Helicopter Eela is composer Amit Trivedi’s eighth Hindi soundtrack this year. In what already counts as his busiest year yet by album count, it is noteworthy that Trivedi has had only three soundtracks all to himself, two of them with his long-standing director partners (Anurag Kashyap, Vikramaditya Motwane). That a composer of Amit Trivedi’s stature has had the majority of his work this year in multi-composer line-ups is indicative of the current state of Bollywood. Even in Helicopter Eela , Trivedi shares space with a remix man (Raghav Sachar in this case) and another guest composer (Daniel B George). On the positive front though, the movie sees the composer work for the first time with director Pradeep Sarkar, a man known for some great music in the movies, especially with composer Shantnu Moitra. And as a result, it also brings Trivedi back with lyricist Swanand Kirkire (they last collaborated for the outstanding Fitoor ) who has been Sarkar’s trusted lyricist in almost all of his movies.
For starters, let’s listen to the remix. The title chosen for this movie is the Anu Malik-Shyam Anuragi-Alisha Chinai song from producer Ajay Devgn’s 1994 movie Vijaypath , ‘ Ruk Ruk Ruk ’. Not that the earlier version is a masterpiece by any stretch of the imagination, but this remix makes the original look infinitely better! I am not sure if it was the presence of the saxophone in the 1994 song that prompted the choice of Raghav Sachar, this time round. Sadly, even Sachar’s sax solos do little to save this song. In any case, the best possible adaptation of ‘Ruk Ruk Ruk’ was in the 1996 Kamal Hassan starrer Avvai Shanmugi (the movie that became Chachi 420 the subsequent year).
Lyrical nuggets
While there is nothing particularly memorable about Palomi Ghosh’s (best known for her role in the award winning 2015 Konkani film Nachom-ia Kumpasar ) vocals in the song, the lady sounds much better in the compositions she gets to sing for the other two composers. Ghosh’s voice has something of a comforting quality to it, even when she is delivering the higher notes. Daniel B George puts this quality to wonderful use in ‘ Khoya Ujaala ’, a track that manages to be motivational without being loud. The singer’s best effort comes in the beautifully nostalgic ‘ Yaadon Ki Almaari ’. Kirkire has a way with incorporating throwback-inducing little nuggets among his words (remember the Murphywala radio bit in Barfi ), and given that this song is entirely set on those lines, he has a field day.
Kirkire’s lyrics are the song’s highlights, even as Trivedi does a splendid job on his part, with a gentle, immensely hummable melody and orchestration rich in evocative strings. Trivedi does a neat segue into O.P. Nayyar’s ‘ Laakhon Hai Nigaahon Mein ’ ever so briefly.
One Trivedi’s best songs, ‘ Dooba Dooba ’ is assigned to Sunidhi Chauhan and Arijit Singh. The number has a lovely melody that the singers deliver to a tee and the composer backs with a soothing seven-beat rhythm and an expansive strings-laden backdrop. The soulfulness in Shilpa Rao’s voice lifts ‘ Chand Lamhe ’ beyond its familiar melancholic setting. Nevertheless, the mellow arrangement, with its well-timed quiet moments, helps accentuate the slower tempo. In ‘ Mumma Ki Parchhai ’ the composer leans too much on his tried-and-tested tune banks and the result is expectedly middling. The song features the director’s son Ronit Sarkar and aside of proving that he’s still a competent singer, the song does not achieve much else. One needless remix from Raghav Sachar aside, Amit Trivedi and Daniel B George deliver well in Helicopter Eela .
