was good, high first serve percentage. The power he packs into his shots are awesome. While Sampras did all of this pretty much the same way, the one thing that separates both is the 'aggression' that Federer seems to be made of.

Sampras, never used to bother about attacking the opponents' serve, but for the closing moments of a set, he would gently knock it in, get his serve done with in matter of seconds and get to the closing moments, move to the next gear, unleash his running forehand, couple of backhand passing shots and be done with the game.

But Federer, plays every point like that - as if there is no tomorrow ! If he can maintain such intensity through his career, and remain injury free, and play like this for another 4 years, Sampras reign could come to an end, easily at that. Only time will tell. ! (This is a radically different stand than the one i took sometime in may. Robbie, i partly agree with you :P )

(p.s For the record, I had initially made-this posts about Federer)

Zero'eth, oops, Fourth, Ganguly (why does mind tend to correlate ducks & ganguly always :-?) - hee hee, am not sure what to write Ganguly. But let me add a word about all the hulla-bulla that had been raised in the recently concluded series against SriLanka. It was about whether Indians were batsmen short or bowler short or fielders short. I think it is all of them.

Think of it,
when Indians win, do all the batsmen score ? no Only two people do.
when Indians win, do all bowlers take wickets ? no Only two people do.
when Indians take good catches, do all the fielders do well ? no Only two people do.
(and all of such feats - neatly separated by a gap of two years - too much 'planning' huhh ? )

My recommendation : Indian team should follow NFL style strategy. Have a batting-team (where all of them are batsmen), bowling-team(where all of them are bowlers) and fielding-team(where all of them are good fielders) and a coach (to decide, when to use which team :P)

Let us enjoy the week ahead and please write in to the BCCI suggesting for the NFL style teaming strategy :-)

[C says..] Fire Hydrant

2005-09-10T19:15:00.000-05:00

I am a Fire Hydrant... Drivers hate me and Dogs love me !

See C's Origin

Bees are here...

2005-09-07T20:20:00.000-05:00

Happy Ganesh Chaturthi

Srikanth's album H1BEES is finally here

I would request you all to kindly encourage such artists, who create music purely coz of the love they have for it.

His motto is 'It isn't hard to compose original music'. Coming from one of the people we know in the blog community, i want to take this oppurtunity to wish him all grand success in this endeavor and urge to you take a minute to support his attempt.

Enjoy the music, and have fun while it lasts.

Related Reads : Behind-the-Scenes, Srikanth's Blog

Disclaimer : All Copyrights & Trademarks belong to respective owners and apply.

[Song Glance] Ponniyin Selvan

2005-09-01T21:59:00.000-05:00

Back in action with one more quick glance at an album. This time it is the movie called 'Ponniyin Selvan'. The music is by Vidyasagar. Lets get to the review quickly ;)

Ponniyin Selvan by Vidyasagar (Click to listen @ Raaga.com)

Do Re Me - Kunal, Arjun, Benny

Don't know why this song needs 3 singers :-) . VS brings out his trademark chords arrangement, with unconventional mix of the beats with some techno-sounds (yes sounds ;) ) - The rap section is quite passable. The invention of 'Skip' feature makes sense after all

Vennila - Cicily, Harish Raghavendra

Simple, folksy number - this song is sure to appeal to masses just for that fact. Stanza starts off in very promising fashion, only to lose direction somewhere in between, nonetheless, song willl definitely stay around on your lips, longer than the last drop of coke ;)

Kadhal Poonga - Udit Narayan, Sujatha

The opening strings piece reminds of some 90s VS number ('vennilave vellai poove' - Arjun, Meena ?) . And yet again, Udit is totally out-of-place with some of the sections in the stanza - not just the pronounciation, which is proclaimedly horrible - but even the singing aspect of it. Just does not fit the bill. Sujatha would have sung this number sleeping :-)
If you are thinking this song should be called 'Kadhal Pisasu' (Run), you are not alone :-) You may end up liking this number, if you liked 'Kadhal Pisasu'

Thachikko - Anuradha Sriram, Mathangi

The song is definitely likeable. Highly catchy and hummable - Anuradha & Mathangi contrast and complement each other very well. Rhythm is very typical of VS. Beautiful touches of kaapi ragam found here and there. Nice song !

Siruthooral - Srinivas, Sadhana Sargam

Nice, melodious piece - simple song - nothing spectacular, neither pedestrian. Both the singers have done a decent job. With few sessions, you will come to like this

Kola Kolayya - KK, Sujatha

Folksy dance number - nothing to write home about more than these three words. With the craze for such numbers, dont wonder if this catches on :-)

This album is testimony to what is called the dis-interested music director phenomenon - either they should not sign-up or if they do, they should give their best. One expects better from seasoned MDs like Vidyasagar.

Enjoy other reviews from the archives

p.s : Enjoy your (long) weekend, drive responsibly. I will be back in action by wednesday. Have fun

Blogolala Blogolala

2005-08-28T09:27:00.000-05:00

Munimma, had inspired this thought, about, how over time, the description of women/girls in movies are getting more current. I had initially started this piece about how in this blog-fad-world, the description would be today - (via a comment on Munim's site and with her permission, elaborating on it :-))

hey blogolala hey blogolala

un azhagu- blog'ai pol adhisaya piravi
un parvai - blog title pol puriyadhadhu
un pinne - comments'ai pol kodi makkal
un ulle - post'ai pol naan mattume

hey blogolala hey blogolala

un kural - oru audio blog
un mugam - oru photo blog
un kaigal - konjam neelamana post
un kanna-kuzhi - konjam azhamana post

hey blogolala hey blogolala

unnai mattum dhaan naan parpen
nee mattum dhan en blogroll
unnai yaar parthalum naan parpen
naan dhan un blogpatrol

hey blogolala hey blogolala

Translation

Your beauty - is a rare genius, as is the creation of blogs.
Like the title of blog, that i never understand, are your eyes - (that speaks thousand words)
Like the comments of post, there are millions behind you
Like the body of the post, am the only one in you

Your voice, is an audio blog
Your face, is a video blog
Your slender hands, are as long as a post
Your dimple, is as deep as a (thoughtful) post

I will just look at you,
you are my only blogroll
If anyone does look at you,
am your blogpatrol

Please consider this as personal invitation with betel-leaf, betel-nut, bananas, and, kumkum to add/build on top of the descriptions, you could also do the hero's description if you prefer ;)

Let the blogaraja comment festival begin ! :P

[Song Glance] Ghajini

2005-08-23T21:44:00.000-05:00

There are so many albums out there, releasing quite frequently, that am unable to perform detailed review/critical appreciation for want of time :-(

Starting this post, I plan to write quick glances into the albums, to essentially capture first impressions and listenability :-)

Ghajini by Harris Jeyaraj (Click on the links to listen to the songs)

Oru Maalai - Karthik

If you have listened to *any* HJ song - you would know this song was coming ;) - Nothing spectacular, the tune is quite similar to many of his prior works (the line Adhanaal Illai urakkam from oh-mama (Minnale) ). The interlude, especially the first, is quite catchy. HJ has attempted to differentiate this song with some of his other works by some novelty in the way instrumentation is setup and the running loop (like Telephone mani'pol - not implying copy :-) )
Karthik has tried his best with this song to impart some life :-D

X-Machi - Naahul, Mathangi

Some good work on the chords, catch rhythm loop, seductive/husky voices cover-up for mal-nourished tune bank :-). Once again, but for the above, this song would force you to hit the skip button every-single time. Mathangi, has done quite a decent job

Suttum Vizhi - Sriram Parthasarathy, Bombay Jayashree

First impression - structure of the song seems to be heavily inspired by 'Kismat Se Tum' ('Pukar' by ARR) - especially the lines '(unnale) kaN vizhithu soppanam kanden'. The tune itself has shades of some 60's song - can't tell which. Second interlude is the best part of the song - with some superb work on the sax. I felt, that HJ was sleeping while doing this number - with the style he has chosen - he had tremendous scope to produce a belter, but he tries to do yet another, vaseegara and fails in the attempt. Couple of listens, and you would atleast not skip it ;)

Rahatulla - Anupama

So far, this song is refreshingly fresh from the other songs in the album. Anupama, has done her job well. Good bass work in the second interlude. Quite a catchy dance number, the closing sections of the song are very well done.

Rangola - Shankar Mahadevan, Sujatha

'Boom Boom Mattukaran theruvil' (Adhe Kangal) song stares at you - when you listen to the first line of the pallavi. The song as noted elsewhere reminds you of 'Andangakka/Rendakka' (Anniyan) in passing phases - especially the second interlude. This song presents you with the impression that this more of Vidyasagar style song than HJ. Both Shankar & Sujatha have done a decent job.

The album itself can carry the song-sequences for any run-of-the-mill movie with fancy dance numbers - but from a musical connoisseur's perspective, this would struggle to cut the grade

Other Reviews out there Kaps

Enjoy more music reviews via the archives

Father of Electronic music

2005-08-22T18:42:00.000-05:00

Robert. A. Moog, popularly known as the Father of Electronic music, named after his invention of 'Synthesizer', passed away

Honestly, have not heard of this name before, till i stumbled upon this article. I think, a moment of silence thanking him for the way we now listen to music is not asking too much.

R.I.P

Got Spam ?

2005-08-21T17:12:00.000-05:00

No, am not referring to the spate of friendly comments by blogdoctor in most of our blogs, but 'the real' spam.

Not sure, since when this feature is available (no release information from Google), but they have enabled 'Word Verification' feature - wherein the commentors would have manually 'enter' the words that they see, created via bitmap. For more details see this article

Ofcourse, you must be well aware by now, that, the goal of blogging is to get many comments, so you can choose to not enable this feature, there by encouraging more visitors.

Start Rant:
It is interesting as to how some of the automated-spammers have not gotten intelligent that they started commenting using 'profiles' - by-passing the 'anonymous' commentor option. It now really is a question for the courts to decide, as to whether, visiting someone's site and saying please visit my site is really a spam ????

Tech Rant : - Guess they use the google's last 100 updated blogs to pick up the blog ID and do a text match for 'this blog does not allow anonymous comments' and decide to use either the anonymous option or 'logged on' option - smart huh ! :-D
:Stop Rant

p.s : If this is not your cup-of-tea, join-in for the masala milk post below :P

Bitter Milk and Birla Mandir

2005-08-20T07:47:00.000-05:00

They wondered why...

She liked his looks, brilliance, jokes and charm.
He liked her personality, wit, smile and thoughts.
They loved each other's presence
They fell in love madly and married promptly

They wondered how they were made for each other

She needed coffee first thing in the morning, she was a south-indian
He will die without tea first thing, he was a north-indian.
He had his way, even plain milk tasted sweet that day !

She wondered why even plain milk tasted bitter that day !

He felt like visiting Birla mandir
She wanted to go to Siva-Vishnu Temple
She had her way, prayed that he gets to like coffee
He prayed, that he gets to go to Birla Mandir

They wondered when their prayers will be answered !

"Solution of one's problem lies with the other" ...
Answers, they apparently, never heard.

Most Silly Disclaimer I have ever written : All the incidents and characters are purely fictional. Any resemblances to individuals are purely accidental and non-intended. If you have not heard the answer till now, you will never ! :P

Blog with Word !

2005-08-17T14:34:00.000-05:00

Breaking News : You can now blog from within MS Word by installing a simple plugin. You can 'publish', 'save as draft' or 'open' posts from via MS Word.

Go for it ! - these guys never cease to amaze me with their creative thinking. From now on, you know who to blame, if you lost your 'post' :P

Follow this link to read the FAQ for it.

p.s : Do you love music, don't miss out on the oppurtunity to enjoy some good music. Have to do no further than just scrolling down below this post :)

Disclaimer: All the products and their websites are registered trademarks and copyrights of the respective organizations

[Song Watch] Agni Nakshathram

2005-08-13T21:25:00.000-05:00

Happy Independence Day - Jai Hind

Agni Nakashathram by Mani Ratnam - starring Prabhu, Karthik, Amala, Nirosha had music by the one and only IR. The album was raging hit by any standards. It had nice mix of all genres producing a feel-good effect when you complete one-round of listening :-).

Per request by many, have tried to cut down on very detailed description of the songs, baby-step at a time. Tell me, if it has worked :P

Ninnukori Varnam - Chitra

Trademark IR violins open this classic fusion number Ninnukori. Acoustic Guitar /Slap bass can be heard being beautiful played. Even though am not an expert in chords, have heard/read from many who are, that IR matches the best of best when it comes to chords. It is proved amply in this song. Azhagiya Raghuvarane (0.58- 1.00) marks the beautiful climax of the pallavi.

Awesome work on the drums, which was one of the hallmarks of this album mark the interlude which has an interesting synth sounds backed by lovely bass riffs.

The stanza, has remarkably underplayed chords, continues with the excellent backing by the guitars and the flawless chitra singing away beautifully. If there is one line that sags in the entire song it is the poojai kaaga yengudhu (2.02-2.12) but that is more than compensated for in the line that follows immediately. Unnondu Naan is constructed amazingly - yet again the guitar doing its bit. Lovely! is the only word that comes to mind.

Second interlude, a very classic IR piece, with yet again, wonderful touches on violin, synth and drums. Second stanza follows the first to a 'T'. Interesting point to note the word of 'mohanam' which is the ragam of the song for those interested. It typically is a practise for all carnatic composers to include the reference to the ragam, in which the song is based on. Will we know whether it was intentional ?

Beautiful fusion number, amazing work on the bass & guitar and flawless rendition

Rating 4.6 out of 5

Oru Poongavanam - S. Janaki

Birds chirp away, flapping their wings setting the scene for the song. Janaki starts off the song with Oru Poongavam. There is the beautiful loop of piano with simple chords. Water splashing (signifying Nirosha swimming) and solo flute sets a melancholic mood to the song which is accentuated by the piano/violin combo with cute beats.

The rhythm pattern changes and sets the tone for the stanza which continues along the main theme of the song. The best part of the stanza is when Janaki hits ulaavarum (2.18-2.28). The violin backing up those lines are simply so cute !. Just a brief one-liner is all there is before you get into the second-interlude. IMHO, second interlude is *the* highlight of the song. synth pieces with amazing violing backing is simpy out of the world.

A simple song, with a touch of melancholy, nicely done.

Rating 4.2 out of 5

Roja Poo Aadi - S. Janaki & Chorus

Cool and hip rhythm piece welcomes you along with chorus harmony/voice chaas (instead of 'oohs') and awesome guitar/slap bass combo yet again. Roja Poo was so dance-inspiring when heard 17 years back. It still is such beautiful fast number. The chords in the pallavi are very nicely layered to bring awesome effect. Janaki emotes well, not ideal for the situation, but still executing the task of sounding youthful in masterly manner. By the time the pallavi is over, You will already be humming ta.taan.ta.taan after the line Roja Poo Aadi vandhadhu

Interlude, again, has violins, guitars and drums forging a superb alliance. Stanza adds to the foot-tapping effect by building on top of the theme. A wonderful twist awaits you at Thodu Thodu 2.15- 2.24.

Second interlude has beautiful piano roll and continues superb work on the violins from where it left off from the first interlude with 'voice chaas' . Stanza is same as the first, the twist, when it comes, is still superb at Idho Idho 3.28 - 3.37.

Bass is much more muted than other songs. IR unleashes some more power chords to top-off the song on a superb note.

Such a dance number, better than many numbers belted out today.

Rating 4.3 out of 5

Thoongatha Vizhigal - K.J. Yesudas & S. Janaki

Who would'nt fall in love with this wonderful number !. It had all the ingredients of a perfect melody - tune with carnatic base (ragam Amruthavarshini - more on that later in this blog), superb orchestration, flawless rendition and voila - a chartbuster !

The opening rhythm pattern is the typical 80'ish one. But that is the only thing that is predictable about the song. Chorus singing with techno sounds in the background and a brief flute cameo sets the tone for the pallavi - literally so. The pallavi is so lavishly composed in Amruthavarshini. It has some very interesting example of how to handle of meter-thaala kattu for the lyrics. In the fourth line, you have 'Anbe Nee illadhu' and the previous line that was similar was 'Paneerai theLithAlum'. You can never do the same meter for Anbe and Paneerai and thats where you can see how IR's genius comes out in 0.44 -0.47 - Wow !

Interlude is brief, simple and harps on the theme of the song. KJY starts the stanza with Mamara Ilai Mele . This alters the style of the song, bringing in some beautiful chord backing the voice of KJY. Some of the pieces are agmark Amruthavarshini - especially 2.07 through end of the stanza. Janaki handles those sections with marked ease. Amazingly well done stanza.

Second interlude is notably different from the main theme of the song, with yet again the stanza bringing in the dialog version of SJ & KJY singing. Second stanza is no different than the first.
Yet again bass riffs & chords have to be given their due credit ! - beautiful work.

Even though KJY handles the song comfortably, I felt Janaki came out on top in this song !.

Amruthavarshini ragam is made of S G3 M2 P N3 S. The ragam is supposed to bring 'rain' when sung. Whether or not that is true, our heart is moist with lovely melody when listening :-). My roomie pointed out another song by K.V. Mahadevan Anathineya Ra (Swathi Kiranam - courtesy Raaga.com)

Awesome song !

Rating 4.7 out of 5

Vaa Vaa Anbe - K.J. Yesudas, Chitra

This songs sounds evokes a pathos kinda mood even primarily because of the use of shades of Sivaranji ragam through the major portion of the song.

Violins, flute and piano join in to welcome us for the opening of the song, before KJY can start. The pallavi is simple with nice violin & guitar backup. Violin Chords are wonderful - you just have to wonder, how such chords have been plucked out of thin air for a ragam like Sivaranjani - only IR

Guitar cotinues to shoulder the bulk-load of the interlude, which is very IR'ish by all means :-) . The stanza is very simple and straight forward, Chitra gets to join-in with Kalai Malai. The chords deserve mention starting at 1.56 - 2.16. Awesome !!. Chitra also emotes to a sad-context. Was this song recorded for some other situation and MR used it out-of-context ? But lyrics all point to a love-duet !

Second interlude, is the best part of the song, wonderful orchestration (Violin & flute). Well, who better than IR to arrange something like that !. Second stanza follows the first in all aspects and brings the song to an end.

Notable piano rolls at the back-end. Quite passable a song. IMHO this song is the weakest link of an otherwise stellar album.

Rating 4.0 out of 5

Raja Rajathi - IR & Chorus

The opening line of this song had been on the lips of everyone during its release. It also had its due share of fun-pokers as to how 'recitative' the song was instead of being a 'song'.

IR showcases his skills as a vocalist & his mastery over rhythm/drums in this song. The drum piece in the first interlude is still famous, he has actually made a 'song' out of that piece !

Pallavi has some nice harmony backing up IR going Raja Rajathi and beautiful bass riffs. Interlude as mentioned above is out-of-the-world, you just listen to it with dropped jaws period. :-)

Stanza continues on the theme of recitative singing. People looking for typical IR 'tune' would not find it in this song. The second interlude is IR with experimentative hat on. The change in rhythm, did not augur well for the song, it kinda lost the tempo, which is odd for a song, that banks on the awesome rhythm. The second stanza is all the same but for the change in rhythm pattern. The song finishes off in the same fast tempo as it opens. It was/is still a dance number amongst most youngsters !. A very catchy, foot-tapping piece indeed

Rating 4.4 out of 5

The collection, has a perfect breath-taking mix of variety of songs, fusion, western, filmi etc. Very wonderfully done. Can't repeat it enough as to how the bass guitar/chord sections are so superb, that all aspiring musicians can ignore listening to such albums only at their own peril.

Some of the other observations include, the duration of the songs - most of them are under 4.30 minutes and also how the first stanza and the seldom differ in their arrangement :-)

This album, IMHO, is one of IR's bests albums.

Overall Rating 4.4 out of 5 - Must Have in any music lover's collection !

Enjoy more reviews from the archives

Disclaimer : Thanks Raaga.com - All copyrights & trademarks of Raaga.com is owned by the Raaga.com web-site

Google's Blogger Survey

2005-08-10T05:32:00.000-05:00

All,

Urge you to take the Google's Blogger Survey and voice your opinion. In most cases, we dont take surveys coz we never 'see' the feedback in action. This time around, just to atleast keep the service free, i guess we should all take the survey and comment on it to say 'keep it free' :-)

Hope Google takes the survey seriously :-)

p.s : Do you believe in anything ? Read this article and its comments. At the end of it, you are guaranteed to be on the either end of 'spectrum of belief' or money back* (Terms and Conditions Apply) :P

Nambikkai

2005-08-07T17:10:00.000-05:00

Recently, there was this kavidhai pOTi announced by Narayan Sir. The topic brought in some thoughts that i have assimilated into a small 8-vari-kavidhai.

For reading pleasure, please read every line twice - that strategy can turn even a.b.c.d (alphabet) into pudhukavidhai !

Nambaikkai
peTravar endral thaai
valarthavar endral thandhai

moothavar endral annan
iLaiyavar endral thangai

maNandhavar endral manaivi
eendravar endral makkal

irandhavar endral iraivan
iravian endral maTTum nAthigam ?

Translation

Belief

You believe,

mother is who gave birth to you
father is who brought you up

brother is who is elder to you
sister is who is younger to you

your wife is, who you married
your child is, your offspring

loved ones that pass away, are (with) God
The moment it comes to God, you believe in atheism ?

p.s : Don't miss out on the chance to be a part of History. Learn the latest technique to blog effectively within 3 minutes 37 seconds. Well, that is what it takes to read my Blogging 101 post ! ;). Scroll down a bit or if you are lazy, click on this... Blogging 101

Blogging 101

2005-08-01T19:33:00.000-05:00

* updated Photo Blogs & Audio Blogs based on popular request ;) - please start the comment festival again :P *

Sometimes, it helps to make fun of your ilk. Request all bloggers to take it easy and laugh it off - no offense meant :-)

If you have really landed on this post hoping to find the right starting point. You got it !!. Please send me a blank check ASAP.

Let's get started !...

Sign up for a blogging account.

Do not think of why you need to blog. Just do it.

Think of abnormal phrases as titles for your blog. It can be anything like 'velilale mazhai' to 'thoughtless thoughts' to anything that cannot be pronounced. Note, nothing prevents you from using day-to-day items like 'Bata' Bytes or 'Rivet'ting rants etc. The more non-indian the title is the more catchy it is. (Tip: Try Greek, Latin, Spanish or even Madras Bashai)

Goal of blogging is to have as many visitors as you can get and as many comments as you get. Do not build up any other false 'hopes'

What to write ? Make up your mind about what you want to write. There are many options.
Daily Journals - which can include anything from your daily activity.
e.g. I opened a new bar of soap at 8.40 am today morning
Here in front of me is a sparrow.
(Oh, btb, it flew off before i could complete the journal )
Note : If you plan on keeping Daily Journals and if you are no celebrity, just make sure, your profile is set to be 'female'. Most readers dont read journals of men (Sorry men-folk that is the truth and Sorry women-folk, trust me, that is the truth)

Raving or Ranting - You can write about anything you want.

e.g. I saw a bee today. God awful. I am gonna $%$%!#$%^*& any bee i see.
Why do crows have to be black ?
I love masala dosai because...
I hate Lalu Prasad because...

Note: Since you are gonna be bashing someone in your post, you better be so speculative that you will generate lotsa readership like some of the 'leading' online 'magazines' (No candies for guessing what magazine is being referred)

Movies/Songs/Entertainment Gossips - Thunukku Mootai.

No examples - If you don't know what gossip/thunukku mootai is till now, you dont need to know it in future either :P

Philosophy/Sports/Science/Arts - Write all about topics in that 'genre'
e.g. Why do we exit
Why Tendulkar rocks or Why Ganguly Sucks
Why Google is hot
Why IR/ARR is good and all others are bad.

Reviews - Write what you felt about book/movie/music/places
e.g. Anniyan Sadha Sodha
Harry Potter raises hairs
Da vinci code is a winner
The best part about writing reviews is - you don't have to know squat about anything - just throw in some terminology - there will be atleast few people who will agree/disagree with you - that is all you need :P

*updated based on popular request :) *
Audio Blogs
For all of those who feel, they are the next SPB, KJY or Hariharan, and the only reason, they are not SPB/KJY is because have not been given a mic, this is your golden oppurtunity. Signup for audio blogging and starting crooning your way to glory.

You can also talk about anything, you can do mimicry, you can sing, you can cry - but make sure you don't make others cry :P

Aslo, you can be like de'waugh sir or banu malick siri.e. you can audio blog existing songs and call it your own audio blog.

Warning: You can be sued by the above sirs for copright i.e. right to copy infringement ;)

*updated based on popular request :) *
Photo Blogs
We all know picture speaks thousand words. If you can take pictures that can express thousand words well and good. Just make sure, you have good enough pictures to convey your happiness about the latest IR album, anguish about how bad a recent movies was. No 'leading magazine' style sleaze festival please ;)

Ofcourse, the fall back is always post pictures of a rose, a building, a bird and many more things. One good thing about using such pictures is, the only 'negative comment' you can get is how the lighting/photograph was not good - never the building or the bird i.e the content is always good :P

All of the above - Safest way to start, since you can write what you feel without being 'branded' :-)

Driving up visitors - Sign up with blogpatrol.com and set the start counter to 'bata shoe price' like 299 or 2999 etc - Never start with '0' - that is a big turn off.

Don't answer any question you are being asked directly. Ask them to go to your blogs instead.

e.g. Q: 'Do you know where the nearest pizza hut is ?'
A: Yes. Please visit my blog.
Q: 'Do you write about pizzas ?'
A: No. My blog has link to google and you can click on it and find a pizza hut near by

Note: It also helps to be a bit shameless. You can go to random sites and leave a comment prompting visit from the victim

Driving up comments - This is a big course in itself. There are some pioneers in the blogosphere who can talk hours together endlessly about this.

Tip1 : It helps to have opinionated friends. Go beat them up, cry, beg them to visit your website

Tip2 : Never restrict your comments to 'Only logged on bloggers'. Leave it open to anonymous.

Tip3 : If no one comments, comment as anonymous. Senthil has written in detail about many more ideas on this topic.

Tip4 : Reply to every comment. If possible, do multiple posts of the same comment, pretending it is accidental

Tip5 : Visit any blog site you can think of and leave a comment. "This was wonderful" is all you need. Copy paste it. Blogger etiquette demands a reply "This was wonderful" on your blog. Guaranteed or money back* (Terms and Conditions apply)

Blogroll biggies- The more your site is linked up via biggies's sites, the more visitors, comments you get.

Have a big heart - there may be cases, when you wont have visitors or comments. Just write something bad about some super heroes, you are guaranteed to have visitors.

If you are not upto the challenge and don't feel like blogging. Don't worry. Do visit this site often, and don't forget to leave a comment :P

Bombay Rains & Nature

2005-07-29T14:51:00.000-05:00

Bombay Rains
Moment of nature's fury is all it takes to wipe out all of "it" from the face of earth
Man's fury tries to do that every second, till his death :-(

Nature
Rains that knew no bounds
37 inches in hours
Hundreds of people dead in a single day
That was Bombay

Lands that know no rain
3 inches a year
Thousands of people die every year
That is Tamil Nadu (not just TN)
Does Nature know no communism ? Why this disparity/discrimination ?

P.S : Don't miss the Musical Blast Post below

Music Blast - Behind the Scenes

2005-07-28T11:09:00.000-05:00

We all listen to music - either man-made or nature-made. How many of us have been part of 'behind-the-scenes' of a man-made album ?

I got lucky this week, when i had a chance to sit-in on the recording of Sriks' new album H1BEES

Man, was it not so much fun ? to watch up-close all the gadget-wizardy, singers in their cabins, humming out their portions. Wow it was really spell-binding.

They were working on the re-lyric'ing and re-mixing yester-year super-hit song. It was so hep and lyrics had a nice modern-day adaptation to it. The music was quite peppy and current !

Looks like Sriks is inspired by his thalaivar ARR, there was so much improvization that was part of the game. You can see creativity flowing when a sudden-idea is born and they re-do some of the parts to fit-in with the new thoughts.

All in all - can't wait to hear the album when it is out - rumour mill has it that, it will be first week of september.

Can't wait to write a review :-)

[Music Watch] Thiruda Thiruda

2005-07-22T21:26:00.000-05:00

Thiruda Thiruda by Mani Ratnam, with P.C.Sriram and music by A.R.Rahman. It was one of those movies that had no logic and was purely entertainment movie. It was rumored to be entirely re-shot after MR did not like the outcome of the first rush. It was a big time flop at the box-office but had some of the best music and amazing camera work.

Rasaathi - Shahul Hameed & Co

A totally new voice was creating waves with the release of Thiruda Thiruda & Gentleman. Shahul Hameed it was !. Very different and pleasant at the same time, he was an instant hit with the audience.

It opens with Raasathi, and you can immediately bet your life, that you have never heard of such 'sounding' song before in your life !. Pallavi is simple and awesome. especially, the lines 'nee pona en'. Vocal harmony is all you get for any musical backing or interludes.

'mmmmhmmm's by the male harmony produces the equivalent of bass effect. 'aaah's by the female voice is nicely layered. First up, a single voice hums that, and then a chorus joins in. Looking at such wonderful layers of vocal harmony, Man, you are floored already and yet to even get to the stanza.

Shahul continues his rendition of the main theme, while the harmony picks up a faster tempo, and you could hear the first traces of bass (the only instrument in the entire song) being used. The male harmony, adds to the nicety in the humming (Manajal Araikkum Munne, 00.59 )

Every single line gets a vocal harmony which nicely complements the line. Listen to porava ponava dhaan at 1.13 - 1.17. The stanza is finished with a nice hum by the lead with harmony continuing.

The second interlude is made up of just female vocalists humming the theme of the song, with male vocal harmony providing with a such a peacefully satisfying tune.

The second stanza follows the first stanza to a 'T' and the song finishes off in the same vein, just that all the vocal harmony tracks are 'layered' to produce amazingly soothing effect.

The song proved early on, how much ARR loves to experiment. The song for the most part is bereft of any musical instrument, but for best ever known musical instrument, vocal chords ;)

It conveys the emotion of sadness caused by separation, excellently well.

Rating 4.6 out of 5

Kannum Kannum - Mano & Company

Yet again, the song starts with vocal harmony. The first time i heard it, don't know what hit you !. It was such a 'never-before-heard' in Indian Film Music type opening. You can replay from 0.00 till 00.23 and it will never disappoint you.

Mano starts the song with Kannum and immediately one notices the novelty. Every line alternates between a 'tick' kinda rhythm and hard-rock rhythm. The guitar work along with bass is awesome. The pallavi lines get repeated twice, before the first interlude sets in. The interlude is simple and cute. The stanza still uses the bongo ticks and hard-rock pattern. Bass guitar is the best part of the entire stanza.

The variety of voices/sound combination is evident by the use of 'vocal oohs' and the vocal effect at 2.22 - 2.27. The second interlude continues the vocal effect seen in 2.22 - 2.27 and uses the female vocal harmony to amazing effect. The guitar accentuates the hard-rock effect of the song.

Some of lines in the lyrics are funny, while some of them are downright superb like edhiri peyarai solli adhithal vetri endre artham. The song is relatively short by ARR standards at 4.06 but the tempo of the song is so fast that you dont even realize it has been just that short.

The song drags you into shout your heart out or shake your body out mode and you can really feel all our stress thrown out at the end of the song. Ecstatic best at the higher octaves and soulful swaras at the lower end.

For the carnatic music lover in your - learn agmark Sivaranjani from this song :-)

Trend-setter, pathbreaking rock song - and appropriately rocks !

Rating 4.7 out of 5

Konjum Nilavu - Anupama & Chorus

What can one say about this song ? About the husky vocals, the awesome programming, jaw-dropping rhythm or the tune itself !. This truly was a master-piece song from ARR's stable.

The song starts with opera like singing. The rhythm is such a free-flowing programming, built on top of traditional beats. Lotsa 'sounds' can be heard, that add the 'techno' feel to it. Bass, is noteworthy here. I think just the sheer work that goes into programming such stuff deserves high applause. The high point of the song is 'chandralekha' with nice chorus humming and superb chords. Interesting to note that some of the bass patterns were slightly touched up and used in 'oorvasi' and 'andha arabic'.

The stanza continues the bass loop, with ARR's forte, rhythm, being tweaked with techno effects like glass breaks etc. It already transports you into a dreamy fantasy mode, and wait till you hear the stanza. To the observant ear, you can notice the wonderfully done synth track that runs through the length of the stanza. The beautiful aspect of the stanza is how the melody theme, even though is very carnatic'ish gets superbly made-over to a western style. Listen to 'vandhu naan' at 2.32- 2.35, one could easily do an alaap in natabhairavi or related raagas as an extension to the song, but still one can swear that it is purely a western style song ! :-) Funny it is to realize that all music is contained in time-sequences of the seven swaras :-) !!!!!

The Suresh peters lead chorus at 2.47 through 2.55 adds a twist to the seriousness to the song and brings an awesome cresecendo to the song by Anupuma. The high point about the crescendo is the 'veena' piece between 3.05 and 3.08. No words to describe how we get puppetted at the wizardry of the music. Anupama scales the upper octaves as easily as she brings the seductive huskiness to the song. The second interlude is basically a re-work on the theme of the song and some from the first stanza. After a very brief pause, the song goes into the meditative mode yet again between 4.14 - 4.32 with the loop being played out by synth this time around. Yet again, the veena shows up for the brief cameo and brings the song back to its final phases, where Anupama once again lends so much 'emotion' to the song. The song finishes off with yet another amazing piece of higher octave singing and great work with the veena between 5.33 and 5.40

The end kinda wakes you up from the high-tech trance the song caused you to enter into :-) Only ARR !

Rating 4.7 out of 5

Putham Pudhu - Mano & Chitra

Sounds of thunder & rain greet you in this sweet melodious song wonderfully picturised in lush green background. PC Sriram and MR combo at its best ! Notes played by 'Bell' signifying rain drops (ARR does that often). Flute chirps away as if birds are dancing to the tune of nature, when beautiful run through of piano happens. I can still remember, how my friends (AP & AS) and I were excited to place our head right in-between in the two speakers of his boombox and see how the piano-roll would travel between one speaker and the other !. Chorus singing, violins and flute form the rest part of intro for 1.05 minutes into the song, before the actual pallavi starts.

(Remember all the audio casette store walahs ?, how they used to crib, "indha payyan, *in apparent reference to ARR* vandhapram, paatu ellam 5-6 nimishan ayidichu pa...munnadi ellam, 4 nimisham vandhale perisu" with a big sigh ! )

Mano opens the song with putham pudhu and Chitra follows him. There is the simple piano chords with lotsa treble, minimal violin instrumentation for the pallavi, and chorus is back at it again. The interlude is so wonderful, yet again, it transports you into such wonderful locations like only Ram.C manages to find :)

Mano continues with the charanam - Sondha Agayam vendum. Treble support continues but the bass steps in do amazing things to the song. Listen to the bass at 2.10-2.12. (Arun@Musicpaithiyam is to be blamed for all overflowing references to bass :P). The orchestration is simply superb and some of the lines (lyrics) are quite nice punnagai enghal thaai mozhi endra varam kodu is an eternally appealing line to lyricists of all times.

The second interlude is a show that is hijacked by the violins that continue with the dream world theme. Short but quite nice. This one song has quite a lot of chords that are underplayed, highly unlike ARR. As said earlier, the piano, violin, flute and heavy bass (awesome pieces between 2.13-2.15 and 3.36-3.38)

The lyrics, do definetely need some deserved credit. For the optimist, asking for peace, no cross-border disputes, no poverty, deserts turning into oases etc and are very good and fit well with the context of the song. Hopefully it just does not limit itself to the 'dream world' and works its way into reality as well.

Very melodious, sweet, simple and wonderful song.

Rating 4.7 out of 5

Thee Thee - Carolene

Jathis (Jathi Raja ?) and slap/bass guitar presenting 'straight from the book' opening of a perfect western-classical fusion song welcomes you to Thee Thee. As always with ARR, the complements of heavy percussion alternating with melody is brought out amply in this song as well. Carolene does the honors with this song, quite easily sung with beautiful chords. ARR redefined how chords get used in music arena after his arrival. This song is a classic example of the same.

Since we talked about fusion, this song is based on raga Bahudhari (S G3 M1 P D2 N2)-yes there bas been some liberal usage of 'ri' . Interlude treats you to another fusion of swaras sung out, with jathis and good work on drums leading you into yet another trance. Kannukul Thee Irundhum sets the stanza into motion with lovely chords with simple jathi backing to the fag end of the stanza.

Starting at 2.55, Tte second interlude IMHO is the best part in the entire song. The guitar plays amazing swaras from bahudhari. And you can keepo the inimicable Naveen on the flute away can you ?. Till you reach 3.30, the song maintains the racy tempo with fusion ambience produced via the rendition of Bahudhariraga. Listen to 3.27 - 3.28, how wonderfully Naveen executes that piece !!!!!!

Second stanza offers nothing new from the first stanza and the song gets ready to sign-off, with simple improvisations on the jathis and ARR unleashes another session of jathis and slap guitar and piano to end the song !.

Wonderful ! Watch out the bass riffs throughout the song ! nice one !. Fusion at its best. Even though western, carnatic style are in the race, in the end, the listener is the winner :-)

Rating 4.7 out of 5

Veerapandi Kotayile - Mano, Unni Menon, Chitra

Chitra (?) opens the song with a hum with immediately, a very innovative rhythm pattern sets in. If i remember correctly, it was played with rings (worn on fingers) tapped against (something like) cocunut shell. The thumping of rotosets the pace for the song.

Mano starts off with 'veerapandi kotayile' and now honest confession... ever since i heard that song, 'veerapandi kotayile' has always been 'punctuated' with 'zzzaaan zzzaan zzzannn zzzzan zzzzan' by the strings section. It is so addictive !!!

For the discerning listener in you, ARR has done voice layering. Mano sings a bass layer as well with his higher octave voice. Get a good ear-phone and a stero system, pump-up the volume and there you can hear him. Very nicely done :-)

Unni Menon backs up as the second male voice for the song. He does an equally nice job. His market picked up after ARR brought him back into the circuit. But poor him, with advent of Srinivas (who has similar voice/style) his market has come down drastically :-(

By the time pallavi is complete, you are 2 minutes into the song, but that does not take away the surprise element - finishing line of the pallavi. Listen to 1.59- 2.03. The 'ohh ohh' vocal are just out of the world - it goes through un-expected hoops with awesome string backing.

The pallavi itself has a 'recitative' feel to it - more like a narration than a song - which kinda gels well with the fast tempo. ARR, IMHO, has mastered the art of 'recitative' songs. Many of his songs have very simple and easy structure, that makes it easier to get into one's mind. At the other end of the spectrum, he has some of the most complexely structured compositions as well. (More on it, in a different post)

The interlude is very interestingly done. The tempo continues with minimal violin and flute combo, evoking the emotion of 'lonely night in a forest fraught with danger' :-). Checkout the section 2.57-3.03 beautifully done trumpet piece along with the orchestration of array of instruments . All of that paves way to the simple rhythm and chitra's voice.

Suddenly the song seems to take a turn for the 'softie' in you with 'rettai suriyan'. The pieces at 3.32 -3.36 distinctly brings a western classic touch to the song. ARR has used similar arrangements in Melissai (a very good song from 'Mr.Romeo') and couple of other songs (that i forget now). The instrument combo of flute, violin and strings bring that effect i presume :-)

The situation is supposed to bring out the herione love-torn between two heroes competing for her hand and the lines 'manavalan inge naanamma'and 'magarajan inge naanamma'provide for nice twist to the otherwise soft charanam and Chitra gets back to softie touch with 'idhu maalai mayakkam' and suddenly from nowhere, the song jumps back to 'ohh ohh' and back to pallavi !

The second interlude is really string in its bass'est mode (if there is a term like that ;) ). I can't seem to describe all the bends of the song in this section, but anyway within a brief period of 20 seconds, you get back on track with a normal theme and our now familiar ohh ohh and finally the chorus finishes off the song.

Pure and bold experimentation that gave us a brilliant song to like instantly. Sheer genius !

Rating 4.7 out of 5

Noticeably, all the songs had so many layers of musical tracks. That has been the hallmark of ARR. Many enthusiasts feel that, the number of layers explain why, sometimes, it takes so many hearings, for ARR's songs to grow on you :-). Every time you listen, you un-cover a piece. (To me, the only thing that comes closest to that experience is watching MMKR. Every single time, one finds a dialog that has been seemingly missed out, but is still rib-ticklingly funny.)

The Album for many years was rated as the best every by ARR - I would still like to think, it was one among his bests with his combined variety of melody, fast paced, fusion and experimental music. There has not been many such bold attempts at defying trend and setting new trends. For that very reason this album, IMHO gets a rating that is higher than the highest of any individual song :-)

Overall Rating 4.8 out of 5 ; if you don't have the album, go get it ! :-)

How did you enjoy this review ? Use the comment link below to express yourself :-)

Find more reviews in the music review archives

Acknowledgements : Arun@MusicPaithiyam

Found a Bug ?

2005-07-15T20:14:00.000-05:00

With lotsa serious soul-searching (not soul-mate - duhh ;) going in the blogosphere, I wanted to write something lighter :-) Here is the outcome. (Acknowledgements: I was inspired by conversation with some of my colleagues)

Every Software has bugs. How do you market your software's user-friendliness, quality and at the same time make money out of the marketing blitz ?. Follow this technique.

Announce the following program for a long time, yes, not limited time.

Found a bug ? Win an iPod*

To participate in the program, you should find a bug in our software and submit entriy-form via our bug-reporting system, that we are yet to build. Only qualifying entries are considered for the unlucky draw. The chances of winning an iPod is one in zero.

*Terms and Conditions Apply:

1. You should not use a lens to read this terms and conditions. (Note, our font has been tested and approved to be not-readable with normal human-sight)

2. An expert panel from our developer group should agree that the reported bug is actually a bug. All decisions made by the developer group is binding and final

3. You may not report more than one bug. You will be disqualified if you have reported bugs in the past.

4. Very detailed step-by-step instructions should be filled out via our non-existent bug reporting system. The steps when followed by any person, should reproduce the bug. Also, the steps should be clear so that even a person, who does not understand the language should be able to read it

5. No other person, should have submitted this bug before. (Note, even entries that have been disqualified because of various reasons, would be considered as reported)

6. Bug should be reported within one-hour of the first sighting with screen shot at the time of the bug. Entries beyond one-hour will be disqualified

7. All bugs should first be attempted to be resolved via our state-of-the-art customer service center with the screen shot of the bug. You will be given a case-number that has to be attached to the entry-form.

8. You should wait atleast one-hour after you get the case-number to fill up the entry-form

9. You should give your email address which will ONLY be used for sending spam mails and you can not opt out of it.

10. ALL THE ABOVE CRITERIA MUST BE MET FOR THE ENTRY TO BE CONSIDERED FOR THE DRAW. ANY DISQUALIFICATION MEANS YOU MUST GIVE US AN iPod. As a customer-friendly measure, we plan on sending out self-addressed envelopes that wont be delivered without a stamp, that you MUST use to send in your iPod.

Caste, Religion Etc...

2005-07-14T19:03:00.000-05:00

This post is in response to the discussion thread initiated by Senthil. This response is a bit long, bit more philosophical. Would urge people to read it through the end and think it over and come to whatever is their own conclusion.

Related Reads : Self, Realization, Zero, Summa Theologica

Here is what i think about it. Since i've been tagged the diplomatic guy, i will try to be sensitive to the question and emotions involved.

Bottomline : Should we need caste system. If yes, why, If no, do we need another system or how to abolish/eradicate the existing system.

Let us think about it.

1) What is religion
Religion is belief in God.

2) What is atheism
Atheism is belief in non-existence of God

3) What is Science
A Methodical way of explaining any phenomena.

4) Can Science define an absolute 'right' or 'wrong'
No. What is 'right' today - may be 'wrong' tomorrow. There is nothing that has continued to stay and has not not-changed. The only non-changed activity over the test of time is 'death'.

What was a rectangle,box is now sphere (Earth).
What had no water (ask all our lyricists) has now ice (Moon).

Like that, all things are susceptible to change. Can we even say that there exists something that is never susceptible to change. I am not sure. May be, we might even be able 'defeat' 'death'.

5) If there is no absolute 'right' or 'wrong' , is religion right
For those who adopt a religion it is right

6) If there is no absolute 'right' or 'wrong' , is atheism right
For those who adopt a atheism it is right

7) If there is no absolute 'right' or 'wrong' , is Science right
The method may always be right, but that does not imply the explanation may always be right.

8) Has Science enabled you to write this and communicate this
yes

9) Who created science
Humans

10) Who created humans
Evolution /God ( depends on you being atheist or a believer)

11) What is the single-most-parent-origin of evolution
we don't know

12) Do Humans change
yes

13) Does Science i.e. method of explanation change
yes

14) What does this all mean
we are trying to work on assumptions, that are subject to change, and hence all the conclusions are themselves subject to change. Every human works towards satisfying his own good. If you feel that, your primary objective in life is to help others, you help, because you feel good if you help others or rather, you don't feel good if you dont help others :-)

Nothing is to say, that, how we now say Earth is not box and it is actually sphere, all our assumptions may be voided in future by some other school of thought.

Keeping all of the above in mind......

15) Why was caste system put in place by our ancestors
We can only go by the historical literature, which says, caste was based on the profession and people were grouped

16) Why did our ancestors feel the need for a caste based grouping system
At that time, based on what they knew as science and what they felt as rational, they put in a system, that they felt addressed a need.

17) Is caste applicable now
Wait till you get to question Q.22

18) What do you get by belonging to any caste
You get a sense of belonging. You get to have an identity outside of your name & your deeds. You get to follow a certain set of practises . You feel like you are part of community

19) Why do you need an identity outside of your name & deeds
Humans are social animals. They need to be with some other living beings.

20) Why do you need to belong to a community
Building on the answer in Q.19, humans have 'egos'. And people feel that when they are a part of community, people with similar beliefs, practises and customs are together and that gives them even more security since it vindicates what they do :-)

Their egos always would like to make them feel superior that someone else. They feel superior to animals. If there were no animals, they'd feel superior over the trees. If not trees, then soil and so on. Why ? Because we think we have the ability to 'reason'. Just because we can 'reason' are we superior ?. We are different yes, but are we superior ?.

Now, even amongst our species, we feel 'oneself' is superior than 'otherself'. These are basic/primal insticts. Think of the world where everyone/everything knows they are all equals. But they also know that each one of them gets to live different life-styles and gets to live for different life spans. They would never know why there is this discrimination. That brings to the next question

21) Why is there discrimation in the Universe. Why can't everything in the universe (all of us) be trees or all of us be animals or all of us be humans. Why is there a need for a dog, a cat, a mango, an apple, a male, a female. Why can't all of it be the same ?

If there was no difference amongst everything in the universe, can the universe exist ?
If there was no different amongst everything, everything exists and everything does not exist.

22) Do we need caste now
Question should be, do we need discrimation. We are, by nature, born discrimated. Positively or negatively. We are born into this universe along with many other living beings. There will be discrimination.

23) Do we need to discriminate
As long as we realize, being different does not mean positively different or negatively different, discrimination is a way of life same as why universe is bundle of discrimination.

24) Why should a discrimination be positive or negative
One question i dont think i have reasonable answer.

We all live, knowing fully well, we all die, but not knowing what to do while we live. We have all devised what is 'acceptable' behavior during our lives.

Think of purpose of living as follows. It is like i write a number on a piece of paper and seal it in an envelope. And you start saying, ok let me guess what the number is and you start writing out some numbers. Now i make sure you can never get to the envelope by destroying it and i refuse to talk about it (Mission impossible huh?)

Whatever number you write down, there is no way of saying that, it is the right number, since you will never get to know the number i wrote. For all we know, you indeed got the same number i wrote in the envelope, but
how do you know, unless i told you or you got hold of the envelope ? :-).

*1) What if i never asked you to guess the number ? You thought you just had to find the number without me doing anything
*2) What if i never wrote a number on the envelope, but just let you imagine i actually did ?
*3) What if i never existed and the envelope never existed ?
*4) What if more than one person attempts to guess the number and in the process believe their methodology to get find the number is better than others ? or their number is right and other's is wrong ?

Think Think Think, for all you can think, can only yeild what you think as answers. One other person can agree with you. Thousands can agree with you. Millions can agree with you. Entire universe can agree with you.

Finally,
*5) Have you achieved anything by finding out why i wrote the number on the envelope ?. The very same envelope you are not sure that it even exists ?

Do you see a pattern between questions *1 through *5 as familiar ? Does it describe what we do in life ?

Please tell me if you did find answers to these questions *1 through *5 :-)

P.S : Ofcourse, there will always be people who do not buy these arguments or answers to the questions. They can choose to believe they are 'right' and am 'wrong'. I fully understand and appreciate their 'belief's while i still believe in what i wrote is 'reasonable' if not 'right' :p

Related Reads : Self, Realization, Zero, Summa Theologica

DC Area Bloggers Meet - Finally !

2005-07-10T10:25:00.000-05:00

Finally,

The day of reckoning : DC Area Bloggers Meet. Mukund, Ganesh, Eshwar
, Shiva, Raman, Senthil and Robbie attended the meet. It was a good start. As Mukund pointed out ;p, the quantity did not matter, quality did

It was so much fun. Almost everyone shed their inhibitions, (helo, inhibitions i.e. ice melting) and was training guns on others' blogging techniques. The leg pulling was pretty obvious. Everyone aimed at the 'increase-your-size of comments', 'how to get more visitors' techniques of others.

It has been a long time, almost since my college days, that i had such laugh-riot for the entire duration of the meet.

We did miss, Srikanth, but i think we can setup one more meet, East Coast or MidAtlantic Area Bloggers meet, may be couple of months from now, where we will hope to have bigger presence and larger meet.

Cheers everyone to the good time we had ! :-)

Self, Realization...

2005-07-07T22:41:00.000-05:00

Disclaimer : This is not written to demean, blaspheme, accuse any individual(s), sect(s), religion(s), philisophy(ies) that are out there. It is just a random collection of thoughts that sprung up. It is long, does not have a structure. It is simply there to promote thinking in you. It may be too 'heavy' stuff for you to take or it may be 'right in the alley' for you. You can call it aimless, you can call it philosophical, you can call it junk.

He was always known for his thoughtful outlook towards life. There would not be a single moment that would pass-by in his life, without him thinking about something. It could be,'how could i have arranged the forms correctly, so that the teller at the bank need not have gotten the doubt as to whether i filled all of them correctly' when he had gone in for a loan application and the teller as part her normal process doubly checked to make sure all forms have been brought in. or 'should i have walked to the front door while the bus was still preparing to come to a stop' when he got off via the back-door, so that he could have been in office 30 seconds earlier.

He'd always wonder about taking lesser tissues than grabbing a whole bunch that his fingers can manage, at fast-food places so that, there would lesser need to refill them, hence lesser expenditure, thereby helping to keep the increase in costs of consumer prices lower. The less said better , about the ketchups, sauces, salt, pepper, water and many more items.

No one had ventured to ask him, whether him eating one packet less of ketchup would really keep the prices lower. He was prepared to meet that eventuality as well. "How would one say a definitive 'yes' or 'no' to the question, hence the benefit of doubt should go towards saving it". He would think of electricity, water and many other resources like that.

He will conduct an elaborate mock-interview about every situation he imagined he'd have to confront. He would think about various uncomfortable questions that people would ask him, if he had to say 'no' to them, when they will ask him for a favor.

He will go back to the grocery store and point out that some item had been charged less and would pay it promptly. And at the same time, think thousand times before nervously stepping in front of the counter to tell them, that they have charged him higher than what he should have been charged.

It was not him. It was his upbringing. He was always trained to think about 'others' first. He used to construct complex theories about 'God'. He would think about whether 'God' really had thousands of forms of appearance. He would think about whether 'miracles' can happen. He would try to construct a conspiracy theory to every such act. At the same time, he would believe that a super-natural power did exist. Any thing that happened after such thinking sessions would be ascribed to 'God' not being happy at him trying to think bad about 'him'.

He'd always tell others that the more scientific one gets, the more agnostic one gets. He read a lot about philosophy. Conflicting theories about purpose of life, about self-realization, all dished out by other people who are all mortals, like him.

He would ask the question that has been asked million times before, 'If everything is God's creation, why does evil exist?' or 'If world is a stage where all of us play out our parts, why does the world need to exist'. He would immediately recoil in horror, thinking about how that question meant, 'questioning the motive for the existence of life and hence existence of God'

He believed in prayers. He'd seriously ask for peace everywhere. He believed that if only everything happened peacefully, how wonderful life would be. He would ask for fulfillment of his loved ones 'wants'. If only his parents' prayers were fullfilled, it would mean he would be happy, since his parents would only wish for his well-being, he would argue.

He read somewhere that, removing 'wants' from life is the first step towards detaching self from the materalistic world. He will argue within himself, 'is not removing a want, a want in itself ?'. He will think 'is not praying for something, wanting something ?' and then he'd be back to reality. He was out of milk, he can never get a full night of sleep without a warm cup of it.

He would once again think, 'if all of us do what we feel is good for themselves, as judged by one's moral values, then why is there something called evil. Since there is nothing absolute in the world other than 'almighty' why would anything be always good or always evil. What is evil today might be good tomorrow he would reason. 'Hence, why should', he'd ask, 'people judge. Only HE can judge'.

He would always ask himself, if there is nothing absolute in this world, except for 'the absolute' there is NO way of knowing what is the 'right answer' to the questions that anyone in the world might have. That would mean all his thinking so far, can produce answers, but never to be ascertained as 'right answer'.

He badly wanted to meet with some old wisdom filled soul that can enlighten him. But he knew deep inside him, if he got the same answer he got right now, he'd still not stop thinking about life or if he got a different answer, how did he even know he got the right answer.

At the end of the day, he will tell himself, that he is no-fu(a)rther in his understanding about life and it makes fullest sense, that his ancestors did not promote thinking along such lines, since he knew, at best it could only be thinking. There is NO WAY of knowing *the truth*. One might as well continue living in the material world, catering to carnal pleasures he'd console himself and proclaim that whenever he is idle, his mind becomes 'devil's workshop', get his warm cup of milk and sleep

DC Area Blogger Meet - Update

2005-07-05T09:18:00.000-05:00

Dear Fellow Bloggers,

As a follow-up to the original announcement, please find the *updated* information about the meet.

It is set to be SSV Temple, Saturday, 9th of July, 2005 at 4.30 PM. Please find the directions to SSV Temple here

This is just a 'break-the-ice' kind of meet that would hopefully lead to more regular meets in the future. There is no specific agenda other than just getting to associate faces to the blogs :-).

Design Courtesy : Senthil

Kindly comment on this blog to indicate the possibility of your attendance :-) Meet you all there, soon !

p.s : would request all to honor the 'privacy' concerns of bloggers who do NOT want to be photographed.

TFMovie Tag

2005-07-01T22:52:00.000-05:00

Ram has tagged me adding that i may not take it offensive that am tagged ;p

Though i watch many movies, i am not sure, i can even list 10 movies that i like the best. Let me give it a try.

1) Michael Madana Kamarajan
This IMHO, is *the best ever* movie that has been made in the history of any film making (ofcourse, of the ones i've seen). Inspite of watching it 100+ times...(literally, no exaggeration), i would never miss a chance to watch it. If only, i could get my hands on the original un-cut version it would be simply great !. The kedaram piece of 'tyoooon tyun tyuyunyun' for kamarajan is the unforgettable bgm !

2) Avvai Shanmughi
After MMKR, Kamal & Crazy Mohan combo tried to do many movies to recreate the magic. But the only movie that came close to MMKR was Avvai Shanmughi. Kamal is the man or sorry the woman to watch out :)

3) Poova Thalaya
Nice movie ! Gemini, Jaishankar

4) Indian
For the instilling the idea that *even one's own children* are not exempt from punitive treatment for corruption

5) Bale Pandiya
Hilarious Sivaji at his best

6) Thillu Mullu
Ample showcase of Rajini's comedy facet which i like best, next only to his villain'ous performances !

7) Pudhiya Paravai
Have watched this move tens of times. Can't place my finger on any specific reason why

8) Mahanadigan
Laugh riot by Sathyaraj making fun of *everyone* including himself ! :-)

9) Sathi Leelavathi
Yet again, Kamal and Crazy combo.

10) Dum Dum Dum
Nice simple movie, with very precise acting by Madhavan & Jyotika and Karthik Raja's best music score ever.

The tag buck stops here. It is left open to anyone who is interested ! :-)

TFMusic Tag

2005-07-01T19:30:00.000-05:00

Arun and Senthil had tagged me. Here we go......

Albums I own
Thiruda Thiruda, Sangamam, KanduKondein KanduKondein, Alaipayudhe
All of them are lovable to the core !....ofcourse internet radio always helps :-)

First album/cassette I bought
Chinna Thambhi (Prabhu, *Khushbhoo*)
Povama & Thuliyile were unforgettable at that time !

Present favourites
TajMahal. I was shocked when i first heard this album, but it has never failed to grow inside me, everytime i hear this. Especially Kulirudhu, Nee Enge, Eechi etc

(I interpreted this as what are the songs that are presently my favorites rather than what present-songs are my favorites ;)

Apart from that my nightly put-to-bed songs are from ARR collection, yesterday was Doli Sajakhe Rakhna (not TFM :-( )

I usually hum…
This is a phenomenon, that i have noticed in many music lovers. The first song you hear since the day started, sticks to your lips like a broken record through the day.
I have been doing some work on reethigowlai and charukesi and hence Thalaiyai Kuniyum/Azhagana Ratchasiye and Aaahista(swades)/yedho yedho (E 20 U 18) are on my lips today...

While on that topic, there are some days, you get up, and there is already a song on your lips ! - wow where did that come from ? :-?

Favourite music directors
ARR is "my man" as Srikanth puts it.
I love many IR, Vidyasagar songs as well. Oldies on&off :-)

Favourite singers
S.P.B, Hariharan, Shankar Mahadevan, Chitra, Sujatha, Sadhana Sargam.

Favourite lines...
mmm...not much of a lyric person....so i'd like to pass it :-)

There is so much about TFM that i like, that am positive have forgotten to mention many. Music is really such a wonderful language to communicate with souls ! :-). No am not talking about aavi amudha ;p

Ok, the tag stops here ! :-) and anyone interested can take it forward

[Song Watch] Zubeidaa

2005-06-25T21:29:00.000-05:00

Zubeidaa by Shyam Benegal, is one of the most under-recognised movie for the effort put-in, for it is a eminently likeable movie. The cast was wonderfully herded by the director and the story was the critical element in the movie. Songs and BGM were simply out-of-the-world.

Presently, we shall get to the review of the songs.

Dheemi Dheemi - Kavita Krishnamurthy (Subramaniam)

A nice and pleasant chords section open the song along with bells and a flowing flute. Gun Gun is the life of the tune, how lilting the section is. Simple rhythm pattern sets in to back the vocals. Somehow, Kavitha's voice suits perfectly with Karishma. A long but enjoyable pallavi, almost 2 minutes.

The interlude, ARR returns to his favorite flute, sweet as a sugarcane ;)

Stanza is a nice continuation of the pallavi with on&off violin orchestra. Sometimes the violin backing is an extension of the tune, sometimes tangential, nonetheless so melodious. The cute use of bells, violin and chords brings one back to the pallavi, not actually Dheemi, but Gun Gun :-)

The second interlude showcases Naveen's mastery over the flute. It looks as if the flute asks questions of you. (3.32 - 3.55) Melodiously so ! what nicety. Man, are we all lucky to have him know, how to handle a flute ;) ARR unleashes a power chord to complete the second interlude.

Second stanza follows the first stanza, and the piece at 4.47 - 4.51 is so beautiful. It feels the tune was composed more with a lullaby backdrop in mind than a romance song.

The song tapers off to the flute playing gun gun with nice chords backing it up.

Wonderful song !. Loses a bit of direction in the middle.

Rating 4.7 out of 5

Mehndi Hai - Alka Yagnik

Heavy bass guitar sets the tone for the song, with Alka yagnik opening Mehndi. A simple and easy pallavi nicely toeing the raga kalyani. The tune follows the traditional mehndi songs, with nice dholaks/tablas and beautiful harps flowing.

Brief but nice Shehnai interlude paves way to the stanza. The section at 2.01-2.05 is a straight from the book lakshana of Kalyani raga. The shehnai continues exploring the various glorious higher octave notes of the raga behind the main song. Underplayed chords complete the stanza.

The second interlude is the best part of the whole song. Listen to 2.55-3.12. The piano is so beautiful and melodious. It somehow fits perfectly with the rhythm pattern that causes one to sway to its nicety. Second stanza is constructed similar to the first stanza, only that we have to put with A.Y's nasal shrillness for a second time.

Alka yagnik, is sometimes so hard/shrill on one's ears :-(

The song ends abruptly, with not enough treatment, that IMHO had so much scope for nice alaap/extension.

Rating 4.3 out of 5

Mein Albeli - Kavita Krishnamurthy & Sukhvinder Singh

The song has a very heavy arabic inspiration. The rhythm/instruments all serve to impress upon the same. Sukhvinder enjoys his role and provides with some 'cool' moments in the song. The song itself has a very run-of-the-mill structure, but it can serve as a perfect case-study to how ARR has added 'layers' of music to it. His embellishments are typically many instruments each one clinging on to their respective theme in the background. On the one hand, there is the accordion accentuating the 'playful'ness and then the regular chords that serve to set the 'mood' of the lines. The bass guitar once again plays the very critical role of keeping the rhythm going. As noted often in my reviews, yet again, you see how the second stanza has been underplayed in terms of use of instruments and the low-key chords etc. This song resembles very much in theme to other ARR compositions like Rang De (Takshak), September Madham (Alai payuthe), Spirit of Rangeela (Rangeela) etc.

Rating 4.1 out of 5

Pyara Sa Gaon - Lata Mangeshkar

A sweet alaap on maand like notes greets us with this wonderful lullaby by ARR. And would it be complete without Naveen on flute ? :-) (00.30 - 00.53) I always keep talking about how chords serve to emphasise/heighten the mood of the melody. The intro music on this song is the perfect example. Between 00.38-00.42 and 00.47-00.51 are the same melody being played, only that the second time around, the chords progressively heighten the 'intense' melody of the song. After a long one minute long intro, ARR lets the song begin. The pallavi flirts with raga maand (actually quite a serious relationship one must add ;)) and a what soothing lullaby it is !. Did ARR's kids enjoy such wonderful put-to-bed songs :-) or are we the only beneficiaries ;) ? The rhythm is simple through the pallavi and almost when the stanza starts, the rhythm gets a bit more enterprising.

Naveen is back with his flute for the interlude and belts out a beauty. Listen to section at 2.26-2.45. Stanza is wonderfully composed and very well sung. I'd like to leave it short and get to the second interlude at 3.41-3.51. Man, i don't have words to describe how i feel when i enjoy that section. Sarangi rules the roost !

(One more place to note the mood change of the song is the flute/chord combo at 5.00-5.05)

The flute finishes off the song....

One word to describe the song is WOW ! How much peaceful, soulful, melodious can a lullaby get. Can a flute be more wonderful than this ?

Rating 4.99 out of 5

Hai Na - Udit Narayan, Alka Yagnik

A brief piece of Santoor opens the song with a hearty rhythm and simple chords with bass guitars. The highlight of the pallavi is when AY hits 'hai na'. Udit opens his account in the album with the casual candy-floss ease. But, that exactly is what is attractive about the song. Santoor continues its way into the first interlude. ARR lets his imagination run wild. Moving from a simple emotion to complex and bring it back to the same light mood, his deft changes on the tune flirts with the mood swings quite easily. The stanza is bit different in terms of the way pallavi was construcuted. The standard hindi movie orchestration of violins running amuck not knowing what role they play is being used to 'accentuate' the 'period'ness of the song. But, try as much as he can, ARR can't bring the feel of, how the typical music director wastes his violin orchestra :-) (i'd leave this vanjapugazchi aNi to you to use per convenience vanjapugazchi aNi means something that can be considered as a compliment or insult, as perceived accordingly).

The second interlude is nice, building upon the theme of the song, with a very minor shift, to quickly remind us of the different emotion possible. Listen to section starting at 3.14-3.30 (especially 3.28, how suddenly there is the shift that adds a sad tinge). The second stanza is completely mastered by Udit, perfectly rendered.

It finishes off with a humming of the theme of the song.

This song is quite easy on the melody and flow and it merely impresses rather than leaving a deep mark. (Personally, however, i like this song very much, purely for its casualness )

Rating 4.3 out of 5

So Gaye - Lata Mangeshkar

This song forms the continuous theme of the music (bgm). Evoking melancholic emotions, using serious orchestration of instruments, this is a slow song. Horn, forms the base of the song, mild humming joins in later. The stanza is the best part of the whole song. With the chorus humming and chords it underscores the emotion. The second interlude is wonderful. It wanders & strays outside the main theme of the song. Starting at 3.05 - 3.54, especially at 3.15 is quite beautiful. It reminds you vaguely of the similar arrangement in 'Nadhiye Nadhiye' (Rhythm). Single layer of piano joins in for the second stanza to complement the tune. The emotions of the song is like complex mosaic. It takes lots of time for one to digest all of them. It is tough to bring them out in words, i'd rather leave it to you to listen. With the variations on the musical theme of song being so obvious, I would have dismissed this immediately as a song from ARR's stable. Well, we all know to expect the unexpected from him :-).

Rating 4.4 out of 5

Chhodo More - Richa Sharma

The review of this song is gonna be brief, but i'd rather detail Gowri Manohari ragam which this song is based on.

The song has beautiful tabla rhythm, with heavy sarangi sections, nice harps & some out of the world chord progressions. Richa Sharma has sung it quite well. The song itself is short but follows the raga to a 'T' with rare/exceptional anniya swaras to be found. Sections to enjoy the creativity in this song are

1.25 - 1.35 Dekho...
2.14-2.22 Sarangi....glorious Gowri Manohari
2.25 - 2.50 chords
2.50-2.55 Ghar... is given a nice treatment

Gowri Manohari is made of s r2 g2 m1 p d2 n3 S. The raga is identified by the following progression g m p n, n n S d p. It is agmark identification of the raga. From time immemorial, this raga has been given red-carpet treatment in the movie industry, but not sure i've heard much in carnatic world that oozes melody as much. Be it, Paatum Naane or Malare Kurinji in earlier days or IR's Kanna Varuvaya (Manadhil Urudhi Vendum) or this song by ARR, the raga itself has stood out so beautifully. If you are upto it, sing/play Kanna Varuvaya and Choddo and the line 'thalai mudhal kaal varai'(Stanza from the song 'Aasai Aasai' - Dhool). They all are the perfect treatment of this raga. But no one would dare to call them copies of each other.

How wonderful is the world of 'creation' of light music based on melodious patterns in carnatic music !

Rating 4.9 out of 5

Overall, the album (as the movie) did not get the deserved credit for its non-mainstream, still amazingly cute and melodious numbers. The movie did not play out any song fully, but man, this album is a MUST HAVE for any melody lover.

Overall Rating 4.6 out of 5

How did you enjoy this review ? Use the comment link below to express yourself :-)

Find more reviews in the music review archives

Acknowledgements : Arun@MusicPaithiyam

You are a winner !!!

2005-06-24T21:46:00.000-05:00

Before you jump to the conclusion that this is some kinda evangelistic post, let me make it clear that i have no such noble intentions.

Yahoo! has the 'Oddly Enough' news section that brings together all kinds of (guess what) odd news items. Well, the following one is surely not odd.

A radio contest announced that the 10th caller would get "100 grand" (grand means thousand dollars). Sure enough, there was the tenth caller who was proclaimed the winner and when she was about to collect the prize, she was given Nestle's 100 Grand chocolate bar. A legal fight has ensued to determine the rest.

This reminds of the hilarious event narrated by my college mate M. In a local saidapet cricket tournament in 1997, it was announced that batsman with most number of 'sixes' would win 10 dollars as prize. And there were many contenders, some serious, about winning the prize. On the d-day the winner was given 10 'murugan padam pOtta dollars' LOL :-) (dollars are the small, variously shaped, metal plates that can be attached to one's necklace or chain :-) )

One more news, that i found funny enough is that, one school in Minneapolis, has decided to offer 'online physical education classes'

I think in that spirit, the blog world can come up with virtual blogs. Where there will not any new postings on the blogs and the reader has to 'imagine' the post instead. But it should be mandated that they still comment on those imaginary posts ;-p LOL.

Dragging self back to the work week ahead....grrrrhhhhh....

Blogger opens up attaching images !

2005-06-24T10:04:00.000-05:00

Finally, Google has relented !!!!

More details on Blogger opening up on attaching images can be found here

What's more, they let you choose the layout of the where the images can be, upload the full-sized picture and scale it down appropriately :-)

Nice !!!!!

DC Area Blogger Meet

2005-06-22T12:34:00.000-05:00

*FLASH : UPDATE => The time and venue has been fixed . It is set to be SSV Temple, Saturday, 9th of July, 2005 at 4.30 PM. More information can be found at this post*

Dear Fellow Bloggers,
We plan to organize DC Area Blogger Meet, to bring together many bloggers from around this area.

It is not restricted to bloggers from just this locality, all interested bloggers are still most welcome, no amway/pyramid schemers please ;p

Tentatively, I would like to propose the date as Saturday, 9-JUL-05 Noon as the date & time of the meet. Based on the availability and comfort level of everyone involved we can work out the logistics. Venue is yet to be decided, but SSVT & Madras palace(dutch-lunch-buffett) makes a good combo, i would guess ?

We have a big gang in this area... Raman,Eswar,Siva,Ganesh,Srikanth,Robbie,Thennavan,Senthil and many more.

Let us use the comments area to agree broadly upon the time, date & venue. In the interest of everyone, I think we should have a list of people expected. I will setup an email id that can be mailed to for that purpose and also to confirm the head count.

Request you all to advertise the meet, it would really be nice to associate faces to words !

So long....

*FLASH : UPDATE => The time and venue has been fixed . It is set to be SSV Temple, Saturday, 9th of July, 2005 at 4.30 PM. More information can be found at this post*

[Movie Watch] Anniyan

2005-06-19T15:17:00.000-05:00

Anniyan, the much hyped, rumored costliest ever, south-indian movie made. Ram C of the blogworld had written an excellent review. He had it nicely balanced out, detailing many of the aspects.

I'd like to add my two cents on top of his review.

With the exception of Kadhalan & Jeans, all of Shankar's movies, have some common trait. They all have a flair for grandeur. There is a strong undercurrent social message for the citizens. There is the hero, a lone warrior, who works towards a mass-movement, never has an easy ending while caught. The hero does not escape the easy route of people shouting the court/government out at the climax. They have more sincerity towards the social message than most other 'claims' made by directors. They have top-class music and good commercial elements housed in it for it to be a commercially viable success.

This movie is no different. There is no denying that, you can repeat the mantra of citizen-responsibility-accountability thousand times and it is still worth repeating. Well, not sure this is applicable in the movie world. It slightly makes one shift in the chair for its repetitive theme. His ideas are still worth applauding.

From a movie perspective, i found the comedy of Vivek, who does not get his 'own track' but nicely integrates and gels with the main movie, to be the best aspect of the entire movie. The acting by Vikram in some cases had an 'affected' style. It was like, you could see he was 'acting' while acting is like making you think they are living it out !. You'd never think Kamal was acting as the Indian thatha. But here, Vikram's Ambi role could clearly be seen as 'affected'. Sada, was at her best, very artifical too. As Ram pointed out, her dancing skills need some serious honing. The music (bgm) just passed the grade. There is nothing that you take out of the movie as hummable pieces. Even though the stunt/choreography was nice, the protracted matrix style frame-freeze technique is pushing the limits of audience's patience. If super-star Rajini's tyre-dodging itself can evoke smiles/laughter at the end of the sequence, there is no double guessing what would be the outcome here. But the stunts themselves were pretty novel. Camera work was good. I felt it to be a bit too-close up. May be my second row from the front had left me with that impression.

The dance sequences, situations, choreography, dresses etc need to be *seriously* revisited by Shankar. One could clearly see the 'Anbe Anbe' (Jeans) effect on 'Iyengaru' and 'Gopala' (Kadhalan) on 'Rendakka'.

As already pointed out by so many people, am not sure as to where all the 27 odd crores of rupees was spent !. I am positive that it could have been completed at less than half the cost, if the matrix-sequence had been cut short.

Sujatha, has, as always, done a wonderful job with dialogues. His command over the language is excellent.

Overall, i left the theater with a mixed feeling. I still have mixed feelings !.

The masses inching out of theater gleefully shouting into the camera could be heard saying...

'oru vaati parkalam'
'vikram acting super'
'vivek kalakitaaru'
'idhu oru nalla social awareness padam'

Algorithm to lyric writing... ?

2005-06-19T15:03:00.000-05:00

Ramesh Mahadevan, is a very gifted and talented writer. He writes on various topics with adequately exaggerated narration, humorous & witty puches and free-flowing style. While googling to find out whether he has a blog, i ran across this article, actually couple of them, about Vairamuthu's lyric writing.

A snippet from his article...

Algorithm number 1 is very simple. Just take any object. Think for a second and discover one of its attributes. It doesn't matter if there is anything creative or poetic about the attribute and the object. You simply say 'Object-kku attribute azhagu'. For example,

Rasathukku uppazhagu, vishathukku warning azhagu
pazhathukku juice azhagu, kizhathukku thadi azhagu
(Salt beautifies rasam; 'warning' beautifies poison; juice beautifies a fruit and a walking stick beautifies an old person)

You can carry this one step further and compose the next stanza,

Wire-kku current azhagu Vaigaikku karai azhagu
Vayatrukku thoppul azhagu, vairathukku muthazhagu
(current is cute for the wire bank is cute for Vaigai river bellybutton is cute for the belly and diamond is cute for pearl)

For the actual articles please follow the links Algorithm 1 and Algorithm 2

His Website

Continuing unfinished business....

2005-06-16T22:36:00.000-05:00

Munimma a.k.a Bunkum Verbosa had written this Part-I of a story and thrown an open-ended offer for anyone to continue/complete the story.

This is my attempt at the same.

Sowmya's nostalgic moments were cut short by the cry of the phone. She knew it was her husband. He usually calls her up for sweet-little-nothings for a few minutes amidst his hectic IT job. She excused herself and walked over to the phone. She could clearly feel how odd it was. Normally, she'd run over to pick up the phone, but this time around, there was this tiny little hesitation. She hurried the conversation and she could clearly feel how obvious it was.

"Sorry Rajesh, that was my hubby"

Rajesh said "I did not mean to interrupt.." getting up, as if preparing to depart, nonetheless hesistant.

It was only understandable that the unspoken emotions masked the spoken words between them during their teenage. It had just been a year after Sowmya had come over to their colony, when fate had its own way. Their relationship never had the oppurtunity to develop, with Rajesh having to bow to the parental-pressure of taking up engineering and having to stay out-of-town. He'd invent many excuses to come back home, possibly once in a month.

"Coffee is getting cold, shall i warm it up again ?". That was sowmya, affectionately. Not sure what adjective one would use to describe the affection.

It was understandably difficult for both of them to talk about how they ended up where they are.

He was the one who had serious feelings, if it could be called that, but was never bold enough to make the ultimate decision to convey his feelings. All the junkyard of movies he had watched, had programmed him to worry about how he may end up losing even being with her, if he popped the ultimate question (azhudha kaadhali annanu sonna...)

On her part, she obviously felt the flirts and passes Rajesh made at her was openly indicative of his mind. But knowing fully well, the prankster Rajesh was, it would be tough for her to even know whether he was pulling a joke on her.

All the while, they knew each other better or so did they think.

And then it happened, one of Rajesh's pranks terribly mis-fired.

(who's gonna continue the story..? they have the liberty to either add one more part to the story to throw it open and make it soap or complete it, making it a short story)

Archives, Features & Requests

2005-06-15T22:16:00.000-05:00

I am hoping that Google listens to users request for categorization of blog posts. I would like to add to that request by asking the categorization to bring posts from archives as well.

Till the time google offers that feature, I decided to take on the responsibility myself. Most of my blogs are marked with distinct qualifiers like [song watch] [book watch] [sports watch] etc to help inform the user the context of the blog.

To allow for the look up from archives, i've compiled (manually though) the list of past music/book reviews into a page that will be 'permanently linked' from the sidebar (right under my profile).

Please use them to pull up reviews from archives. To enable easier usage, the page is marked with 'Last updated date'.

I am also planning on coming up with a 'review request tracking' page that will help keep track of the numerous requests, that you all keep inspiring me to write :-)

Hope this helps. Ideas most welcome :-)

[C says..] Computer

2005-06-13T22:53:00.000-05:00

I am a computer....people use me for everything and then call me an idiot

See C's Origin

[C says..] Mirror

2005-06-13T22:21:00.000-05:00

I am a Mirror....I reflect the real 'faces' of people.

See C's Origin

Book tag

2005-06-12T10:34:00.000-05:00

The recent phenomenon in the blogosphere has been 'book tag'. By this, one writes about the books they have had, they read, books they like the best and 'tag' five other people. The five who have been 'tagged' inturn do the same, there by 'networking' people.

I have been tagged by 'Robbie' of Scientific Masala

Books I own: Have never counted, but not that many i'd guess. I rarely re-visit a book after I read...

Last book I Read: History of Tamils & Summa Theologica

Three books that mean a lot to me: Trick Question. Not to say these are written in stone. (I've changed five books to three, but ye all must still use five book format)

Sherlock Holmes Series : Holmes is "THE BEST" detective character ever produced and i will never give up a chance to read them again

Larry Ellison, Intimate potrayl of Oracle : This was the first corporate/biography mode of books that get me into reading like crazy. Hence will always eat the extra space in my heart. (Find details in my review archives)

Dilbert : Best of Dilbert series - Scott Adams has a knack for capturing and adequately understating the workplace humor

I tag :
Well, i think i will play it safe by tagging Raman ,Siva,Eswar,Arun,Manoj

Gentlemen, please do the honors !!

[Song Watch] Ayutha Ezhuthu

2005-06-09T19:11:00.000-05:00

Ayutha Ezhuthu by Mani Ratnam was an action thriller with a 'message' and the novel (to tamil industry) of narrating three people's lives and how they intersect.

Music was by the maestro ARR. On many hearings, it did little to tickle the melody 'lover' in one. However, as with many ARR's albums, it finally grew on me. Lets get to the review without much further ado.

Sanda Kozhi - Madhushree

The song opens with bells (like cow bells) and a nice and easy ghatam piece. Madhushree opened her account with Tamil songs, not on a very good note, one must add. The pallavi is very very cute, the melody only dampened by her pronounciation. A nice udukkai joins in to setup a catchy rhythm and the plucking of the stringed instrument (guitar or mandolin) brings a deeply relaxing mood to the song.

There is little or no interlude, highly unlike ARR. Power chords of the highest order greet you when the stanza starts at vaangi thandha vethala. The crescendo is comfortably handled by the singer bringing back to the anupallavi, devoid of any musical instrument, but for the rhythm. The occasional bells here and there are so simple but provide such a pleasing context to the song.

The second interlude was a precursor to the now-familiar mature singer in ARR. The alaap is so wonderfuly free flowing, with guitar nicely backing up his vocals. Latter half of the interlude switches the song for a brief period into 'grimness' from its casual feel....the interlude fades into the second stanza.

This time around, as his wont, ARR reduces the power chords to just chords ;). To the keen observer in you, would notice this 'style' of ARR where the chords of his second stanza is always under-played or minimal when compared to his first stanza. Sometimes it is very disappointing. In this case it is apt.

The song closes off with the same sombre note it started.

It is a wonderfully done song, very folksy, quite casual but, does not sound that 'peppy'. Somber i think is the best word to describe.

Rating 4.6 out of 5

Jana Gana Mana - A.R. Rahman, Karthik

A typical rock number opening greets with acoustic guitars leading the way. ARR hits the higher notes in his 'strained' style. ohh yuva yuva is full of emotion. Strings section dominate the song. The rhythm has stick/clap on top of the regular beats to bring a grandise touch to the song.

The whistle interlude sounds like title music of a wild west movie. It is quite cool, brings vague memories of lines (stanza) from the song 'tauba tauba' (Vande Mataram). Alaap from the opening lines continue in the background of the interlude.

The stanza goes from monotonous 'ayudham edu' to ecstatic 'irulai porAdu'. The mood swing is wonderful, but at the end of it, it brings the song back to the monotony mood.

Second Stanza has more guitar backing and improvised rhythm, but the instruments sound too 'crowded'. To make it up, the pallavi has only strings to back it up :-)

The bass guitar finally steps in to bring such a cool feel to the song. One wonders, why the stanzas had to be that different in musical structure from the pallavi ? Another ARR experiment ?

Rating 4.2 out of 5

Hey Goodbye Nanba - Sunitha Sarathy, Shankar Mahadevan, Lucky Ali, Karthik

The song is a techno-pop dance number. The song feels as if it is made of three different sub-songs. The first sub-song is the 'hey goodbye nanba' - it has the dreamy/romantic flavor to it. The second sub-song is the 'nee yaaro naan yaaro' - this has a typical pop feel to it. The third sub-song is the 'kalla vizhigalil' (starting at 1.33) is a simple,melodious, fast paced section.

Even though all of them are 'connected' via the overall song..the connection seems very 'artifical'. The subsongs individually nice themselves but together it makes the 'kalla vizhigalil' section stand out and other two pieces fade out.

Out and out experimental piece. I would not be sure of the successful outcome of this expirement.

Rating 3.9 out of 5

Nenjam Ellam - Adnan Sami, Sujatha

Haunting loop of music welcomes us that runs throughout the song. Drunken sounding, Adnan Sami, who now seems to be a permanent fixture, joins Sujatha in this song. All the instruments used, can never be thought of as a filmi song. The overall song has a variety of instruments thrown into it, they gel well, but never sound 'natural'. It adds such a 'gadget' touch to the song. The melancholic tune structure, with beautiful singing by Sujatha redeems the melody aspect. Once again, very valid attempt at fusion, only this time the elements being fused are not carnatic & western, it seems to be western & western !

Rating 4.1 out of 5

Yaakai Thiri - Sunitha Sarathy, AR. Rahman, Shalini Singh

So many reviews have called it a disco number. I dont feel like disagreeing with them. But would have to add that, this is a better song as most reviews have made it out to be. The rhythm is as good as any fast number. The tune has arabic touch it, which is, but expected, from ARR - be it Humma Humma or Chayya Chayya. ARR's alaap is wonderful with the song getting into a mode of repetitive recitation swaying the dancer in you.

Rating 4.2 out of 5

Dol Dol - Blazee, Shaheen

Another disco/rap number, the loop is haunting, setting you up for another grim but melodious piece. Trumpet (?) piece is very nice (sounds like Sivaranjani ?). Quite passable song. It more showcases the skills of the programmer than a composer.

Rating 3.8 out of 5

Mani Ratnam - ARR combo has been producing musically rich and wonderful movies. This was another movie they setout to do with no music in mind. But having ARR sit in front of you and get no songs out of him is like having cute little baby in front of you and controlling your urge to curve your lips for a smile. Irresistible !

MR tried once in Alaipayuthe and failed to resist the temptation. He tried it second time in this movie and failed once again and finally had ARR compose the songs.

The entire album had a bold, non-mainstream, (still)fast pace to it. As with dance numbers, it has a touch of melancholy to all the songs which leaves a 'deep' mark in you. You may not necessarily smile after this album, but still feel relaxed.

Overall Rating 4.2 out of 5

How did you enjoy this review ? Use the comment link below to express yourself :-)

Find more reviews in the music review archives

Acknowledgements : Arun@MusicPaithiyam

[Sports Watch] Tennis Roundup

2005-06-08T20:11:00.000-05:00

Sania Mirza, after creating much expectations, has struggled to live up to the pressure & hype created by the media. She lost in the opening round in French Open Championships. She has been plagued by injuries. We'll keep a close watch on her progress in the coming days. It is too early to judge her abilities as yet.

Agassi's ignominious exit from the French open let loose the talk of him retiring from active tennis. Agassi is a master at comebacks. Is this too late for a comeback ?. It is sad that a person of his class, as evident by Sampras's remarks that Agassi can give a run for his money anyday, has to face such petty talks about his retirment time.

Interestingly enough, Agassi kept saying at every given oppurtunity at the rivalry with Sampras as 'Sampras is one person, who could still beat me, even while I play my best tennis'.

Talking of Sampras, the person touted as the next Sampras, Roger Federer, apparently inherited Sampras's nemesis as well. The French Open. Sampras's only missing trophy was the french and Federer has not been able to get to it either. Will Federer live upto Sampras reputation ?.

Even though Federer has better allround game than Sampras, he does not have a flair for serve & volley like Sampras did, neither does his forehand appear as deadly as the running forehand of Sampras. Pistol Pete is The Peak. I'd hate to see Sampras lose the throne :-(

Rafael Nadal, the new sensation, would be watched out for his performance on grass. There were many such 'couple of season' sensations on clay. Like Beresatagui, who used to hit the ball with only one side of his racket for both the forehand and backhand. (He was the surprise finalist at french open in 1994.)

Our own Leander Paes & Martina Navratilova - two 'old workhorses' who never seem to tire, inched their way upto the finals in mixed doubles. Both of them are known for their reflexes and sharp angles and perfect placement of the exchanges at the net.

Back home, when any sports fever was around the corner, that would spill onto the streets well. Football worldcup meant everyone on the roads with a football, not so much for hockey ;)...and goes without saying cricket would *always* be on our roads :-)

Keeping that in mind, we went to some local courts to play tennis, and crowded court greeted us, there was no chanting from the crowd except the sound of tennis balls getting hit around. All the courts were full. What a bummer :-(

As they say, mazhai penja adhuleye oru quick kuliyal eduthukko, i decided to use the time that i'd have played tennis to blog about tennis ;) atleast konjam satisfaction :-)

Who is Maithili ?

2005-06-06T19:44:00.000-05:00

Before you all jump to conclusion, this is not about T.Rajendar's movie. This is supposedly internal conversations from one of India's premier IT solutions company.

Read it bottom up.....it is very very very nice *witty* comedy.

-----Original Message-----
From: Aniljoshi
Posted At: Friday, September 03, 1999 11:39 AM
Posted To: General
Conversation: What is Maithili?

Subject: German's ,Jews, Aryans
We sit before the monitor staring into the pixels,
making faces the whole day like monkeys. And you claim
that you are not in this monkey business? Beats me!!
ANIL JOSHI

-----Original Message-----
From: AnandV
Posted At: Friday, September 03, 1999 11:13 AM
Posted To: General
Conversation: All Infoscians are dravidians

Subject: All Infoscians are dravidians
My theory is first step to identify software engrs.I'm
more interested in showing that software engrs are not
monkeys (bcas they are not aryans) which my house
owner believes!!!

-----Original Message-----
From: DHRUVAV
Posted At: Friday, September 03, 1999 11:09 AM
Posted To: General
Conversation: All Infoscians are dravidians

Subject: teachers and dravidian
Your theory only proves that Software engineers are
not aryans.Therefore they can be any thing other than
aryans and not only dravidians.
-----Original Message-----
From: AnandV
Posted At: Friday, September 03, 1999 11:04 AM
Posted To: General
Conversation: All Infoscians are dravidians

Subject: All Infoscians are dravidians
B'cas only teachers (arya's) are aryans. So all
software engr's are dravidians.All Infoscians are
software engrs........Hence the proof...

-----Original Message-----
From: raghavendrak
Posted At: Friday, September 03, 1999 11:00 AM
Posted To: General
Conversation: What is Maithili?

Subject: Aryans- H aryana
Let me get it clear.Are u suggesting that all people
in haryana are monkeys?????
-----Original Message-----
From: ashokkm
Posted At: Friday, September 03, 199910:59 AM
Posted To: General
Conversation: What is Maithili?

Subject: Aryans- H aryana
No, Only the native of Haryana are are aryans b'coz U
just remove the 'H' in Haryana so it becomes
aryana.Agreed or not????
-----Original Message-----
From: raghavendrak
Posted At: Friday, September 03, 1999 10:54 AM
Posted To: General
Conversation: What is Maithili?

Subject: German's ,Jews, Aryans are Indians
Then even monkeys are aryans!!!!!!(I think they too
have 10 fingers). That's what ramayan says. So all
vanars were also aryans!!!
-----Original Message-----
From: Aniljoshi
Posted At: Friday, September 03, 1999 10:50 AM
Posted To: General
Conversation: What is Maithili?

Subject: German's ,Jews, Aryans are Indians
How logical!! Now I could easily prove that even
Africans are Aryans. They have 10 fingers- so they are
aryans. They have 10 toes on their feet - so they are
aryans. Thanks for proving that all are aryans.
ANIL JOSHI

-----Original Message-----
From: Kedardesai
Posted At: Friday, September 03, 1999 10:40 AM
Posted To: General
Conversation: What is Maithili?

Subject: Proof:German's ,Jews, Aryans are Indians
Indians invented the decimal system. Ravan(Jew) had
ten heads, Ram's father(aryan + German)had ten
chariots (Dash-rath) etc.Thus , the base is 10. There
fore they are all Indians
-----Original Message-----
From: Aniljoshi
Posted At: Friday, September 03, 1999 9:58 AM
Posted To: General
Conversation: What is Maithili?

Subject: MAJOR FALLACY- Aryans/Germans
Germans don't play cricket. So cricketers can't be
germans. QED
ANIL JOSHI

-----Original Message-----
From: Dinni Lingaraj
Posted At: Friday, September 03, 1999 9:56 AM
Posted To: General
Conversation: What is Maithili?

Subject: MAJOR FALLACY- Aryans/ Germans
It just occured that a better subject would have been
"CRICKET" but this one stopped ...."Are our cricketers
Aryans/Germans ?" So we got to solve this one !
-----Original Message-----
From: Aniljoshi
Posted At: Friday, September 03, 1999 9:55 AM
Posted To: General
Conversation: What is Maithili?

Subject: Major fallacy/Aryans & Germans
Let the 'intellectuals' decide... you will know who
you are soon enough.
ANIL JOSHI

-----Original Message-----
From: Yeshwant Dattatreya
Posted At: Friday, September 03, 19999:39 AM
Posted To: General
Conversation: What is Maithili?

Subject: MAJOR FALLACY- Aryans/Germans
OH BOY!! WHO ARE WE?
-----Original Message-----
From: ashokkm
Posted At: Friday, September 03, 19999:37 AM
Posted To: General
Conversation: What is Maithili?

Subject: Major fallacy/Aryans & Germans
According to maxmuller, Aryans came from Middle East.
According to Bal Gangadhar Tilak, Antarctica was the
home place of Aryans. And Swami Dayanand Saraswati
says Aryans were originally from India b'coz the place
"saptsandhav" that is described many times in their
book is nothing but Doab region between Ganga &
Jamuna. And One theory according Bhagwandas is that
Aryans were originally from India then they went to
middle east and after some time they returned back to
India. So there are different theories about the
origin of Aryans but recent belief is that only India
was their native-land.

-----Original Message-----
From: Aniljoshi
Posted At: Friday, September 03, 19999:37 AM
Posted To: General
Conversation: What is Maithili?

Subject: MAJOR FALLACY- Aryans/Germans
So, at present we are at a point where MK's son is a
Russian, implying MK is a Russian. MK is a ardent
follower of Ravan who is a German Jew. Looks like the
german govt running Karnataka(see our previous
discussions for a proof of it) is conniving with the
Russian govt at Tamilnadu (who support German) to
fight the Italian Govts reps at 10 Janpath road. Some
heavy international politics we have going on here.
Wat's d'ya say man!!
ANIL JOSHI

-----Original Message-----
From: amajumder
Posted At: Friday, September 03, 1999 9:21 AM
Posted To: General
Conversation: What is Maithili?

Subject: MAJOR FALLACY- Aryans/Germans
Importance: High
Might be Russians too.. that explains why MK's son is
called STALIN.

-----Original Message-----
From: raghavendrak
Posted At: Friday, September 03, 1999 9:13 AM
Posted To: General
Conversation: What is Maithili?

Subject: MAJOR FALLACY- Aryans/Germans
Say this to the DMK and they're gonna kick u!!
according to them Ravan was a dravidian and was
attacked by ram as ram was an aryan. So if Ram was a
german, and assuming he was a 'hitlerite 'aryan, then
Ravan must have been a jew!!!

-----Original Message-----
From: Aniljoshi
Posted At: Thursday, September 02, 1999 6:57 PM
Posted To: General
Conversation: What is Maithili?

Subject: MAJOR FALLACY- Aryans/Germans
No, on the contrary it proves that Ravan was a German
since it was he who owned the Pushpak Viman. The
passengers could belong to any country.
ANIL JOSHI

-----Original Message-----
From: vishnoor
Posted At: Thursday, September 02, 1999 5:44 PM
Posted To: General
Conversation: What is Maithili?

Subject: major fallacy...
After defeating ravana .... Sri Rama flew back in
Ravana's pushpak vimana & This is what the Mordern
Lufthansa is . It is the modern version of the older
pushpaka vimana. The pushpak vimana was "driven" by
hansa or swans.... The insignia of Lufthansa is also a
swan... This further proves Sri Rama was a German Hail
Rama ....

-----Original Message-----
From: khandelwalh
Posted At: Thursday, September 02, 199912:54 PM
Poted To: General
Cnversation: What is Maithili?

Subject: major fallacy...
the argument is wrong. the conclusion is fallacious
-----Original Message-----
From: vishnoor
Posted At: Thursday, September 02, 1999 4:44 PM
Posted To: General
Conversation: What is Maithili?

Subject: Mithla
Rama was an aryan ; Germans claim to be aryans so Rama
was a German Hail Rama....

-----Original Message-----

From: ashokkm
Posted At: Thursday, September 02, 199911:53 AM
Posted To: General
Conversation: What is Maithili?

Subject: Mithla
And what about Home minister Advani & Noble Prize
winner Economics Dr. Amartya Sen???
-----Original Message-----
From: Sudha Vedula
Posted At: Thursday, September 02, 19994:02 PM
Posted To: General
Conversation: What is Maithili?

Subject: Mithla & Maithili
God Shiva is also a foreigner becauseMt.Kailash is in
China. Buddha was also a foreigner because Lumbini(?)
is in Nepal. So was Guru Nanak, because Talwandi is in
Pakistan. So was Porus. So was Gandhari.....:)
-----Original Message-----
From: Vikas Sharma
Posted At: Thursday, September 02, 1999 10:14 AM
Posted To: General
Conversation: What is Maithili?

Subject: Mithla & Maithili
Recently one Congress leader, in defense of Sonia,
quoted that Sita was also a foreigner because
Janakpuri is in Nepal.
-----Original Message-----
From: Pranav Chandra
Posted At: Wednesday, September 01,1999 1:10 PM
Posted To: General
Conversation: What is Maithili?

Subject: Mithla & Maithili
Maithili is a language which derives it's name from
the region in Bihar where it is spoken, the old
kingdom of Mithla. There is a reference to the area
even in Ramayana- Janak( Father of Sita) was king of
Mithla and has been referred to as MithlaNaresh at
many places in RamCharitraManas - therefore Sita was
also called Maithili.

-----Original Message-----
From: Subhashis Roy
Posted At: 1999"N9OE?1"=FA 13:03
Posted To: General
Conversation: What is Maithili?

Subject: what is Maithili ?
Importance: High
Maithili brahmins are known for their gastronome
qualities !!!

-----Original Message-----
From: yogesh
Posted At: Wednesday, September 01,1999 12:12 PM
Posted To: General
Conversation: What is Maithili?

Subject: re: what is maithili
Maithili is a language spoken in central bihar. It has
its own literature.It has its root in the old kingdom
of that area.It is similar to Hindi.

-----Original Message-----
From: himanshudas
Posted At: Wednesday, September 01, 1999 9:06 AM
Posted To: General
Conversation: What is Maithili?

Subject: What is Maithili?
Hi!
Who or what is Maithili, in context of Indian literature?

__________________________________

Shark Tank

2005-06-05T21:20:00.000-05:00

I am yet to pick up new set of books after the recent 'History of Tamils' & 'Summa Theologica'. Before mid-2003, i used to limit myself to the umpteenth read of Sherlock Holmes and not the best, but still cut above the rest, Hercule Poirot - though always whining about how it does not stand up to Holmes. Since late 2003, thanks to AN, have diversified my reading portfolio and started to include many subjects. Since those days, it has only been the past two weeks that i have not had any serious book to read. This period of no-books has literally pushed me into a vaccum. Never knew i was that addicted to books. Have to pick up books positively this weekend.

As a filler, i resorted to Computerworld's & Infoworld's of the world. Pretty casual reads, but they don't even standup for one-way of the commute :-(

Notwithstanding the tech-talk in those mags, the lighter moments were the best. Last week i had posted about how 'eggs are tasty' from Infoworld.

This week it is from Computerworld.

Funny Scene 1 : During a demo of 'email client', the company asked the user to pick his most important mail, deleted the mail - to show how it can be salvaged. And guess what happened next ? He never managed to restore the 'most important mail' of the user.

Never do 'live demos' again

Funny Scene 2 : CIO emails all employees via the company email explaining how company email will not be available anymore on the web for security reasons. He gets a mail back by an employee from her company mail id saying she never knew that the company had email and she was interested in getting one. The CIO promptly forwarded the mail to the network & admin department to get her one :-)

Reminds me of the ad by IBM "I sent an email about the email server being down"

Funny Scene 3: While at the salon, X told the stylist, 'just now clearing up the mess that my boss had created when he killed the server'. It took a long time for the shocked stylist to understand X did not work at a restaurant rather in IT :-)

All of this and more can be read at Computerworld.com

Disclaimer : All companies, products & sites are registered trademarks and are copyrighted appropriately. This includes the 'shark tales'. Please do not attempt to send an email when the email server is down.

[Book Watch] History of Tamils..follow up

2005-06-03T20:19:00.000-05:00

'History of Tamils, From the Earliest Times to 600 A.D' by P.T.Srinivasa Iyengar.

I had blogged the initial opinion about the book here

The book tries to reconstruct the 'history' by whatever discernible evidences of culture/life-style is made available via the ancient literature/poetry. It is scary to realise that what we all call as 'history' is what was passed via hearsay for generations of ages till writing/scripture became part of our culture. What is to say the disciples did not 'change the meaning or add new text' the original information :-(

For the better part of the book, poetry fills the pages up. Gosh, reading that poetry stuff makes your head go round in circles, like a battery powered train, never coming to a stop, but forced to sulk when the battery runs out ;)

It is also funny to observe how the author takes potshots at other contemporaries and their conclusions despite the fact that his modus-operandi is no different than others. However, one has to appreciate the 'logical' conclusions the author attempts to arrive at.

This books leaves you bit tired because of the way it is organized. There is no coherence/flow of topics as noted in the initial thoughts

Some politcal parties of TN would be happy to agree with the content of the book, which says that 'Aryas' were not native to Tamil Soil. However Aryas slowly but surely worked their way down via 'culture infiltration' rather than 'physical' i.e. Arya culture was inculcated into the lifestyle and making people 'think' in Aryan lifestyle, especially the use of 'fire' as the mouth of 'God' which explains why all 'yagnas' and 'funerals' are conducted with 'fire' as the ultimate vehicle of transportation to God (i.e. the mouth of God)

There is nothing that is very controversial in the book that enlivens the subject matter except for attempting to persistenly define the culture of people in various ages.

It is a valid, nonetheless amusing, point that the author makes while saying 'all the references in poetry of the lifestyle of citizens must be tempered or taken in moderation, since bards were beggarly, in the sense they did not have any other means of earning their food & drink, but by singing the praises of the chief-tain'

Very sobering and not-so-disagreeable argument.

The author uses this to rubbish many claims as to how 'ascendants' of various dynasties like Chola, Chera & Pandya, were called as Gods themselves, were nothing but the hyper-imagination and exaggeration of the bards for want of recognition of livelyhood :-)

Another interesting remark is that of 'names'. Agastya was a common name then, and there could have been many rishis who took that name but were not the 'real' Agastya and he uses time-factoring from various literature to say all references to 'Agastya' were not essentially the same person. Like this, the author attempts to 'assign' ages to people which makes it very reasonable.

Not till the end, did the major speculation or conspiracy theory come. It was about 'thiruKuRaL'. Thirukural is considered as 'THE' treatise on 'life'. The author devotes an entire section titled 'The indebtedness of Kural to Sanskrit culture' claims (based on V.R.R Diskhitar's (then) upcoming book) that Thirukural is heavily influenced by the works of Sanskrit writers on the four objects of human life, the Purusarthas of the Aryan scared books.

'But whether he borrows his material from Sanksrit or follows Tamil tradition, he displays an originality of treatment and a sequence of ideas entire his own, which contributes much to the merit of the poem'

'It is reasonable to assume that Tiruvalluvar follows mainly in his Arappal the most popular Dharma Sastra of Manu, and in his Porutpal the well known Artha Sastra of Kautalya. Though these works seem to be the main sources of information, it can be conclusively proved that the poet was familiar with the Panchatrantra and Hitopadesa, the slokas included in the Satakas of Bhartrhari, the Ramayana, the Mahabharata and the Kamandaki nitisara, and other allied literature'

There are very many examples cited (including references to Sanskrit literature had already expressed what kural attempts to ) to support this theory.

On the whole, at the end of this mega-book, 600 odd pages(thankfully the poems save the day by eating up more than 30% of the pages ;) ) one leaves the book with a mixed feeling.

One gets to understand how life, culture, civilization evolved, how identities were developed & associated with religion etc.

Would rate this book quite high. It is a 'should-read' for people interested in 'history/civilization/tamil literature'. Not recommended for 'mystery/conspiracy theory seekers'

A very refreshing break from the monotony of books I had. Have to profusely thank XX (he knows who he is-Thank you !!) for lending me this book, the age of which, by itself is ancient history (1928-29).

Happy Reading !

[Song Watch] Roja

2005-05-30T15:10:00.000-05:00

Roja by Mani Ratnam, starring Arvind Swamy & Madhubala.

Many people, including yours truly, were awestruck when we first saw the song on Independence Day, 1992. DD telecast this song, which had a sound that was *totally* never heard before and had 'ad'ish tinge to it. I still remember where i was when i first heard that song, and all the images are etched like 'pasumarathaani', heard the song couple of more times that day and was like 'IR rocks' :-D. Yes, at that time IR did.

Little did i know that the music director (ARR) would take the cherished spot in millions of hearts with his lilting and soulful music.

ARR's Roja has been included in TIME Magazine's Best SoundTracks of All Time (Thanks Ganesh for breaking the news :-)

I decided, i'd give the other planned reviews a short-circuit and write about Roja instead.

Chinna Chinna Aasai - Minmini

Opens with a cool flute/guitar combo that sets the 'youth' in you jumping to the cute rhythm. This opening reminds you of jingles in those days. (by ARR ofcourse). Minmini opens the song (used to sound like younger day Janaki) nicely picturised, awesome lyrics.

The chimes of the bell are cute.

Interlude has a nice violin like instrument belting out folk notes. Listen to 1.55-1.58 -it simply has a 60's musical touch to the flute.

The stanza is simple, with flute & chords doing a stellar job of conveying the joy of the young girl. Before you know, the stanza is over and you end up at chinna chinna

Second interlude has 'dandiya' to setup the rhythm and our man ARR adorning filling in with a nice alaap...what a dreamy simplicity to it !

The second stanza is no different from the first. The beauty of the song is its recording. I don't know what it is called 'technically'. But, you hear the 'overlap' of minmini's voice i.e like an echo effect. This produces a 'dreamy' texture to the voice. Since ARR started using this mechanism, it has since been commonly followed.

Overall nice and cute song, but broke traditions & set the stage for announcing the new genius.

For the raga lovers, nothing fanciful found...notes of Harikambhoji :-)

Rating 4.5 out of 5

Kadhal Rojave - S.P.B

A melancholic hum of melody in raga 'Desh' starts the song. The 'bass' guitar sets the 'serious'ness of the mood. The sounds of the instruments were (are) all new. The 'kaapi'/'desh' combo of the tune is excellently intonated by SPB the master. The tabla thrown in is clearly reminiscent of the 'Loy Mendosa' days.

Naveen on flute is so loveable in the interlude. With the hum and flute combo improvising on the initial intro, the stage for the first stanza is set. The soulful rendition by SPB is out of the world and the chords (power chords one should say) ooze melody & do a wonderful job of conveying the sadness.

Second interlude is the same as the intro music. This was actually a style that ARR used till 97-98 i.e. the intro piece being developed upon as the second interlude. He still does that occasionally.

Beautiful, top-class melody spoke of ARR's abilities.

On a related note, there was a imitation of this song, ('Tere liye janam', Ajay Devgan) which imitates every aspect of the song, including ragas, instruments, picturization etc.

Rating 5 out of 5

Pudhu Vellai Mazhai - Unni Menon, Sujatha

A battalion of talent, that had been ignored erstwhile, was resurrected at the advent of ARR. The classic example was that of Sujatha. She had debuted long time back but never clicked and always shadowed/left behind by Chitra.

These had a neo-age feeling to it. It reminded one of the opening music of the tv version of writer Sujatha's 'Geno' (Nee Nila Naan Sibi anyone ?). The use of instruments conveys perfectly the ambience and location of the song and would be picturized superbly well.

Sujatha opens the song with pudhu vellai mazhai Unni joins in for the duet. nadhiye nee takes the song to a different plane before bringing it back to the opening of the song.

The interlude continues its work on the lovely sounds. Lyrics have to be noted here.

male : penn illadha oorile adi aan poo kaetpadhillai
female : penn illadha oorile kodi dhaan poo poopadhillai

Translation
male : men don't buy flowers in a place that has no women
female : in a place that has no women, flowers don't bloom

As remarked since, Vairamuthu and ARR have worked towards bringing some 'sanity' in the quality & lyrics they use. I would'nt label them as 'leaders of the lyrics revolution' but they are at the fore-front.

The stanzas are simply superb. All you have to do is close your eyes and you will feel like in you are in some sci-fi mission with a therapeutic audio massage ;)

Everytime it snows in this area, this song comes to ones mind :-)

The song has kAnada flavor to it. Excellently done.

Rating 4.5 out of 5

Thamizha Thamizha - Hariharan

The voice till then heard on Bajaj ads all over India, had now a public face to it :-) Hari it was.

Everytime i listen to this song, i get goose bumps. The way the song fires you up is unbelievable. It is only ARR, that can move from a pallavi that sounds like a lullaby to a patriotic cry and rousing one's senses. Lyrics by vairamthu have to be noted yet again.

Chords are out-of-the-world . The violin piece at 2.02-2.05 is so cute as if to to singing to a child. That section alone clinches the song for me ;)

It can be counted to be one of the best emotion-evoking songs of ARR (also Ruk Jah from Bombay)

Rating 4.6 out of 5

Rukkumani - SPB & Chitra

This song is ample show case of ARR's rhythm skills. The amazing change of pace from the roll of drums to simple claps and then back to the neck-breaking pace is excellent.

The tune of the song itself is very simple and the stanzas don't live upto the promise of the pallavi. The song's public relation is carried out entirely by the foot-tapping the nature of the song and thankfully SPB & Chitra do a good job of the song.

The tabla piece in the second interlude was a pre-cursor to, what we have now come to know of as ARR's standard experiments with rhythm. (like Chikku bukku, Thillanna etc)

Interestingly enough, this song became the chart-buster when Roja was released in Hindi. Well, beauty lies in the eyes of the beholder apparently.

Rating 3.9 out of 5

Chinna Chinna Aasai (Short version) - Minmini

The only thing different from the longer version of the song is intro 'nadhaswaram' piece which is superbly done in kalyani to merge with the mainstream song.

Rating 4.5 out of 5

The album paved way for region-neutral music i.e. the same tune appeals to 'masses' from all over the country as opposed to specific treatment in the past. It brought new direction the Indian music scene. All music directors changed their style, reluctantly though, to not be left-behind by the new phenomenon.

Looking at where we are right now, almost 13 years from the day ARR surfaced on the celluloid map, he has rightfully annexed the title of 'The Emperor' of the Indian film music for the past decade. Only time will tell how/whether ARR can keep reinventing himself to live up to the challenges of the ever changing cine world.

One only hopes that he gets to spend more time in the Tamil cine industry and bring us more haunting melodies for many more years to come.

Who would not want to have Roja in their collection ?
Overall Rating 4.5 out of 5

[Book Watch] Summa Theologica

2005-05-29T12:02:00.000-05:00

Summa Theologica by Saint Thomas Aquinas.

'Summa' means a comprehensive treatise on philosophy or theology (Find the word, its pronunciation at Dictionary.com)

He belonged to the thirteenth century and was expected to take up being an abbot according to family traditions. However, he took liking to the movement of 'Dominicans' which emphasized on removing 'heresy' through preaching. The family would not hear of such a thing and had him 'kidnapped' and tried to lure him away from this idea. However he persisted and finally the family relented.

This was his greatest work one among the great works on theology in history. The entire book is structured in the form of 'questions' which are the major components of the books. Each 'question' is subdivided into 'Articles'. Every 'article' is countered with 'objections' (arguments against the article - sometime not very convincing) as to why article can't be true and finally 'answered' and also 'reply-objections' to counter the objections.

Starting off by asking a question whether 'theology is science' the doctrine examines various topics including 'existence of God' and 'Will' 'Death' 'Good' 'Bad' etc. Some of the topics may be superfluous for 'non-academic' readers of theology.

Out of the many topics that interested me, two of them stood out. One, ofcourse was, 'existence of truth' (as part of existence of God).

For truth to not exist, the statement "truth does not exist" must be 'true'. So for truth to not exist, 'true' must exist, and hence truth exists

Second was about 'fate' or 'chance/luck'.

For instance, if two servants are sent by their master to the same place; the meeting of the two servants in regard to themselves is by chance; but as compared to the master, who had ordered it, it is directly intended.

The entire book is based on 'logical' attempts at solving problems-that do not have 'mathematical' existence. Whether or not one agrees to the conclusions arrived at by the use of logic, one must read it to understand the marvelous use of reasoning.

This is a must-read for people who love 'philosophy' but just to add a note of caution, the subject treatment is 'serious' stuff and the book is a long one by itself. Some of the 'questions' are quite passable, but unfortunately, some of the answers are based on 'articles' that have been already answered at which point in time you may have to switch to that 'article'.

Happy Reading.

And, if I may, one recommendation - 'Do consider the point of reading all the philosophy and how even a small (even 1%) percent of it can be incorporated into our lives, reducing the tension and countless worries we create for ourselves in day-to-day living'

It is pertinent to narrate the following incident. A mother used to always keep telling her child to make sure he does not spill the coffee on the carpet, literally everytime the child took the coffee to the living room. And one-day the child, in a calm voice remarked, 'Mom, I know that, you know that am not so stupid, to pour coffee onto the carpet. If the coffee still gets spilt, it is then called "accident". There are so many ways it can be remedied. We could clean the carpet ourselves. We could have some professional do it or as a last attempt, replace the entire carpet. The solution is so simple that it does not warrant you 'worrying' countless times everytime you give someone a cup of coffee. Just relax and let this not cause mental tension

One of my relatives narrated the above event. Without getting into the 'realities' of the story, if you can take away the essence that almost everything in life can be translated into $$$ terms, but never let your life to be expressed in $$$ terms :-)

Enough of the 'Ohh am so serious' topic..Let me get back onto some more music reviews ;)

No Haggle Offer

2005-05-28T10:49:00.000-05:00

(Hint: This post should be read while imagining a laughing machine in use at the end of all conversations)

KL decided he'd get a new car that day, come no matter what. Eswar & I had to accompany him over to the dealer. When we hopped on to the metro, SN (KL's project mate) also was on the same train.

All of us wanted to interview KL about his choice of the car, why 'new', why 'used' etc and Eswar began to bell the 'cat'

Eswar : KL, how long have you been thinking of buying a car
Me : 3 years, 30,000 miles..but finally he decided to buy a car today.
KL : Yeah, kind of

Eswar : What car are you gonna buy ?
KL : Thinking of Corolla.
Eswar : Corolla, what is the freaking point. You might as well by a Camry. The resale value is anyway gonna be 3K lower the moment you take it off the dealership.
KL : Yeah, that is why I want to take Corolla
Eswar : Dude, Camry is the best selling car and you have more chances of selling it. Corolla does not have the 'horse power' to run it up a hill, take for example my car, it struggles to get up a hill. The pickup is bad dude.

By this time, we were all successful in instilling enough doubt in KL's mind about what car to buy.

Me : Eswar, that is no big deal. He will put the car in reverse and climb the hill. The pickup does not vary that much between cars, to go up a hill in the reverse gear ;)

Eswar : No seriously, KL, you should get a camry, it has better pickup that corolla
SN : I agree, Camry is better than corolla and has decent pickup, but it does not 'race'
KL : Yeah, am looking at driving a car and not racing a car and you know the resale value is important

Me : Then you should buy something like 'kia spectra', you pay only 5k to take the car off the showroom and you lose 4k immediately and you can drive the car with peace of mind
Eswar : And you can donate the car, claim tax deduction, which will be more than 4k and you actually endup making a profit.
Me : Buy & Donate couple of times and you would have saved enough to buy a Merc :-)
KL : Boss, all of you are confusing the heck out of me

Me : You are like vishwamitra meditating and we are like the 'distractors' and Eswar is the Menaka to completely change your mind...

with those words, we started drove towards the dealership and started taking a look at the car.

Eswar : KL, if you take some weird colored cars like bright yellow, the price will be lesser than the mainstream colors
Me : and yeah, your insurance rate will be jacked up to overshoot the savings :-D

We were examining the cars and came to Echo, which had very or little trunk space

Eswar : I think you should take the Echo, it will help you control your finances.
Me : Yes, even if you buy a trunk load of groceries, it is not much. and at the going price of gases, you will think twice about making another shopping trip, essentially keep in check the amount you spend ;)

We finally decided to meet with a salesperson (SP) and what a meeting it was. SP was apparently from West Indies. He recognised desis and started talking about cricket, cricketers, his ancestral parentage from India and Eswar was giving him good company by striking erudite conversations on the game. It could be sensed clearly KL was getting restless about this conversation and suddenly he was like

KL : Thats all fine, what is the price of the car ?.
KL looked like he was an emperor amidst a serious war facing his arch enemy. His dealings were all like 'I don't care'. He meant business

SP : Let us go and take a look at the car.

We went out to look at a blue corolla LE, which was KL's ideal buy. The sticker price was 17,645 + tax,tags & title. The moment SP started to explain the features

KL : We know about the car. We have the cash ready on us now. We will pay for it and take the car out right now, can you let us know your price ?
SP : Honestly (yeah, i bel that) am here to actually fight for you. (ethana paeru raaja intha maathiri kilambirukkeenga). Knowing 'our' culture i will not tell lies (asku busku, indha alwa ellam vera yaar kittayavadhu vechukunga). Why don't you give me a price that I can go work with the manager to seal the deal.

After thinking a bit,
KL : OK, I am gonna give you a price. But it is 'no-haggle' no-hassle offer. It is 13,800 + tax,tags..i have the cash and will take the car away immediately. This is a final offer, Take it or leave it, no negotiation. Thats it.

SP did not open his mouth. But everyone heard him say 'Excuse me, that is my dialog to say, who is the salesperson here...take it or leave it offer from a buyer ?'.

He was too stunned for words.

SP : Let me find a car for that price and walked to the next car and read aloud the sticker price. 13,400 - yeah you can take this.

And it was a ECHO :-)))))))) He levelled the playing field with KL

KL : Are you telling us we don't know the difference between Echo & Corolla ?

KL was still a man at war. And then we decided to have the SP deal with his manager for the price KL had 'finally offered' and obviously the price SP got back to us not even remotely close to KL's range.

Then we played our 'internet pricing' offer which was amazingly close to or even less than invoice price.

I'd like to recommend to all the readers that if you find some internet, no-haggle price, of course not the offer like KL's ;) but one from the dealer and it is considerably close to the invoice price, that is the best way to buy a car. You walk in and walk out with a new car in less than 2 hours no bargaining, you get the best price and a new car.

The post car-buying experience was also funny, like how KL got an insurance quote so low that everyone was joking around that the coverage may be for just wheels alone etc.

All along KL was worried about some safety issues with Corolla, where some one over the web had posted a message saying, when the car goes above 65mph, you get air draught under the car and the wheels don't feel like on the road, making the car wobble from side to side.

KL aired his concern publicly.

Me : Yeah, just make sure you got your pilot's license handy and beware of the no-fly zone restriction in DC area. For all we know you may drive the car about 65mph and the car starts flying into DC and F-16's will be scrambled to 'land' your corolla safely.

Finally Siva, asked KL about the tags.

Siva : KL, did you get a 'personalised' tag ?
Me : He is taking a 'person-i-liked' named tag. (This would remain cryptic to people who can't decrypt it)

Everyone in laughters, but we all felt that KL internally was thinking of how great this idea was.

Only time will tell what tags KL ends up displaying...he atleast does not have to get it right away ;)

Disclaimer : Don't try this at home. Have made all attempt to depict the events and conversations as happened. Narrator can't be held responsible for any 'missed' out oppurtunities. All the cars specified above are registered trademarks, copyrighted by the respective companies. Including the no-haggle offer by KL Inc.

Diwali Stamps in US

2005-05-26T21:55:00.000-05:00

Diwali is an important Indian festival, and the Post Office Department is thinking about issuing stamps for this occasion. And why not, USPS has stamps for other festivals too like Christmas, Hanukkah, Kwanzaa, Eid,and Chinese New Year.

To do this, USPS needs 500,000 signatures to have a stamp release, and so far they have 191537 people who have signed the petition.

Please go to the site below and support the release of the Diwali stamp. Also, please forward widely to others who would support this (do not have to be Indian to sign the petition or has to be in the US! )

Click Here or go to this URL http://www.PetitionOnline.com/diwali03/

That was horrible..

2005-05-24T21:11:00.000-05:00

Americon Idol is one of the surest bets to hog TV ratings and gain instant popularity with the audience. It has repeatedly performed the trick for Fox Network, not withstanding the sensation mongering 'O'Reilly Show'

The idea of people 'voting' to elect their idol and the tremendous participation of viewers is what makes the show click.

Flashhhhhhhhhh to a different scene.....

'Attraction' by 'repulsion' is a phenomenon that all Indian movie goers are familiar with. The hero and herione would be fighting to the extent of killing each other and suddenly they become the closest since humans & money.

Flashhhhhhhhhh to the current scene.....

The same factor has been put to good use with 'Simon' from American Idol. 'He is caustic' is an understatement. Most people feel his comments are so rude & unfair. People just 'love' to 'hate' him.

Well, i beg to disagreee. 95% of the cases, his 'judgement' is spot on...may be his comments are not appropriate, may be he needs to be more polished, may be he does not need to drive a truck over people's ego...but when he says someone is not good enough to 'sing', he is right.

Randy is ok...not always consistent, Paula is the 'sizzle' factor, she is the 'moderate' person amongst the judges, shedding tears bringing a 'aahhhhhhhh' or 'ugggggggggh' from the audience.

Today was the finals of American Idol. I would not say i was impressed with what was put up as the 'finalists'...the previous idols finalists were better, but hey these are american people's idols...they are the people's pulse :-)

Talking of which, am reminded of some ARR interview(Not sure about the source) where he was asked, 'what do you remember about your school days'. He replied that at that time, he hardly found time to study, he used to play for bands & troupes and then rented out instruments, playing around with them and learning them etc and rarely would have time to devote attention towards curricular activities. One time, his teacher scolded him saying 'intha maathiri ellam harmonium vasikarennu, ooru suthitu thirinja, naalaikku station le pichakaran mathiri paada vaendi varam'.

Translation: (Without spending time towards studies) If you roam around playing harmonium etc, you would end up playing it like a beggar at the railway station

and apparently having said that, ARR smiled :-)

It may have hurt ARR a simple musician then, a genius now. I would not blame the teacher very much...(s)he was trying to emphasise the need for education more than extra-curricular activities. Yes, he could have been not that mean and rude, but he was doing his job.

The teacher, when watching the interview, would have had massive attack of guilt or remorse, would'nt blame them either. How would he feel ?....That was horrible. Nonetheless an interesting incident !

So would be, when, after you, singing your heart out hear Simon say, 'That was the dullest/boring performance i've ever heard'

That is indeed horrible !

Eggs...ummmmm tasty !

2005-05-24T19:54:00.000-05:00

The world leader in the personal desktop operating system, microsoft, announced a competition called 'Gatekeeper Test - are you the ultimate security expert' aimed at developing the security skills of IT professionals in 19 countries around Europe & Middle East & Africa.

The idea was people could answer security related questions and the winner gets a free trip to Security Conference in Amsterdam, Netherlands.

Apparently, the people who participated, took the challenge very seriously. Instead of answering the quiz, they broke the system. They did not have to work hard to do that...they manipulated the system by 'using' back buttons, they found out that the right answers were not 'accepted', they broke the daily limit of two questions...(yes you can't know more than two security concepts in a day) to bring the contest to a grinding halt.

Organisers had to 'suspend' the event and bought towels in bulk to wipe eggs of their faces.

Why do Eggs seem more tastier when it is on someone's face than your mouth ?

Information Courtesy : Infoworld

All copyrights, trademarks, registered trademarks are the owners of the respective organizations

[Song Watch] Innum Ennai

2005-05-23T21:12:00.000-05:00

Singara Velan - starred Kamal Hassan and already plumpy Khusboo :-(. Directed by RV Udayakumar. The movie was a run-of-the-mill with all commercial elements and nice songs. 'Innum Ennai' & 'Thoodhu selvadharadi' were very nicely done. 'Pudhucerhi Katcheri', was what stole the honors however.

Innum Ennai is the best song in the movie and lets get to the review of the song right away.

The song is set in Gambeera Naattai, the swaras are simply 'sa ga3 m1 pa ni3 Sa'. No complications there. But how can one produce a lovely melody out of such simple notes. IR shows us how....

The song opens with bells & violins at a very fast pace going over the raga's structure, before trumpets & drums join in and announce a grand opening to the song. The electric piano/synth flute sets up the pallavi for the song with a fast & hip rhythm section and our inimicable SPB opens with 'Innum Ennai'

The pallavi is wonderful especially the section 'kaigal thaanai korthai, katti mutham thenai varthai'. One wonders where such melody was kept hidden behind the raga till IR discovered it.

The interlude is nicely done...that is first place, i guess you note an anniya swara in the song so far....with the typical IR combo of flute/violin.

The stanza once again is kicked off by SPB...the flute follows the line so closely that it feels as if a logical extension of sorts. If you are humming the song..rarely would you not hum the flute piece as well. Janaki joins in quite late in the song and it is a walk in the park for her for this stanza.

Disclaimer: Bit detailed the following para is.
In the following lines am gonna attempt to explain, what i've observed as notes...it may have technical term to it, if there is please let me know. If you listen to 'pudhu pudhu vidukadhai (2.24)' , the way the tune is structured is pudhu pudhu & vidukathai are theoretically similar, but slightly shifting the start note of vidukathai by 1 full step brings in a majestic touch to that song. I've seen many MDs do it...but never knew whether it is a 'construct' in light music. Help appreciated.

As his wont, IR toys around with drums to produce a nice climax to the stanza and anupallavi with Janaki bringing it off easily.

The second interlude is the best part of the entire song. Starting at 3.00, a nicely 'gamakam'ed veena (positively synthetic) for 4 seconds is out of the world. The trumpets join in with the piece repeating and the violin arrangement is as expected.

The second stanza, is set off by Janaki. As with the first stanza at 2.02 and here at 3.37, 'nool idayiyai yenga vidum', the section between 'idayiyai' & 'yenga' there seems to be a drop of note by half-note that brings in wonderful but subtle variation to the song.

The song finishes off with SPB & Janaki letting loose their creative improvisation...but as we have heard thousand times before..it is actually 'programmed' by IR.

In my list of bests, this song is amongst IR's Top-3 if not the best. It has a simple structure, easy melody, nice fast pace & lovely orchestration. I would listen to this IR gem anytime !

Rating 4.9 out of 5

Chappell, the new Indian Cricket Coach

2005-05-22T14:09:00.000-05:00

Being an Indian, cricket lover and blogger - it would be highly unfair, if i did not devote atleast one blog towards the latest developments in cricket.

After much hype & hoopla over the possible candidates for the Indian cricket coach, BCCI has finally settled for the old race horse Greg Chappell former Aussie Captain.

As always the controversy sorrounding whether we need foreign coaches etc continue to be raked up and supported by the media.

We are all living in a world where competition is the keyword. The salary is rumored to be in the range of 200K dollars per year. Now, at this pay-rate, controversies are understandable. One question that i still have is, assuming Gavaskar or some other Indian was selected...would he be paid at a similar scale ?. He need not be...you pay for the services you get. Then would you make use of the services he provide ? BCCI - uh-uhh...NO. He does not get to select the team. He does not get to select the players. He does not get to select the 'strategy'. He does not get to participate in the 'vision' of the game. So why do we need him ? Wake up BCCI !!!

What India cricket needs is *professionalism*. We have talented players. We are paper tigers. We have the money. BCCI is unimaginably rich. So why can't we consistently succeed ?

There is lack of professionalism. This i think should be the primary goal of the new coach. One thing that scares me is what *all* are talking about. All the players are international players, they don't need to be taught how to bowl or bat.

I beg to disagree. Our bowlers DO NOT bowl yorkers. They only think of yorkers as a virtual entity. Our batsmen DO NOT play consistently. Our fielding, with exception of couple of folks is abysmal. What, i may ask, is the reply from our 'international players' ?

Unless we shed the attitude of 'I have done enough to sit on it and continue in the team' or 'Why is it, that I should be the person who always scores runs' no international coach is gonna help.

John Wright, to his credit brought in the idea of 'fitness' - which seems to have worked wonders for the team.

Can Chappell bring in professionalism first ? and then 'execution of strategies' so that India can graduate from the current situation of 'paper tigers really rats' to 'consistent cup holders' ? (not our desi cup ;) )

Jaws

2005-05-22T09:23:00.000-05:00

I have travelled through that road 3-4 times before. Everytime, looking at the peaceful, majestic, posh, pleasing, awe-inspiring palaces. They are valued at millions and above the number of fingers that all of us have !

Would always be thinking, who exactly owns these p(a)laces. Senators, CEOs, Business men ? It always remained a mystery !

This is the 'potomac'/'river rd' area in DC.

I had KR, hubby of my cousin come over for the weekend. He had a friend, that we were gonna say 'hi' to. Hopped onto my car and drove down, and when we took the exit i was suprised to see where we were on. River Rd. I said interesting....KR set the expectations straight by the giving the background of the family and the home we can expect to see. The number of acres of the order of 'elements of the world'.

As always the drive was exhilirating. Then we finally stopped in front of a 'palace'. There was a 'Mercury Mountaineer' in front of the place. The apartment had a cul-de-sac of its own, bigger than any cul-de-sac of the public places have seen before. The apartment had 8 full bedrooms including full baths and other rooms that we were too demoralised to count. Three levels, each housing its own full-service kitchen and all of them super-sized. To rub it in, we were driven around the 'locality' and show some of the 15-20 million homes...and i don't know how long my jaw rested in the same 'dropped' position. All along, I kept telling myself...'Arvind, you are doing ok, this is not a dream ! ' until we reached a place where we were all left searching for words. Words we have been using since our birth. Multitudes of decades worth of learning all to no avail.

The place was built on 15-20 acres of land with royal lion statues in front of the gates and angel guarding the home and 'wide' gates in front all with state of art gadgets in place. The place was unpriced. It is better not to !

I was told the place that we went to, the single 'window' in their hall was worth well above 65K dollars !

Now i was really afraid that someone had to wake up before i go crazy and write this on my blog. Every though that flashed my mind was punctuated with expectations of the same....but it never happened. As KR pointed out, when we stood in front of the place, looking like bees in front of aeroplane, so disproportionate a scale, that we could hear the breeze flowing, not wind, breeze !. We could hear the single leaf shifting its position. Pin drop silence !

Man ! was that a mystical experience that i will ever forget ! Humbling, intimidating, thrilling and enlightening !

My rest of the day was spent ranting and raving to near & dear ones about the experience and how, it changed my perspective in life ! and now ye'all get to put up with the same !

[Song Watch] Anniyan

2005-05-18T20:15:00.000-05:00

Shankar's new movie Anniyan is the buzz maker in kollywood. Multi-crore project, rumored to have been insured for astronomical sums is expected to be released late may'05.

Shankar for various reasons, had replaced his 'aasthana' music director ARR with Harris Jayaraj. That being an onerous responsibility, let us see how HJ has responded to it.

Iyengaru Veetu Azhage - Hariharan, Harini

The song starts with Pancharatna Keerthanai, 'Jagadhanandha' set in Naattai (*Correction* it was earlier noted as Gambeera Naatai) ragam, at cinematic tempo rather than the classical tempo. The trend of fusion'ising classical songs, (of late) was set off by ARR with Vanajakshi (Andhi Mandarai) & Alai Payuthe (Alai Payuthe), which was promptly followed by Vidyasagar's Endaro Mahanu (Devadoothan). All of them were quite compelling, notwithstanding the purist's critiques.

The pallavi takes off from where the classical singing says bye. Hari simply steals the show, his Ghazlish touch definitely lends credence to the raga. The stanzas are quite run-of-the-mill stuff. It has foot-tapping rhythmic mood, but does not quite sustain the melody from the pallavi.

IR, ARR have all belted our chart busters in this raga. This song does not come close to them.

Deva had done one in 'Maane Maane' from Senthoorapandi & his son Srikanth Deva's 'Chennai Senthamizh' from M Kumaran.....were prety neat.

I am afraid that HJ would not like to see him clubbed with the likes of Deva&co, but unfortunately, that is what it is.

Rating 4.1 out of 5

Oh Sukumari - Shankar Mahadevan, Harini

Shankar Mahadevan must have jumped up in glee when he heard the track played to him. It suits his style of rendition and he comes out on top. The song has Arabhi touch to it. It is quite a cool song, the melody is retained throughout the song. One wonders why Shankar has to use those accents (may be the movie situation ?)
Sax joins in for the second half of the song. The structure of the song is very similar to 'Kaadhal vanducho' from Hey Nee....This is the best song of the album.

Rating 4.1 out of 5

Andangakka - Jassie Gift, KK, Shreya Gosal

Language neutral musical babbling starts this song off..and once again, you think you have heard this song before. It has 'kapi'ish notes. Shreya Gosal asserts herself comfortably. The interlude is quite nice, Stanzas are constructed with foot-tapping rhythm. The lyrics are outright horrible.The use of instruments & the tune itself reminds you of 'Kuchi Kuchi' from Bombay. But for the lyrics, this song would be best song of the album.

Rating 3.9 out of 5

Kaadhal Yaanai - Nakul, Nelwyn, GV Prakash

This is a typical HJ number, nice chords, cool voice selection and lyrics dont need to mean anything. HJ cant keep away from using his favorite sequences like at 4.00 etc. From the even'ness of the song, rhythm and catchiness, this song seems to be right there on the top within the movie. Definitely a fancy disco number that teenagers are gonna ga-ga aover.

Rating 3.9 out of 5

Kannum Kannum Nokia - Leslie Lewis, Vasundhara, Andrea

Techno pop song...seems to be the counterpart of Shakalaka baby. 'Cappucino Coffeeaa'...man am no tamil pundit, nor do i worry that much about lyrics...but it atleast has to sound pleasant...should never have to go back to the golden lyric days like 'pannadha ravusu, palapalakudhu blowsu' kind of lyrics ;p
Eminently passable...would wonder if it would ever be played again by any listener.

Rating 3.2 out of 5.

The entire album has a 'heard it somewhere before' feel to it. It is definitely not called copying, but it seems the creative inspiration did not fully click for HJ this time around.

From the expectation of Shankar's movie & past offerings from HJ, the music is definitely a letdown, but from a saleability perspective my guess is that it would still sell well. It has the catchy'ness & foot-tapping quality to it.

IMHO a director is the person who selects the song from the variety offered by the music director. Good or Bad, the director also has a share in it.

We know Shankar has better taste than this. We also know HJ can do better. So is it a case of HJ & Shankar not hitting the right 'chord' (pun intended) ?. The listener returns Disappointed :-( !

Overall Rating 3.8 out of 5