Hum Do Anjaane Music Review: Hum Do Anjaane: Let’s Stay Strangers

The careers of Jackie Shroff and Anil Kapoor form an interesting counterpoint to each other, if you think about it. While both debuted around the same time and followed a similar trajectory with their films in the '80s, the way their filmographies have shaped up are as different as chalk and cheese. Sometime between the '90s and the noughties, Jackie lost his way completely, even as his screen brother Anil 'Lakhan' Kapoor managed a fantastic transformation with films like 'Taal' and 'Virasat'. So, today, where Anil is still at the top of his game and on the edge of international success, Jackie is relegated to nonstarters like this, 'Hum Do Anjaane', reminiscent of Mithun's late '90s releases. If the music album's cover is any indication, 'Hum Do Anjaane' doesn't have a hope. While one knows better than to judge a book (or, in this case, an album) by its cover, having given the music a fair listen, one knows one isn't mistaken. The film is produced by one Naresh Kaura, who, it turns out, also stars in the film, and is plastered on the album cover with Jackie Shroff, glasses, guns, et al. Milind Swamy handles direction, while a certain Prashant Singh contributes the music. While the opener, 'soniye' isn't half bad a track, with Kunal Ganjawala and Priyani Vani on vocals, the unnecessary English interlude just take away what little charm it has. A fairly run of the mill romantic track, the number is reprised in something called a 'band version', with just Amit Mishra on the vocals and a more rock oriented arrangement. 'Pallu Latke', with Sonu Kakkar, is a fairly formulaic item number, easily avoidable in a crowd of 'munnis' and 'Sheilas'. The arrangement and the melody are uniformly peppy, but it doesn't make much of an impression. 'Resham si' is another soft love ballad like the opener. Pamela Jain is competent in her singing, but the melody stays too staid to make a real impression. Now, while the album stays bland, though not unbearable so far, the next number, 'tress passing', actually takes it to atrocious levels, and not just for misspelling the word 'trespassing' in the title. For starters, the melody is completely plagiarised from the Black Eyed Peas' massive 2003 hit, 'where is the love', right down to the way singers Jolly Mukerjee, Prashant and Vinti Singh deliver the vocals, even. Of course, the nonsensical lyrics are an insult to even BEP's passionate plea for peace. Composer Prashant also seems to have had a severe financial crunch while arranging the track; resulting in him working with just a synthesiser and a drum machine through the entire track. The man has even autotuned his singing parts, instead of getting a more competent singer to handle them. Terrible doesn't begin to describe this one. The two remaining tracks try their best to shake off the pale cast by 'tress passing', but don't quite manage it. 'Manga hai', with Babul Supriyo and Dipti Gautam, is a confused sort of melody, unsure of whether it wants to stay in the 'iktara' space, or go with a Southern tune, or seek out a folk music touch. 'Come on come on' is a fairly okay club number. Shruti Rane does a good job with the English verses, while Amit Sharma is okay with the Hindi interludes. Good for a listen or two, but not much more. Overall, the 'Hum Do Anjaane' soundtrack is okay at its best, bad and ugly at its worst; unfortunately for Prashant Singh, the negative far surpass any positives on the album. This one is the very definition of avoidable.