Happy Birthday Guru (This post was written one year ago on the same day, for its the birthday of The Boss, AR RAHMAN. It is only apt that the Boss is now changed to Guru)
HAPPY BIRTHDAY BOSS A lone boat on the sun kissed waters, makes the ripples ripple a ripple more. When all of lifes oh-nos, whys, some-other-days come to a halt and celebrate life. A smile that refuses to leave the aching face, makes you wonder whether it is worth caring and thinking all that and all those we think and ponder about all the time. For no one goes home with you except the reason you smiled today. Water that flows without the fear of losing ground, like it will always keep falling like the way it does, it will not tear the heart of the earth or spoil the clothes. Water in which I saw all the colors of life, untainted by anything that could taint water- its music, its melody and its integrity and purity. I want to get up and jump like no one is looking, keep making circles on the sand with my index finger till the wave washes it away, the circles keep getting deeper without the fear of an impending loss of identity, may be identity for them meant blending in a bigger, more real reality There is more than images and visual imagination that Rahmans music generates, it is a world indescribable in words, something that can be felt like having a chocolate ice-cream or the first kiss. I have followed his music since I was 13, and it has been a constant presence in my life ever since. All these years, Rahman music movies and songs have been knitted in my memories of school days, friends, girls, movies and my frequent relocations. Every song every note is etched like a brass impression, bringing back times in their exact color and sound. When I hear a Rangeela, I remember the day I bought the tape from hard-saved money, got it home, played it aloud on my 32 watts Philips tape, drew the curtains and started dancing like crazy. People said it was different but I got what I had ordered, every month I used to wait for the next Rahman release, drove all the music shops in town crazy by calling them umpteen times. The movies have changed, people have changed, the scene is different but my association with his music remains the same, innocent and independent of what the world thinks or says. I still run to grab that first copy of his tapes in town, still cant do anything before I listen to the tape at least two or three times, and pass my pre-decided verdict that it is vintage Rahman, period. May he live on and on and keep creating the magic over and over, so that one day when I am 98, I will tell ultracool kids of the future, this tape of Bombay that you see, is the first tape that I bought way back in the summer of 1994, it cost Rs 28 then, and it meant Magic for me then, it means Magic for me now. http://passionforcinema.com/happy-birthday-guru/
