Replay: 'Tadap' And The Arijit Singh Ballad That Outlived Its Film

There are three Hindi films called Tadap. This is the 2021 one, Milan Luthria's romantic action thriller for producer Sajid Nadiadwala, which introduced Ahan Shetty opposite Tara Sutaria. A remake of Ajay Bhupathi's Telugu film RX 100, it was moved from September and reached cinemas on 3 December 2021. Reviews were mixed, though the music was widely mentioned.

Pritam wrote the songs and Irshad Kamil the lyrics. John Stewart Eduri handled the background score. T-Series released the singles one by one through November and the eight-track album on the film's opening day. The album runs 34 and a half minutes. Five of the eight tracks are originals: the four below and Neha Kakkar's "Ae Dilla Marjaaniyaan", set over a heavy sub-bass. The other three are alternate takes, two of them of "Tere Siva Jag Mein". The film opened on 2,107 screens, 1,656 of them in India, and grossed about Rs 34.86 crore worldwide. The film is set in Mussoorie. The songs are old-fashioned romance, with the hills behind them.

'Tumse Bhi Zyada'

The first single came out on 3 November, and it is the one people still search for. Arijit Singh sings a slow-building ballad, with Ashish Pandit sharing the lyric credit. The session list is long: Alan Hertz on drums, Ridu Shaw on guitar, Roland Fernandes on bass, Shirish Malhotra on sax, flute and clarinet, and a row of dholak and tabla players, all arranged and produced by Prasad Sashte. With that many players, the room is in the recording. The vocal sits over strummed acoustic guitar and hand-played percussion, and the opening minute takes its time before the first chorus.

Singh stays inside the melody and does not push the lyric, which is already doing the work.

Few people now could tell you the film's plot. T-Series' lyric video alone is past 180 million views.

Rao and Raval trade lines, and Charan's verse comes in from somewhere closer to a streaming playlist than a film.

'Hoye Ishq Na'

The fourth single, out on 27 November, sold the film's turn from romance to grief. B Praak sings it with the cracked edge he is known for, and Dino James and Akashdeep Sengupta are credited with him. Kamil's lyric is about love that won't let go. Pritam keeps the arrangement to strings and a heavy, slow beat, and leaves the space to the voice, which is at full volume from the first line. It turns up on late-night heartbreak playlists, the songs people play in the car with the windows up. Praak takes it right to the edge of shouting and stops there.

'Tere Siva Jag Mein'

Shilpa Rao, Darshan Raval and Shashwat Singh share the tune, and Charan adds a rap. At under three and a half minutes it is the shortest of the originals, and the most 2021-sounding, with a bright pop production. Rao and Raval trade lines, and Charan's verse comes in from somewhere closer to a streaming playlist than a film. Raval later cut a solo edit of his own. It is on the album as the "Cafe Edit", 3:35 long, and the album closes on a third version, a reprise sung by Mohammed Irfan and Asees Kaur.

'Tu Mera Hogaya Hai'

Jubin Nautiyal gets the most openly 1990s song on the album, a love song that could sit in a Kumar Sanu film. Nautiyal sings it wide open, as the style asks.

Kamil's lyric is moons and promises, the kind a 1994 audience would have known on sight, and Pritam's arrangement goes the same way. It was the quiet one at release, and it has picked up listeners since, the sort of song requested at a wedding by someone who can't remember which film it came from.

Later on the album, Javed Ali sings it again. His encore runs 5:10, a second longer than the original.

(Source: official soundtrack credits, T-Series release, Spotify and YouTube, Apple Music album listing)

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