My Name is Khan

Chandni Chowk to China, Short Kut, London Dreams... 2009 was not a great year for Shankar Ehsaan Loy...

Not really; I can’t agree with you totally. This is a perception people form. Wake Up Sid was a hit and the music also became a hit. But for Chandni Chowk or London Dreams, the films didn’t do well. What happens in our country if the film doesn’t do well, the music also is not promoted. It’s a sad fact that in our country the music and the film are so interdependent. We are still very proud of London Dreams. You know, our songs take a little time to grow because we try to create songs which are new in melody pattern and even lyrically new. The moment a film flops, the music company loses interest in the film and stops promoting the songs. And the immediate perception is that Shankar Ehsaan Loy is on a downslide.

But the popularity of the music of MNIK or even Karthik did not have to depend on the film’s fate...

But the films did do well. For My Name is Khan, I felt that when you have a film set almost completely in the US, in places like San Francisco, and you give a qawwali or Indian ethnic sounds in that ambience, it works in a very strange way. Every film we try and follow a distinct path and stay true to it. So the soundtrack of MNIK had a dharm, a particular genre. re khuda is technically a western ballad but it’s got a sufi flavour, an element of prayer and surrender. Simplicity was the key there.

When you get a mammoth project like My Name is Khan, do you treat it as a special assignment and take extra care?

All projects are fresh challenges. The amount of effort we put in for My Name is Khan, we put the same effort for every project. Of course, it was a big canvas. But at the end of the day, it’s a film, you know. It’s not that just because it’s a so-called big film, we will not make simple songs like Sajda. Basically we stick to the fact that we have to do justice to the script and the genre of the film.

You have been working with a lot of offbeat singers like Shafqat Amanat Ali in MNIK and a Mika doing your Apni toh jaise taise version in Housefull...

Shafqat we had used in Mitwa (Kabhi Alvida Naa Kehna). We just wanted to give him one more chance. For Tere naina, in fact, we tried many voices but finally thought of Shafqat. For the Housefull song, we wanted someone who is totally opposite to Kishore Kumar, who had sung the original song, so that there is no comparison.

Housefull

Are the so-called playback voices like Sonu Nigam and Shaan fading away?

Not really. It all depends on the song really. Like Sonu has recorded a song with us for the Stepmom remake (produced by Karan Johar). Shaan is always singing for us. The idea is to use voices that do justice to the particular song. For MNIK, we got Richa (Sharma) back and she sang Sajda so well with Rahat (Fateh Ali Khan). And if we don’t use new singers, who will? So you will always see us having at least a couple of new singers in every soundtrack. Shilpa Rao was singing outside our studio a few years back and we gave her Saiyaan re to sing in Salaam-e-Ishq and see what songs she has sung since. In Karthik Calling Karthik, we had Clinton singing and there was Alyssa, Loy’s daughter.

Is it difficult to work on a film like Housefull where the songs just pop up from nowhere?

The comedy genre is like that. You have to keep the sound of the film in mind rather than just one song. And also if you notice, from My Name is Khan to Karthik Calling Karthik to Housefull, you can see the contrast. If you play the soundtracks one by one, you can see the versatility of the music directors. You cannot imagine they have been done by the same set of people. We are proud of our range.

Tell us about your world tour...

It’s out first world tour — the Inspiration Rock On Live. We will have 12 concerts in cities in the US, UK and Canada between July and August.