GV Prakash - Rahmanesque?

One of my friends did not quite agree with what i said vis-a-vis south indian and Hindi film music in my post on Dasavatharam. Well, here i am back with an instance that explains in part what i said there. GV Prakash, the 21 year old nephew of AR Rahman shows yet again after 'Ullasanga Utsahanga' the path the southern film music (especially Tamil) took after Rahman took over. Just listen to the compositions in 'Kathanayakudu/Kuselan' to see the kind of efforts put to bring in the many layers in vocals and orchestration. Even as he was working with the same traditional instruments, the newness is hard to miss. We got used to this kind of diet since Roja days and that is why i did not quite understand why Aascar Ravichandran had to rope in Himesh Reshammiya, who at best can hum well and rehash some old tunes.

Coming back to 'Kathanayakudu', songs are very good.
Maybe this is the only dubbed film in the last several years where we can actually hear the lyrcis! Well, because we have Veturi writing 2 beautiful melodies while Anantha Sriram handles 2 more. What a relief without the Bhuvanachandras..! Prakash composed in such a way that he let the singers be audible while they sang and then took over the music-mixing in the interlude. Songs are meaningful and AR Rahman's impact is inevitable though. He looks like Rahman's younger days' version. In fact, some bits remind us of what Rahman did in 'Donga Donga' and 'Oke Okkadu'.

Couple of songs are especially for Rajini fans. Both are very well written by Anantha Sriram. Well, we are definitely going to see much more from this guy, who like Prakash is around 20. 'Cinema Cinema' eulogizes cinema and its reigning superstar. Shankar Mahadevan goes to the hilt. This song is a nice example as to how Rajini successfully packages his image and stardom into his movies. In fact this song is a best-fit for Rajini (despite so many stars around in south) as it recalls his fan following in other asian countries. Khailash Kher further raises the tempo for the superstar in 'Ra Ra Ra..'

It would be fun to watch Rajini in his many avatars in these songs.