Mamta Sharma & Aishwarya Nigam: “Munni Badnaam” (Dabangg, 2010)
My post with a very pretentious scholarly title, Hey Munni!: Dabangg, Item Songs, and The Reinforcement of Gender Stereotypes, is up at appears.
Lest it sound too critical, let me reiterate how much I like both this song and the accompanying item number: acoustic drizzles peppering modern beats, strong vocals, and that irresistible “darling tere liye” hook. The parallels between its critical response and my enthusiasm for its recognition (despite it being the only number not penned by Sajid-Wajid on the soundtrack while the team collects all the music director accolades) is only offset by the fact that I’m actually Team Sheila.
Musical Consumption, 2010: 50 Incomplete Thoughts
01. If anything, writing about Korean pop for 10Magazine has expanded both my interest and knowledge in the genre, where before I was content to dabble in a few of the bigger names. In terms of tapping into the popculturenow via singles, South Korea did it better than any other country this year. Still finding major problems with albums as a whole, though.
02. My second largest genre of musical consumption this year was Indian film music, beginning with Hindi and ending in Tamil and Telugu, which took up the bulk of my research from July to November. Unbelievable how some of the worst films had some of the best music (see: anything Pritam composed this year).
03. Girls’ Generation (SNSD) came out with three phenomenal singles this year in “Oh!,” “Run Devil Run,” and “Hoot.” My vote, musically, goes to “Hoot” and lyrically for “Run Devil Run.” I don’t really remember much about “Oh!” except how ridiculously cuuuu~te its portrayal of the female gender was.
04. In January, I always read year-end lists and listen to things I either didn’t have the chance to or hadn’t come across. My favorite missed-in-2009 albums were Phoenix’s Wolfgang Amadeus Phoenix and Bat for Lashes’s Two Suns.
05. A friend bought me a copy of Lady Antebellum’s Need You Now, telling me that I absolutely had to hear the title track. My reaction was kind of like…uh. This song would be a lot better if the male vocals were not happening. Also, whoever got paid to play the piano hook got away with the smartest paycheck.
