Fanney Khan Music Review: Disappointing

When a film arrives with stars as huge as Anil Kapoor and Aishwarya Rai Bachchan, you expect the soundtrack to be pretty effective as well. Of course both of them are veterans in the business now and are not even romantically paired opposite each other. This also shoots down the possibility of some conventional music in the offering. Still, with Amit Trivedi at the helm of affairs as the composer and Irshad Kamil roped in as a lyricist, you expect a quality outing. The beginning of the soundtrack though has guest composer Tanishk Bagchi churning out 'Mohabbat'. A stage performance featuring Aishwarya Rai Bachchan, this one has the kind of tune that used to be prevalent back in the 90s when the leading lady had started her career as a heroine. Though the song has a catchy hook to it, there isn't much about it that one can expect to stay on once the film is off the screens. Surprisingly, the kind of canvas and grandeur that one expects from a song featuring Aishwarya is missing as well as the overall stage and setting is rather restricted. Same is the case with 'Halka Halka' as well which is semi-situational and semi-music video. Again, the canvas is quite small in both the segments because while former has been set in single room, latter just has a couple of screen backgrounds against which Aishwarya has shot the video. Nevertheless, while that is about the video part of the song, from the audio perspective one wonders why a sufi number by Nusrat Fateh Ali Khan has been given such a club remix treatment by Amit Trivedi. Sunidhi Chauhan and Divya Kumar come together for this recreation which is eminently forgettable. Though Amit Trivedi tries to croon for Anil Kapoor in 'Achche Din', the overall effect is pretty dull. One can understand that this was meant to be a sad outing as a man wonders that when would his 'achche din' arrive. Still what one gets to hear is rather listless as the song just drags along with no real impact felt even emotionally. Thankfully there is at least a bit of a momentum that comes in once Monali Thakur sings 'Tere Jaisa Tu Hai' at a high pitch. That said, the hook-line is the only part of the song where one can feel high energy on display even as rest of the outing stays on to be just about ordinary. Still, compared to the couple of songs preceding it, this one still manages to work at least to some extent due to its thematic appeal. Last to arrive is 'Fu Bai Fu' and this one appears to be a rather 80s kind of outing, what with Monali Thakur singing this one for a street celebration stage and setting. A lot would depend on how the song is picturised since as a standalone number it doesn't really have much of a potential to strike a chord amongst the audiences. Fanney Khan is a relatively big film this season but the soundtrack doesn't really justify its conclusion. This effort by composer Amit Trivedi is rather disappointing. Our picks: Mohabbat, Tere Jaisa Tu Hai