While Abhijeet is consolidating his light romantic space, Rahat Fateh Ali Khan is exploring the mushy terrain with “Back 2 Love”. The 10-song album sounds filmy with electronic music drowning Rahat’s assertions that he has done fusion with raga Champakali and that there are Arabic influences in “O Habibi”. It sounds like a compilation of songs waiting to be used in a Bollywood film album.
It was on the cards as Rahat, nephew of legendary Nusrat Fateh Ali Khan, has now emerged as a playback singer in Hindi films. “It was surprising for me. First I was roped in for special numbers but slowly composers started using me for playback as well. I am not trained for it but I try to justify. However, my first love is still qawwali.”
He is also amused by Bollywood fascination for different voices. A few years back he replaced the established players and now he is being replaced by Arijit Singh, the new sensation for singing his popular Punjabi number “Mainu Tu Samjhaanva Ni” in Humpty Sharma Ki Dulhaniya . It is a bad copy but nobody is complaining as of now. “What to do. This is the trend these days. Perhaps, it has to do with the fickle taste of the audience. They prefer something fresh over quality.” And quantity as well, one presumes. It was on display at IIFA event in the US where he was asked to sing a medley of his popular numbers in a jiffy. “IIFA is a big stage and an opportunity to reach out to the diaspora but singing 10 songs in 15 minutes was too much. It indeed led to compromise considering the kind of songs I sing.”
He admits qawwalis are also hit by this trend. A number of qawwals, he says, have started to include allusions to corporal love for cheap publicity. “They have lost touch with the One above. Similarly, many composers don’t know the true meaning of sufi. Using words like maula doesn’t make a song a sufi number. Sufi is a thought. However, I see it as mausami bukhar (seasonal fever). We will recover from it,” says Rahat, who is working on qawwali album now. “It will be for the purists,” he promises.
Rahat has suffered because of the inefficiency of media managers. A couple of years back he was caught in a foreign exchange violation case. “I didn’t know the rules. Now I am extra cautious.” He is hopeful that the new government in India will be supportive of Pakistani artists working in India. “Aaghaz achcha hua hai. (The beginning has been good.) The message of my album is that hate won’t achieve anything. I hope there will be harmony and cultural exchange will continue.”
