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Business News/ Mint-lounge / A score for the peaks
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A score for the peaks

A score for the peaks

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British director Danny Boyle’s last film, Slumdog Millionairehad an A.R. Rahman score that sounded like Hollywood’s idea of Bollywood, but their latest tie-up for ,127 Hours eliminates that awkward sense of cultural crossover. 127 Hours is an unconventional Hollywood action picture about a man trapped alone in a canyon trying to free himself, and its music is unconventional action movie music too.

Interspersed with these and other Rahman compositions are selections that span an audacious range of genres, from Bill Withers’ classic Lovely Day and a Chopin nocturne to some stunning synthpop (Free Blood’s Never Hear Surf Music Again, Plastic Bertrand’s Ca Plane Pour Moi) and Sigur Rós’ epic Festival.

They may be distinct from each other, but together with Rahman’s original score, they form an intriguing ensemble. Rahman’s Indian film music integrates complex, sometimes unlikely elements into his infectious brand of cinema pop; for years now, his music has been about getting listeners to re-evaluate the unfamiliar or the ignored: unusual playback voices, once-moribund genres of film music such as the bhajan and qawwali, multilingual hip hop, Chithra’s voice on a bhangra song.

Here, as with some of his Bollywood work, he produces a score bursting with international influences. The results are perhaps at their most artless on tracks such as the instrumental R.I.P, and his ethereal, much discussed duet with Dido, If I Rise, which also uses the voices of Mumbai’s Gleehive Children’s Choir.

But artless is not Rahman’s best mode, and on others, the effect is more layered. The sombre orchestral The Canyon would fit right in on any Steven Spielberg-John Williams soundtrack, but the solo guitar in Touch of the Sun is a minimalist miracle. And who other than Rahman would create something called Acid Darbari, in ambient flute-and-chime tones that recall his gorgeous Rehna Tu (Delhi-6, 2009), to play in the background of a story about a hiker trapped in a Utah canyon?

None of this may strike the hammer blow of Trent Reznor’s thunderous rearrangement of Grieg’s In the Hall of the Mountain King for The Social Network, which has probably already power-chorded itself into an Oscar nomination, but 127 Hours holds its own. Its lack of Bollywood exotica may not earn it as much worldwide attention as Slumdog Millionaire, but it is a much better expression of Rahman’s range than the other soundtrack.

It may not be a big surprise for those who already know and love him as a global composer. But for any music lover, the effects are heady.

127 Hours: Music from the Motion Picture, Universal Music,Rs295.

supriya.n@livemint.com

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Published: 07 Jan 2011, 07:32 PM IST
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