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If the Yeh Jawaani Hai Deewani song-and-dance is pulling you to the theatres as much as Ranbir Kapoor and Deepika Padukone are, then you have Pritam to thank for. The Presidencian takes t2 through the strings and strains of the album of the season.
The backstory: “When Ayan (Mukerji, the director) came to me for the film, I was under the impression that he was coming from the Wake Up Sid and Iktara space and would want soulful Sufi songs… ballad numbers. But he told me that he wanted a
full-on quintessential Bollywood album, full of energy and pumping beats. So first we recorded the fast-paced songs like Badtameez dil, Balam pichkari and Dilliwaali girlfriend and then came the slower ones like Ilahi and Kabira.
“I am extremely happy and a lot of people have congratulated me on the opening of the film because along with Ranbir Kapoor, Deepika Padukone and Karan Johar, the songs have been instrumental in getting the audience into theatres. Ranbir and I have also clicked as a team, in this film as well as in Barfi! and Ajab Prem Ki Ghazab Kahani.”
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Badtameez dil (Benny Dayal & Shefali Alvares): I first came up with the hook (Badtameez dil… badtameez dil…) but Ayan was not too sure. I sat with Amitabh (Bhattacharya, lyricist) to write the lyrics and basically the theme that we hit upon was to have the Kishore Kumar kind of nonsense lyrics! The abol-taabol kind of words that Kishore Kumar was famous for right from Shing nei tobu naam tar shingho to C-a-t, cat maane billi. I had some other mukhda in mind, but when Amitabh wrote the paan mein pudina bit, we knew we had a winner. And when he wrote the Aloo bhaat muri bhaat lines, I was SO happy. I told him: ‘Khub bhalo, tui Bangla lyrics likhechhish’. In a song like this, phonetics becomes very important and Amitabh, because he is a singer himself, his control over phonetics is very good.
But all was not really hunky-dory, we had a slight argument over the word ‘dil’ because I felt it has been used too much in our songs. When we played the song for Karan, we had two options for the same situation. But hearing this version, both Ayan and Karan jumped up and Karan screamed out: ‘This is the song! Why are you playing an option?’
I think Ranbir has really justified the energy of the song. Even at that high-speed tempo, Ranbir’s dancing is effortless. He’s really brought our song alive.
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Balam pichkari (Vishal Dadlani & Shalmali Kholgade): Ayan called me up one day and said: ‘I love the energy of Holi. I want a Holi song in the film’. I prepared the tune and Amitabh wrote the lyrics, but again I was sceptical because I felt that the song would only be restricted to Holi. But Karan and Ayan were cool with it because they wanted this to be a special song. It’s a very high-energy song with an infectious tune. Deepika and Ranbir’s chemistry has actually taken the song a few notches higher. In every interview of his, Ranbir makes it a point to say that Balam pichkari is a double-meaning song and we also tease Amitabh about it!
Dilliwaali girlfriend (Sunidhi Chauhan & Arijit Singh): This was a song that’s been with me for a while and was never meant to be in Yeh Jawaani Hai Deewani in the first place. Kumaar (lyricist) who had written songs in Desi Boyz for me came to me one day and said that he wanted to work with me again. He came up with the mukhda for Dilliwaali girlfriend in about 20 minutes! This is a song which has a very ’90s feel… the kind that would be picturised on Govinda. When Ayan heard this song, he wanted it immediately. It was one of the first songs to be shot.
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Kabira (Rekha Bhardwaj & Tochi Raina/ Harshdeep Kaur & Arijit Singh): Kabira was initially meant to be a wedding song. The Kabira encore is actually the main track while the Rekha Bhardwaj-Tochi Raina version was the encore. While promoting it, the makers went with the second version. Even yesterday, Amitabh and I went to Ayan and told him to make a video on the Kabira encore. To be honest, this is my favourite track of the film… the version that’s sung by Harshdeep Kaur and Arijit Singh. I feel this version is fresher and has a more soothing vibe compared to the other one.
Ghagra (Vishal Dadlani & Rekha Bhardwaj): When we did Ghagra, it was never meant to have Madhuri Dixit. If I knew that Karan was planning on getting Madhuri, I would have done a different kind of song. But nevertheless, Ranbir’s energy and Madhuri’s charm really work for the song. It’s got a very masti kind of vibe and that’s what is catching on well with the listeners. Locking that song didn’t take much time, but its execution did.
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Ilahi (Mohit Chauhan): This is one of the album’s best numbers, but has not really been promoted. That’s my agenda now: to persuade Ayan to promote Ilahi and Kabira encore. Ilahi is all about love and life, about past memories and moving on in life. There is a certain portion in the film in which the song mirrors Ranbir’s vagabond state. This is Ranbir’s favourite track from the film and alongwith Kabira encore, my favourite track too. The Ilahi refrain runs through the film and it reflects Ranbir’s state of mind. A member of (British band) Mumford & Sons, Winston Marshall, has actually played the banjo in Ilahi.
Subhanallah (Sreeram): Subhanallah and Dilliwaali girlfriend were the first songs to be locked two years ago. Subhanallah is a very typical Bollywood song… I have come up with many similar songs. But it’s a beautifully shot number. In fact, I had requested Ayan to take out the song because it had been recorded a long time ago and I felt that it would make the album sound old. But Ayan asked me to see how it had been shot and when I saw how beautiful it looked in the snow with Ranbir and Deepika, I knew this would be a winner.
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