Audio scan
Touch of Kishore and Rishi

Bachna Ae Haseeno
(YRF Music)

Papa Rishi Kapoor has grown in age and girth, and has handed over the mantle of lover boy to sonny boy Ranbir Kapoor. His first film Saawariya had proved to be a dud but the Kapoor kid had left a good impression, especially among his female fans.

While in the first film Ranbir baba was not lucky in love, in this Yash Raj Chopra film, he gets to have as many as three heroines (Bipasha Basu, Deepika Padukone and Minnisha Lamba). The title comes from a song of his dad’s film and that song by Kishore Kumar has also been replayed here with rap by Vishal Dadlani and some lines by Kishore’s son Sumit Kumar.

The Punjabi touch is all-pervasive in the compositions of Vishal and Shekhar, especially in the song Jogi mahi (Sukhvinder Singh, Shekhar Ravjianu and Himani Kapoor). But overall the music does not exactly pack much punch.

The opener Khuda jane begins promisingly with KK’s haunting vocals but loses steam on the way. Shilpa Rao, too, is promising.

The remix by Abhijit Nalani with its pub-friendly disco beat, too, does not retrieve much ground. But the use of guitar is impressive.

It is the earthy Sunidhi Chauhan, Hard Kaur and Raja Hassan who rock in Lucky boy.

Lucky Ali is impressive in Aahista aahista although Shreya Ghoshal is not able to provide sufficient support here.

Shankar Mahadevan adds some zing to average lyrics of Anvita Dutt Guptan in Small town girl.

Healing Mantras
(Times Music Spiritual)

Believe it or not, there is a sizeable section of the public which is certain that mantras have magical powers which can heal everything from heart diseases to high blood pressure. These two albums cater to this section.

While one is for curing heart problems through vedic mantras, the other is for high blood pressure.

Combining these with the power of music therapy, choice selections from the Vedas and other knowledge bases of India have been sung by such stalwarts as Padmashri Padmaja Fenani Joglekar and Sanjeev Abhayankar.

There are Vedic hymns, Gayatri Mantra, Surya Kavach, the Jaap Om Vajrahastaayi Namah and Surya Stavaraj. Even if one does not believe in the healing powers of these sacred words, they leave a soothing, peaceful effect, which is well worth the effort. —ASC