Pudhiya Swarangal / Dalapathi
Recently, in doing research for a Media Studies paper on the cultural impact of the cassette (nerd alert), I read skimmed through this very interesting book about how the introduction of the cassette totally revolutionized the Indian music industry by making it possible for specific regional forms of Indian popular music to be recorded and distributed on the cheap, breaking EMI Records' stranglehold on the Indian music market and reinforcing distinct regional Indian cultural identities. I won't pretend to be any kind of expert on the ins and outs of the various Indian regional cultures- I know just enough to grasp that the different regions of India are, like... different.
I'll admit, before consulting The Google to try and dig up some background on this tape, I didn't realize the various distinctions of the Indian film industry- any Indian film, to me, was a Bollywood film. Not so- Bollywood specifically refers to the Hindi-Urdu language film industry based in Mumbai, and it's one of some 16 distinct genres divided by region and language.
This tape contains the Malayalam-language translations of the soundtracks to two Tamil films from the early '90s: Dalapathi and the unreleased Pudhiya Swarangal. Both soundtracks were written by composer Ilaiyaraaja and poet/lyricist Vaali, each apparently very famous in India. This particular tape doesn't seem particularly official - the spelling and order of the Dalapathi tracks doesn't correspond to the track listing on Wikipedia, and the distinction between the two film soundtracks is a little rough: Side A and the first track of Side B constitute the Dalapathi soundtrack, with the remainder of Side B being rounded out by five songs from the Pudhiya Swarangal soundtrack (which has got to be incomplete). Either way, the music is great- lots of thick, driving percussion. I like this kind of stuff, even if I don't know that much about it.
Puthham Pudhu
(Pudhiya Swarangal)
Marketed & Distributed by Jaya Brothers, 588 Parliament Street, Toronto, Canada.