For many of us Gen X’ers, growing up in the 80s, much before the computer or the Internet, the playback of the music from the 60s and 70s was not just a throwback to older times that our parents listened to when they were young, but very much part of the present music scene then, all of us consuming this generation of music, as much as our parents did. The term ‘OK, Boomer’ was still thirty years too far in the future, and we grew up listening and absorbing the 60s and 70s, as much as we did the 80s, the 90s, the 2000s, and the 2010s, and continue to do so now in the 2020s. I call our generation the ‘blessed generation’, possibly the only ones that can simultaneously enjoy pop culture and music across 6 decades!
That’s why this blog on “Music That Changed Our Lives, Music That Made Us”. To travel back and forth across time over 60 years to re-visit the brilliant pieces of magical and inspiring symphony that have changed us for the better, and made us who we are today. As the famous quote goes, ‘We are what we consume’. Well, “if music be the food of love, play on”.
The first one I start with in this series has to be one of those songs that introduced the idea of an urgent and longing romance to our young and hormonal teenage minds. As some of us might recall, in the mid-90s, when India opened up to the world, cable TV had just transformed our lives, and we suddenly had access to content like never before, both Indian and international. Just as MTV and Star TV were teaching us about the birds and the bees, Indian channels were flooding us with films and songs from our glorious film history. Suddenly R D Burman's music was in vogue again (even giving us his last album around the same time, 1942, A Love Story,1994). And that’s when we re-discovered this genius of a love song ‘Jaane Jaan Dhoondta Phir Raha’, from a 1972 film Jawaani Diwani, starring Randheer Kapoor and Jaya Bhaduri (Bachchan was still a year away). (Yes the same film that also has the eponymous song, which also had a recent popular remixed version… Haa Meri Raani, Ruk Jao Jao Rani… ).
The central emotion of the song is that of longing for a beloved, that is just within reach and yet so far away. That wretched bitter-sweet feeling when you know your love is just about to be fulfilled, but it’s still taking a while to get there. Mujhko awaaz do, chhup gaye ho sanam, tum kahan… and the response makes you believe it’s almost there.. Main Yahaan.. As teenagers, listening to this song on a loop, again and again, it spoke to our simple fluttering hearts that beat for the opposite sex around us. This was not a time of Tinder and casual hookups. This was the time when romance was the desire, awkward glances exchanged were enough to make your day, and a smile and walk together holding hands was the ultimate reward for a privileged few. For the rest of us, reveling in our one-sided unrequited love, this beautiful duet became the perfect representation of how we felt most of the time… Dhoondta Phir Raha, Hoon Tumhein Raat Din Main Yahaan Se Wahaan. Stringing our hearts with the harmony of the chase, the tease, the search, the innocence, the yearning, the unfulfilled destiny, the uncertainty of whether it’s going to happen or not.
The brilliance of the song goes further, as the game of hide and seek continues, as it flows from the first mukhda, sung by the boy, showing his vulnerable insecurity (not much has changed there has it) of whether his beloved will be with him, will his love be fulfilled Raaste Mein Kahin Reh Gaye Humnashin, Tum Kahaan.. despite his beloved re-assuring him with a Main Yahaan in response. And into the second mukhda with her response re-affirming that she feels the same sense of being lost and uncertain despite the inevitability of their love Haath Aise Mein Bas Chhodkar Chal Diye Tum Kahaan.. which then flows into the last mukhda, when we realize it wasn’t hide and seek, as much as it was ‘lost and found’.. where the feeling of being lost and uncertain was unnecessary, because in truth they had found each other long time back and that their destiny was already written to be together always Paas Ho Tum Khade Mere Dil Mein Chhupe, Our Mujhe Kuchch Pata Na Chala. And that they were so caught up with the noise from the outside world that they couldn’t see what was always inside of them Dil Mein Dekha Nahin, Dekha Saara Jahaan, Tum Kahaan, Main Yahaan.
All in all, this magical stringing of music and words, sung by the genius Kishore Kumar and the inimitable Asha Bhosle (uff, her background voice and an almost baritone Mujhko Awaaz Do) hit the sweet spot every time, gratifying the ears and the hearts of us all, the adolescents of the 90s. And we listened and hummed and sang together in get-togethers and parties on the top of our voices, feeling good with a sense of affirmation of what we all felt as a generation in the 90s.. alone and together.
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