Coke Studio Is Dead! Long Live Coke Studio
For music lovers who grew up in the late ’90s in the subcontinent, the last week was one of much chagrin. One of the pioneering rock anthems of the time was nothing less than butchered in tribute, that too on the land’s much-vaunted independent music platform.
Once the highlight of the musical calendar, Coke Studio in recent times has garnered more brickbats than applause, even from people who were once staunch loyalists.
What has gone wrong?
“We are a melting pot of all these people and these cultures and they’ve brought their art forms over the years, their instruments and their ways and their philosophies. So that was liberating, and of course that led to a process of self-discovery.”
At the outset, Rohail Hyatt’s brainchild was more than a TV show. It was a showcase using music to present a rich and varied culture, aiming to re-popularise what was then the old and the forgotten among the youth. It sought to bring traditional music into the modern world. An almost spiritual endeavour.
Every song on the platform was chosen for a reason: a message, a feeling, a mystical verse. It was mixed in non-intrusive ways with elements of classical music, to create a wholesome experience of modern instrumentation mixed with traditional essence.
Artists were called in with their ideas and new work. The production team and the house band worked with them on giving new directions to their songs, in an organic, open and collaborative process. This was truly original music from the land.
The song belonged to the artist. The garb was modified, but only in ways that stayed true to the original. The creation of the songwriter remained intact, only dressed in a grandiose arrangement, medley or combination. Sometimes, new ideas took birth on the spot, new verses were written, new ideas explored. All part of the process.
Looking at the behind-the-scenes videos from the earlier seasons of Coke Studio, one walks through the rationale behind the choice of song, the motivations of the songwriter / artist, the process of constructing the sound, and the dynamic interplay of ideas bursting forth that results in original content. Each song was a story.
Nowadays, songs on Coke Studio are pre-produced, mostly written by the in-house lyricist. The elements are decided and arranged beforehand. The singers? They just come and perform their parts. A song is a spectacle, mechanically produced and dressed up for the gallery.
Where is that pang-filled melancholy of Umair Jaswal’s Khayaal that you can feel in the croons of the writer? Where is that collaborative build-up of creating a new Miyan Ki Malhaar with the three main female vocalists of the season? Where is that trip to Fez for that one little percussive sound?
What was once a deeply moving experience, is now a commercialised spectacle. The most popular producers making popular music. A machine to churn out chart-toppers in the instant gratification world. YouTube views are deemed an apt gauge of success. It’s a Bollywood formula, with essentially playback singers, and all manner of bling.
Another hallmark of Coke Studio was the concept of mashups between classical and modern music. The folk song Pere Pavindi was given a groovy feel, the Chakwal Group sang with a Punjabi rapper famous across nations, and Alan Fakir’s Tere Ishq Mein was given space on a song by Jal.
Along with countless other instances, these combinations were unobtrusive and effortless, the elements feeling at home with each other, the collaboration done only when it was needed, and only when it sounded good. Artists were given individual songs to fully utilise their brilliance, be it Abida Parveen’s inimitable devotional vocals, or Farhan Rais Khan’s sitar on Seher.
In the new age, one can hear the jarring noise of forced collaborations. Jaffer Zaidi’s beautiful arrangements might have given us a modern version of Man Kunto Maula for the ages, but the needless addendum of some fresh-made Urdu lyrics in the form of Ali Azmat’s interjections had to spoil that. Similarly, Quratulain Balouch’s refreshing take on Laung Gawacha was needlessly riddled with a random loud number. And although I love Ali Sethi, his presence on Aaqa was superfluous, where Abida Ji should have had full stage with her mastery of the genre. And despite all the rage, why was Afreen combined with anything? What did it achieve? In a good collaboration, one mustn’t wait for one part to end.
If not this ungainly hash, a song is most likely a crowd of “performers” taking turns to sing, the most recent case being the overkill of three vocalists on Season 10’s Tinak Dhin. I fail to grasp why almost every number should have two to three singers, unless their styles and parts combine to create a coherent whole. Paar Channa De had the male and female voicing different characters. Fair. For what special reason did Jhalliya have Masooma Anwar singing two verses and a bridge?
Rohail Hyatt’s original vision gave Coke Studio a unique sound, a well-defined style and a pursuit of bringing relevant portions of the rich culture and music to a wider audience. Classical music and mystical poetry were given center stage. Fareed Ayaz’s Rung was still sung in the same style as Amir Khusro’s original qawwal bacche had sung; the band provided reverent accompaniment.
In the past two seasons, one gets the feeling that every thing is just another element of a song, a component that fills the song up, there for the sake of being there. A snippet of Bulleh Shah is a filler, so is a little play of the sitar. The list of common elements is set, to create the idea of “classical music”, a fabricated fusion designed for pop radio: flute, mandolin / rubab, and Hindustani-pop vocals. There is no space for an untouched15-minute trance-inducing qawwali from six centuries ago.
Everything is a cog in the big formulaic production machine, that has no one helmsman and no one direction. Multiple producers were brought in to add freshness, so far they have only added confusion: there is no overall “sound” like the one that belonged to Hyatt, and no one producer has come close to his musical genius, the one that decorated song upon song in that seamless blend of the new and long-established.
Aik Alif is a poem of Bulleh Shah’s sung by the popular rock band Noori, featuring Saeen Zahoor, a folk voice from deep inside Punjab. My play count for it lies above 400. It exemplifies the meaning of Coke Studio for me: creating raw fusion of Hindustani music and mystical poetry to preserve and promote a rich culture to the masses. On the other hand, last week’s episode already lies forgotten.
You either die a hero, or you live long enough to see yourself become the villain. Now that this platform has fallen prey to the waves of commercialism and populism, I must guard against the sullying of its image by keeping its original incarnations close to my heart. I hope their richness can keep me sated for eternity.
