Annie’s new album Kya Yehi Piyar Hai delivers a whopping punch of disappointing mediocrity

In the wake of listening to Annie Khalid’s new album, Kya Yehi Piyar Hai (KYPH), all one is left with is a toothache. And can you imagine what something that causes a toothache is like? Quite terrible. The other thing one is left with is a desperate scrambling for one’s brain cells. Whatever remains of them, that is. You must wonder if KYPH is as bad as all that. Please let me assure you that it is.

The album opens with the title track, ‘Kya Yehi Piyar Hai’, a fairly okay song. ‘KYPH’the song is all about the achings of a new love and the questions that go with it. This is the first single off KYPH and its video was released on TV not too long ago too. Yes the lyrics are trite at first listen and the tune is catchy, though nowhere as much as the infamous ‘Mahiya’ but after listening to the entire album, this is easily the best song in retrospect. The album closes off with a trance-ish version of ‘KYPH’ so this song makes its way into your subconscious, however begrudgingly you allow it to.

The saddest bit about KYPH the album is that none of the songs are the kind that make you sit up and utter a “WOW!” or even a heartfelt “blah”. It is an album that simply exists for reasons that shall remain a mystery to mankind forever and ever.

The next track on the album, ‘Listen’ is a prime example of the kind of music that makes you hang indecisively between letting out a ‘blah, this song sucks’ and ‘wow I can’t believe Annie inflicted this song on us’. The song is sort of a double treat; it employs both Urdu and English in the lyrics and hence ups the torture ante. The thing is, nobody ever expected Annie to belt out meaningful, wordy songs a la Tori Amos, but “can’t these words make you see, I need you so desperately” is just bad poetry. To top it off, the tune is pretty mediocre and while mediocrity any other way is a sin itself, bi-lingual mediocrity can be truly horrifying.

‘Tu Mera Dil’ is yet another bi-lingual endeavour. It has a techno beat, which is reminiscent of the music that used to play behind promos of jhankar compilations back in the day. “Tu mera dil, tu meri jaan, tu meri zindagi” is the chorus of the song and if the music accompanying the words wasn’t jarring enough, enter the English lyrics on which Annie sounds a little bit more nasal than usual. The song ends as abruptly as it starts and leaves you hankering for, well, it leaves you hankering for saner times before you ever had heard of an album called Kya Yehi Piyar Hai.

There is also the token bhangra beat song on the album, ‘Kaali Raat’ being the song that does the honours in this case. The music comprises of a lot of dhol and a fast, hectic beat which accompanies Annie’s vocals. One can easily imagine this song being played at shaadis and even becoming a song that might be danced on at mehndis. So this can be considered one of the better songs on KYPH.

Right after this slightly pleasant comes yet another Urdu/ English ditty. ‘Vaari Vaari’ is sort of Punjabi, sort of dancey and a whole lot annoying in terms of its music which is once again on the geet mala in the ’80s side. The lyrics are nothing to wax eloquent about. The vocals are again nasal and slightly out of form. But then again, so are the vocals on mos tof the songs on this album.

If you are keeping count, we are headed towards track number six now. By this time I am longing for better Annie song days so I Google up ‘Tenu Takya’, a song Annie had collaborated on with an act called R n B. Now that song is no musical masterpiece either, but imagine if that starts sounding like heavenly music, how absolutely dismal  the tracks on this album actually are.

Next up is ‘Do You See Me’, another dancey track which is all about Annie asking if “do you feel me like I do?” The song is once again in both languages and this is starting to seem like the thread that connects all the songs on this album. Apart from the fact that this is music at its crappiest. Harsh words, I know, but as I trudge my way through the album I realize that if there was a definition of bad music in a thesaurus, Annie’s picture may as well be put next to it.

‘Jan e Jaan’ is in exactly the same vein as the rest of the songs on this album. Only Annie raps a bit in the beginning. Next.

‘To Woh Naheen’ is a slow track about love found and lost. It sounds different from the rest of the songs and is not quite as bad as the rest, but is still not worth talking too much about.

In all, Annie’s latest disappoints greatly. Just the fact that her sound or manner has not evolved since Princess is a let down. In a day and age when great music producers are aplenty, one wishes Annie had been advised to work with someone apart from DJs Ali Mustafa and Suketu, Dr Khalid Saleem and Kashif Ejaz. Even if she wants to work the dance sound, Annie can find a decent producer who will encourage that while helping her develop amore sophisticated end product. As for KYPH? Fail.

*****Get it NOW!
****Just get it
***Maybe maybe not
**Just download the best songs
* Pretend it doesn’t exist

Source : Instep Magazine