MUMBAI: Former ‘Agnee’ band member and frontman of the band ‘Airport’, Arijit Datta has now entered the Indian film industry (he avoids the term ‘Bollywood’) with a brilliant soundtrack for the movie ‘Filmistaan’. He talks to Radioandmusic.com about his journey and his experience as a musician.
Datta has been performing on various stages, including NH7 in 2010 for many years now. He believes that it has taken him a while to reach this point, but he is glad that he has finally achieved it. “It has been quite a ride. I have been playing live, and now finally I have composed music for a movie. It is such a big deal. I am extremely happy that I landed ‘Filmistaan’ because it is something that I am proud of. It is such a different movie – it is witty and brilliant,” Dutta says.
As a child who loved music and looked up to musicians, the Bengali composer always dreamed of becoming a musician someday, despite beginning his music career at the age of 24. The only natural goal that he could wish for was to make it big in the Indian film industry.
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“I did not have any idea about being in a band as back then bands were not popular. I kept imagining a big Hindi ‘banner’ with my name on it. The industry seemed so grand with stars like Dilip Kumar and Amitabh Bachchan.”
About being offered to compose the music for the movie, he answers, “When I met Nitin (Kakkar, the director), I played a few of my tracks (Airport). Coincidentally, he had heard my music and he claimed that he had been listening to my music for quite a while and that he really liked it. We clicked. When I read the script of ‘Filmistaan’ I fell in love with it and we immediately agreed on working together.”
The music composed by Datta has repeatedly been tagged in the Sufi genre, which he denies humbly. Although Datta’s music does not belong to a specific genre, he has highly been influenced by jazz and blues. The music he creates as a part of ‘Airport’ is a mix of everything – jazz, pop and rock – with western influences. For ‘Filmistaan’, it is more soft and semi-classical.
His band ‘Airport’ was formed in 2009 when he met Vinay Lobo (guitarist) and they started jamming together. He explains, “One day we realised we had like 15 odd songs and the idea to form a band just came up. ‘Airport’ is like we are on a stage; every song is a flight of emotions. There is so much drama – someone is flying away for a new job, someone is saying goodbye to a loved – there is eagerness, happiness, anxiety. I like going to airports and being a voyeur. For me, song writing is about forming a connection and the listener’s interpretation.”
Datta’s first major inspiration was the American singer-songwriter Bruce Springsteen who he thinks is really ‘cool’. He says, “When I was small and I saw Springsteen on TV, I was awe-struck. He left a very indelible mark on me; I wanted to be Bruce Springsteen!”
Over the years, he became a fan of Sandeep Chowta, music director of movies like ‘R…Rajkumar’,’ Jaani Dushman’, etc and Vishal Bhardwaj who is a music composer along with many other talents. Today, Datta has worked with both of his muses, people he has always looked up to. He says, “Chowta has taught me so much. I have had so much to learn from him which I have applied in the music I composed for the movie.”
When asked about finally making it into ‘Bollywood’ which is commercially bigger than the independent scene in the country, he retorts, “Bollywood has become such a negative word; I would rather term it as Indian film industry. Our film industry is larger than life; it is one of the largest. This industry has so much power; it is an honour to be involved in something so big.”
Talking about his upcoming projects, he discloses that ‘Airport’ has composed the music for the re-release of the 1989 Aamir Khan hit ‘Raakh’.
Datta also stated that he has been asked to work on the soundtrack for a movie called ‘Pipeline’ which has not been announced officially.
Besides the movie projects, the artiste’s band is about to release their debut album in July which will possibly be a self-titled album.
