Open Letter Season

I've read open letters to Sharukh Khan, Shobha De, Rahul Gandhi and a few others. I decided to add a letter of mine as well. But mine is less intellectual though. No research has gone into this letter for the only reason that the content is right there, in my face and constantly annoying me. I make this letter to the dear bollywood lyricists and to the music industry in general!

Dear Music Industry,

First of all let me start of with telling you what a commendable job your lyricist forefathers have done and how you are doing it all wrong now. Hindi songs were supposed to be about love, hope, faith, inspiration and all that. But the only thing I see is hate, blame the girlfriend, idiot boyfriend, bad grammar, random objects, English words, Totally made up hindi words and I wouldn't be too wrong if I said 'Audio erotica' (Eugh! I know). I find myself cringing. All the time. Oh! this is not me being all condescending about hindi music, but what the hell is "Bagdad se le kar Delhi via-agra?" all this is also about a Ghagra! "Udti phirti affwa hai tera Ghagra?" come on people! seriously? What about a udta ghagra as an afwa is really song worthy? My cat once wore a shirt. Take that as a theme to your next song. Gah!  I mean don't you read when you write? Let me tell you rhyme scheme isn't everything if the the lines don't make sense. When that song started with 'saheban meherban I was almost sure it was going in the 'Bandar ka khel dekho' direction, sadly it shifted to Ranbir Kapoor fixating on Madhuri's Ghagra that is apparently a matter of great concern world over. Another gem from this movie is 

"Balam pichkari jo tune mujhe maari
Toh seedhi saadi chhori sharaabi ho gayi
Haa Jeans pahen ke jo tune maara thumka
Toh lattoo padosan ki bhabhi ho gayi." So much fail both grammar and general intelligence wise. 

I could point you towards 10 songs that have been ruining my days for the last few months and not one of the lines in any of those song makes sense, I am sure you try your best to write. But you really have to up the effort. What are you going to be writing about next? I am worried. I think you've covered the innate objects department with the duppattas, payals, woofers, fevicol, pichkaris, jeans, Coffee, rains and how can I forget alcohol? and so many more others like flowers and gardens and the random body parts like eyes, lips, hips, hair and whatnot!. In fact you've covered those aspects where people didn't think writing was possible. Second hand jawani?! I was wondering what that expression even meant. Don't even get me started on the ridiculous jokes I have in mind right now.

 You've written songs about those things that have nothing to be sung about. Trust me when songs are about  a car ride, you've really have run out of things to write about. It's like when I was 5 and my mother encouraged me to write poems and I would start with "Trees are green, so big and wonderful"  except in your case you seem to be adding a heady mix of erotica to it. Amplifier, anyone? Also Fevicol from Dabbang 2?  She says she's like a tandoori and people agree because women are a piece of meat? Pata le saiyaan miss call marke. I mean, huh? Kaun pat ta hai? So ridiculous to fathom a person who'd say something so silly.

Even the supposedly good romantic numbers are outright creepy. Sunn raha hai na tu was just a lot of deep psychological issues wrapped into one. Holy crap! Sun raha hai tu -Ro raha hu main? I mean what in god's name is that supposed to be about. Attention seeking Disorder plus dependency issues? plus the existential crisis! That just sounds like a list of things from a menu of a restaurant; if there were restaurants about psychological disorders you could get from being overly in love with your girlfriend. Stop making love sound so tedious. Love can't be that hard. It just can't. Another piece of bubbling psychological issues is this song called Tum Hi Ho the song is about "love" but sounds like a good background score for Shahrukh Khan from Darr! Hello! Sounds like a stalker not a lover! 

Kyunki tum hi ho
Ab tum hi ho
Zindagi ab tum hi ho
Chain bhi, mera dard bhi
Meri aashiqui ab tum hi ho.

All that's left in this song is for the hero to cut his wrists and write love letters in his blood.

So when you write these songs please understand that your target audience is NOT bunch body shakers  who will dance to anything although that may be the image  that most of the youth give out today. It is not cool to have random sentences in English that don't mean anything, not really making a great case for English or Hindi. If you have Akon doing a piece of rap or if you have a little bit of (what I think) is Tamil you are not getting anymore fans than there are. Also, including locations in your song doesn't make your song exotic either. Same rule with Urdu as is with unnecessary English or Punjabi or any other language. It is not "sufi" if your actor is going to be singing songs to a woman, sufi music is essentially prayer songs. So unless you think somehow singing about undying love for his fantasy woman is prayer, I'd suggest you stay away.

Here is a tip -EVERYTHING does not need singing about. Do you sing about parking your car? Brushing your teeth? somethings are better left unsaid. It's like singing praises about a watchman who sleeps on his job, entirely pointless. I always thought songs were about taking the story forward, these songs don't take the movie anyway these songs are like stagnant water. Breeds disgust at best. People are going to be tired soon, once they actually take what they listen to seriously. So I write this as a  fair warning. Anytime soon in the next few years people are going to smarten up!

 I see people who will swear by their favourite actor, even singer but never their favourite lyricists, know why?  Because most songs don't mean squat. They are just fancy words that talk about heartbreak/Timepass/Love/Hurt/Hate in punjabi, urdu, hindi and English what is called the 'We're pretending to be Abhishek Bachan's superhit attempt at hindifying the song by Blue'. These songs get old fairly quickly because there are at least ten other artists who are recording a song about a girl breaking someones heart. (Also, what's your problem with women? Why so much hate?. Break up you have a problem, in a relationship you have a problem, no girlfriend you have a problem, have one you have a problem). Speaking about women, please stop telling the world that we are the greatest villians. When you sing songs about calling someones ghagra pointless (Be matlab ki bakwass tera ghagra) what do you expect your hero to end up with? 

I am not getting into  item numbers but here's a tip- class them up. Women stripping to entertain is getting old. For once let these "songs" be something that people who have ears (that work) connect with.. Please note, not everyone is stupid and may be it would help if you actually tried to reach to them. Also a lot of us use autos and buses to travel, we eat at restaurants. So just as public service have some semi decent songs that don't make us want to run and jump off the nearest bridge because Pallo ke neeche isn't a great conversation starter; Just bloody weird to sit through. I speak of this exclusively from personal experience.

Love,

Anyone whose ears are currently bleeding from the ridiculousness of your lyrics!

PS: The only things making sure your are eating two really fancy meals each day are Singers and music composers who make your lyrics looks awesome. Thank them. No, Seriously.