Welcome to an IndiPop Classic

I'm going to end the week on a nice intercultural, fusion theme. I have greatly enjoyed the pop music emanating from India over the last few years. The entry of MTV into India a decade or so ago completely changed the music scene there. Many talented musicians got a great deal of visibility and a huge new genre of music "IndiPop" started growing. One of the earliest acts to attain superstar status in India was a group called Colonial Cousins. It's fascinating to realize that this group is now so legendary that they're almost considered an "oldies" act there. There has since been an explosion of Indian musicians who skilfully blend western music styles with a range of Indian styles - from Bollywood to classical Indian music.

I'm planning to feature an entire week of IndiPop on this blog within the next few months, but for now, let me start with the people who started it all - Colonial Cousins. Colonial Cousins consist of Hariharan - a top notch musician trained in both the south Indian and north Indian classical styles, and Leslie "Lezz" Lewis - a long-time fixture on the music scene in India who was known for writing catchy jingles for the advertising industry there.

I think they were astonishingly successful at blending the extremes of classical Indian music with Western music. Many people who have not been to India are surprised to learn of the widespread use of "Hinglish" in Indian colloquial speech as well as in advertising. The mixing in of English words, phrases and sentences in a conversation otherwise conducted in Hindi is common. In the selections I have featured here, there is a great blending not only of musical styles but also lyrics in multiple languages. By the way, they were the first (and so far only) Indian act to be featured on MTV Unplugged.

Both the songs featured here are from their debut CD. You can actually buy the debut Colonial Cousins CD on Amazon here. If you like this, you can find their other CDs here. I strongly recommend you start with the debut CD and then move to the others. I think the weakest album of the lot is The Way We Do It, but I would recommend their third album, Aatma.

Krishna starts off with a brief religious chant and then an invocation of God in a very south Indian style. Then Lezz Lewis jumps in with his very secular lyrics in English. Spectacular! Sa Ni Dha Pa (the south Indian equivalent of Do Re Mi Fa) also starts with a south Indian chant followed by Lezz Lewis's great blend of western and north Indian melodies. The mix of styles here is quite astounding and brilliantly smooth.

1. Colonial Cousins - Krishna (5.34 MB; 128 kbps MP3)
2. Colonial Cousins - Sa Ni Dha Pa (Never Know The Reason) (4.67 MB; 128 kbps MP3)