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BY KAVITA CHHIBBER
When Adnan Sami came
to Atlanta two years ago with legendary singer Asha Bhonsle, the show
was sold out, so much so that additional seats were added in the
Gwinnett Arena and weren’t enough. The quality of the singing,
Asha Bhonsle’s evergreen presence matched by Adnan Sami’s
musical talent and charm on stage had made it a memorable night.
The return of Sami this time with a chockfull of stars, that included
the incredibly talented singer Sunidhi Chauhan, the well known actress
Amisha Patel, and current heartthrob Raghav, had Atlanta rocking with
anticipation of a great show. Raaz Promotions had also worked very hard
to present what they thought would be a memorable evening of music
dance and a night of musical excellence.
What we saw instead was a badly choreographed overcrowded hodgepodge
that should have never seen the light of day.
The show began with former VJ cum singer Mansi Scott trying to make the
most of a bad beginning when she tried to sing songs from her debut
Indi-pop album, “ Nach Le”on karaoke, since the
orchestra could not play live for her. The cd didn’t work,
several times, and the poor woman had to smile through it all.
Mercifully after a couple of gaffes, Sunidhi Chauhan was invited to
come and perform. Chauhan has incredible power and range in her voice,
and has among her admirers none other than the legendary nightingale
Lata Mangeshkar herself. She came out and belted all her powerful item
numbers, be it Sajan ve Sajna from Chameli, to her
blockbuster Dhoom macha le, to Ishk Samandar Dil from
Kaante, and Kaisa jadu dala re from Khakee. In
spite of a sound system that didn’t seem to work too well, and an
orchestra that was too loud, Chauhan’s voice soared through the
chaos to regale the audience. It is a pity though that in spite of
having sung some very soulful numbers like Aa bhi ja from Sur
and Behta hain man kahi, Chauhan has become
synonymous with item numbers and in the limited time she had on stage
stuck to those songs.
Amisha Patel showed up after that to do a medley of songs a couple of
times. She was seen for may be a total time of 20 minutes, and someone
in the audience joked that perhaps she wanted a free ride to the US and
to make a quick buck and what better way than to latch on to a
Bollywood show and do that. Patel recently appeared in an Adnan Sami
music video and perhaps received the nod from Sami because of that.
It was when Adnan Sami came on stage that the audience really woke up.
However the problem with Sami and some other new era artists as Asha
Bhosle pointed out is the fact that their diction is not clear. Even in
his last show with Asha ji, we were wondering if there was something
wrong with Adnan Sami’s voice because one couldn’t hear
either his wise cracks or his songs with clarity. But Asha Bhosle
walked on stage and from the very beginning her voice, her stories were
crystal clear. It all comes down to how much effort you want to put in.
This time was no different. His jokes and songs were pretty
incomprehensible a lot of the times-mercifully his facial expressions
made up to some extent. Still in spite of his excessive weight, Adnan
Sami is a born charmer. There is sweetness, not only in his melodies,
but in the way he conducts himself on stage. He is a born showman who
knows how to get his audience involved, and this time too, he charmed
every one by singing some of his ever popular numbers from Hoyla
Hoyla to, main Sirf tera mehboob tu meri mehbooba, teri bahon
mein, to a couple of new songs he has recorded recently along with
music for the movie Lucky starring Salman Khan. He ended the night with
the ever popular Lift kara de which is usually his final song,
though his second segment was abruptly cut off because of lack of time.
Raghav is a major sensation now and on his way to becoming an
international star. His name evoked the maximum screams from the
younger crowd and his segment garnered the maximum whistles. The older
crowd in the audience wasn’t too pleased with his taking a
segment of a golden oldie and using the same notes to create a rap
style song out of it. Still Raghav who is trained in classical music
and has several hits and awards to his name, was a breath of fresh air
and will definitely go places-there were some hysterical fans who
thought he looked like a hipper, cooler version of Jude Law.
Shefali of Kaanta Laga fame was hyped to the skies by Manasi
Scott-what we saw was a nervous, over weight girl who can’t dance
to save her life and didn’t even bother to try to look good.
Amisha Patel was booed the second time she appeared on stage as no one
wanted her. The dancers in the show wore horribly stitched clothes with
colors that were a total eyesore, and gyrated like monkeys to identical
steps throughout.
Half way through the concert people kept running out to take a break
from the farce going on inside. One die hard fan of such shows, Anita
Gupta got up saying- “ I can’t take this any more,”
and went outside to lie down on a couple of chairs. Pushpa Narula who
is visiting from India, and had been looking forward to her first ever
Bollywood concert show was seen discreetly taking out a little torch
from her hand bag and peering at her watch to see the time-hoping
desperately for the cacophony to come to an end so she could go home.
Had the show featured Sunidhi Chauhan with Adnan Sami and maybe a
segment from Raghav, this would have been a treat. Too many artists
squashed together, lousy choreography made this a show that is best
erased from memory. I just hope the poor promoters managed to get their
investment back.
Kuch Dil Se? or to interpret it in English-Something from the heart?
Maybe, but it definitely left all of us brain dead pretty much from the
start!
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