Dabangg – Music Review

Lalit Pandit‘s sole offering for Dabangg in the form of Munni Badnaam, though the staple Salman Khan folksy dance number, turns out to be a better job than Sajid Wajid generally pull off, thanks to a commendable arrangement highlighted by an acoustic guitar loop. Mamta Sharma and Aishwarya put enough life into the vocals so as to not waste the composer’s efforts. (The official Dabangg site strangely credits Lalit only among the lyricists! Shoddy job that! Talking of lyrics, “Le Zandu Balm hui Darling tere liye“? Really? 😀 ) The song seems to be composed in Madhyamavathi (Madhmad Sarang in Hindustani, wiki tells me) which is in general a very pleasant raga in any case, so that could have helped I am guessing. The remix is a far cry though, diluting the folk effect as usual.

Though faintly reminiscent of Surili Ankhiyon Wale probably due to the Rahat factor, Tere Mast Mast Do Nain has enough elements in its arrangement, especially the choral and interlude portions, to have you listening, though not sure for how many times. And as they did with Surili.., the composers come out with a duet version of this one too, Shreya Ghoshal joining Rahat for a brief cameo. Even then her rendition adds to the beauty of the song and makes it a better version than the solo. The remix is also pretty well-made, especially the innovative opening sequence. Chori Kiya also faces a similar fate as the previous one, even more severely, that of having a tune that has a lot of heard-before elements. Sonu and Shreya are impeccable as always on the rendition front but the melody has too much of the ghisa pita components to have your attention for long. The first thing that is bound to come to your mind when you listen to Udd Udd Dabangg is the title song of Omkara. With a lot of factors in the arrangement and Sukhwinder‘s rendition literally crying out the similarity, the duo still do try to add some elements of their own. The song is a good work in entirety, but with this comparison coming into picture they lose out to Vishal Bharadwaj. Sajid-Wajid present an improvement over their own general dance tracks, in Humka Peeni Hai, adding some smart semiclassical elements sung by Master Saleem. But the Salman factor finally wins over the rest and it ends up just an average dance number. The remix doesnt make it any better. In the end comes the theme, replete with Spanish guitar loops. While the track is totally functional, with dialogues et al, listening to the Latin elements is fun!

Dabangg is once again the customary Salman Khan soundtrack, but Sajid-Wajid and Lalit Pandit manage to make it more enjoyable than the previous ones in that line.

Music Aloud rating: 7/10

Recommended Tracks: Tere Mast Mast, Munni Badnaam, Udd Udd Dabangg