Anjaam   Producer: Rahul Rawail & Maharukh Jokhi Director: Rahul Rawail Starring: Shah Rukh Khan, Madhuri Dixit Music: Anand-Milind Lyrics: Sameer Singers: Alka Yagnik, Abhijeet, Udit Narayan, Poornima, Sadhna Sargam, Sapna Awasthi Audio On: Weston    Number of Songs: 10 Reviewed by: Rakesh Budhu  - Rating: 7.5 / 10   Let us know what you think about this review Movie Review

Anjaam may have been a mess film wise but its soundtrack was almost one hundred percent pure gold. It remains one of the best soundtracks by Anand-Milind that we’ve seen yet for a number of reasons. That including: the experimentalism, the expansiveness of the songs and the variety of singers ranging from Abhijeet to Poornima. This soundtrack not only had one song to treasure, like Badi Mushkil Hai, but many others like Tu Samne Jab Aatha Hai, Barsoon Ki Baad, one of Alka’s excellent hits, and the popular Athara Baras Ki. Anjaam was truly a hit soundtrack right from the start and for the fact that it had good tunes to go with it, it was even better.

With “Barsoon Ki Baad” one doesn’t know what is sweeter, Madhuri dancing to the tune, or the tune itself. Alka Yagnik beautifully renders Sameer’s poetry in a soft meaningful tune, which is perfectly interwoven with a dholak backdrop, the oozes melody. Surely, this tune is one of the beauties of the soundtrack alone.

And, if Alka Yagnik has her solo, so must Abhijeet. The man with the golden voice, who reigned prior to the Udit Narayan domination, sings with his silken tone in “Badi Mushkil”. Unfortunately, the lines, Badi Mushkil are too often used by Sameer today and may lose the impact, but the song itself about a love obsessed Shah Rukh is truly a beauty.

“Tu Samna Jab Aatha Hai” is one of the more experimental tunes on the soundtrack, which infuses a great deal in making the song sound sensuous, infectious and pretty exotic. Alka and Udit Narayan are in great form with nothing less expected. Interludes including the saxophone, drums, etc. are all well interwoven into the romantic duet.

The more popular masti number which ran similarly along the lines of “Gup Chup” and many other wild and derogatory numbers (lyrically anyways), is a full of beat fisherman song. Poornima in one of her regular appearances (back then anyways) is in form for these styled of tunes. Give her a non-peppy song and the singer is pretty much lost.

And then there are the more typical numbers. Granted, most of them are composed for strict on-screen narration advancement and shouldn’t perhaps, contain the greatest of competitions, the tunes are pretty average. The must include shaadi number, “Suno Meri Banno”, is a typical wedding number sung overall regularly by Alka Yagnik.

The peppy numbers do not end there either. The obviously pointless lyrics of “Kolhapure Se Aaye” are brought to life with typical Indian styled music on Anand-Milind’s part. Sadhna Sargam doesn’t do much to make the tune out of the norm regular.

The soundtrack ends with four versions of shloks of sorts, (it is truly false to call them that- but lack of better term calls for the word), titled “Pratighat Ki Jwala”. Sapna Awasthi sings in folk version for all the four versions. The songs are strictly meant to resonate the theme of revenge using a somewhat religious under-tone as the film took and are strictly successful in doing just that. Nothing more!

Anjaam’s tunes are overall a mix fare but the songs that were sweet and melodious were enough to project the soundtrack to higher standards. Many of them are still played today and are certainly worth the purchase of the soundtrack.