ON ETERNAL SUNSHINE...

Five lines hardly makes a piece of poetry deserve a place in my 'Book of Rhymes', and these five particularly are... disastrous, yeah. A cause of devastation for a couple of days, and I'm posting them here just to get rid of them from my computer. And it's not the poem itself that irks me, it's rather the effect it was supposed to create, which it didn't and this disappointment, well, is an intolerable disease, and I think I'm good being short of it. Although I wish the world got sensible enough to appreciate five lines Alexander Pope would have dreaded to see in his life.

Something that hits him on the face. Something that doesn't prove him wrong, but tells him how incredibly narrow minded he had been when regarding the concept of 'Eternal Sunshine' (goes to you too, Messrs. Gondry and Kaufman!) and something that establishes how I view things. And something that shows I've just begun to think of reading Derrida. :P

"Only as happy would the vestals be,
as inhabitants of this idiosyncrasy;
for in forgetfulness, if heaven lies,
what use is an Eternal Sunshine,
without room for a rise...?"

P.S. Written not as a nature-freak, please do not misinterpret. Thank you.

YOGI - MUSIC REVIEW

A bullet through the brain that asked me not to write to a newspaper again: Here's what was never published (alongside parts, of course, that made it through half-witted pairs of hands).

MUSIC REVIEW – YOGI (2009)

COMPOSED BY: YUVAN SHANKAR RAJA

Yuvan’s seventh feature of the year and sixth in tamil could come with a certificate saying ‘mature audiences only’, and that would be only apt, considering the level and seriousness of the music, as well as its aesthetic impact. The compilation of six tracks, two of those featuring Sarangi virtuoso, Ustad Sultan Khan (of ‘Tabla Beat Science’ fame) both in vocals and instrument-play is certainly not the everyday thing that tamil film music is associated with, and it is for this reason that I urge the active-listener to look deeper than the sheen. Both ‘Yaarodu Yaaro’ and the ‘Sarangi theme’ (the former rendered along with Yuvan himself) are examples, where there’s not just a showcase of exemplary play of the bow-type instrument, but rather a use in a different context, where the effect is something surreally surly, and more moody than sad. It’s psychotic, to be short, an emotion that is provoked no less by the ‘Main Theme’ itself, and the bunch of these three tracks score for unique and riveting tunes amidst the current chaos where there’s an uncertainty between pop-rock, hip hop and ‘dappankuthu’. Apart from the three, ‘Yogi Yogi Dhaan’ (both versions) is a rage, featuring Blaaze and the vocal seduction of ‘Viva Girl’ Neha Bhasin and it’s impulsive with no check on the rush of adrenalin. ‘Seermevum Koovathile’ is something on the lines of ‘Oororam Puliyamaram’ featuring an ensemble of Ameer, (Director of ‘Raam’, ‘Paruthiveeran’ who debuts as protagonist) Naveen, Snehan (lyricist, who debuts as actor too) and Jijuba and that’s about all the album has in store. All lyrics have been written by Snehan where there’s not much room to let the words flow, and thus there’s no remarkable lyrical accomplishment: It’s somewhere between clichéd and passable, and the line’s thin, yeah.

Overall, ‘Yogi’ doesn’t hold ‘anthems’ or tunes you hum at your leisure: It’s thought-provoking, to say the least, and I would recommend you dive straight in if you don’t fear the deep. If there’s a narrow-mindedness propelling you to stay adverse, I’d say you don’t listen to it then, for there’s nothing shallow over here…