Once Upon a Time in Mumbaai Music Review: Once Upon A Time In Mumbaai: Pritam’s Retro Fever Catches Up!

Bollywood has always been fascinated by the underworld and director Milan Luthria's 'Once Upon A Time In Mumbaai' is yet another film on the same theme. The movie which has been produced by Balaji, comes with a lot of buzz attached to it. This is a movie which is set in the seventies, when the gangster cult had just about begun in Mumbai and the makers are believed to have done a lot of work on recreating the bygone era in the movie. The film has an impressive star cast in Ajay Devgn, Emraan Hashmi, Kangana Ranaut and Prachi Desai. The film's music has been composed by Pritam, while the lyrics have been written by Irshad Kamil. There are nine tracks in the album, five of which are original. As expected, Pritam rises to the occasion once again and delivers a score which is melodious and quite memorable. The opening track of the album is 'peey loon' and has been sung by Mohit Chauhan. Pritam has always reserved something special for this singer and he does that with this number as well. 'peey loon' is an outstanding number and has been sung with great feeling by Chauhan; a number which is bound to be topping the charts very soon with Chauhan's silken chords weaving a wonderful romantic magic. Kamil's lyrics are refreshingly different and the number forms a perfect blend of music, lyrics and appropriate vocals. The number begins with a slight classical touch before Chauhan's vocals make an appearance on the scene. It is a terrific start by Pritam. The second number on the album is 'tum jo aaye' sung by Raahat Fateh Ali Khan and Tulsi Kumar. Both singers combine very well in this romantic duet which has a certain 'quawali' touch to it without actually being one. It would not be unfair to say that Tulsi manages to more than hold her own against an accomplished singer like Raahat. This number occurs once more in the album, this time as a solo by Raahat. This number proves to be a winner as well. The third number on the album is 'I'm in love' sung by Karthik. This has two more versions, both of which have been sung by KK and Dominique. The lyrics of this number have been written by Nilesh Mishra. While Karthik does a good job with his solo version, it is really KK who manages to steal the show with his version, supported by Dominque. He really lifts this melodious number to another level altogether, in yet another inspired outing by Pritam. The fourth number is called 'parda' and has been sung by Sunidhi Chauhan and Rana Mazumder. This is a number which has been inspired by the famous Seventies cabaret number, 'duniya mein logon ko' from the Rajesh Khanna-Mumtaz starrer 'Apna Desh'. The basic premise of the original is maintained, right down to the famous refrain of 'Monica, O my darling'. It's in the second stanza that the 'parda' number begins. Pritam stays absolutely faithful to the cabaret style of the seventies and 'parda' turns out to be quite an interesting outing. The fifth and final number on the album is called ' Babu Rao' and has been sung by Mika with lyrics by Amitabh Bhattacharya. This is Pritam's version of the typical 'tapori' number in a gangster film. The song seems a little out of place after the beautiful melodies that have come before and therefore takes some getting used to. But, by itself, it is a fairly decent number which has been sung well by Mika. But it's definitely not showstopper material like some of the other songs in this album. With 'Once Upon A Time In Mumbaai', Pritam has come up with yet another magical score. Each of the numbers in this album is above average, with at least the first four being definite chartbusters. Pritam and Kamil combine very well yet again and the result is out there for everyone to see and hear.