By Hemisha Morarji.
With catchy laid back beats, it’s no wondering that Dhunush’s single, “Why this Kolaveri’ has already reached over 22 million hits on Youtube. A soundtrack to the Tamil star’s upcoming film, the track is fast becoming an international hit.
Every now and then in the Western world, a video of a bright-eyed pop star wannabe will attract millions and millions of views on website Youtube, with merely the use of their decent voice, an instrument and the fact that they tick every criteria on the ‘Marketability’ checklist.
But India has witnessed the very first of this viral phenomenon. Cross cultural Tamil-English musical hit, ‘Why this Kolaveri Di’ has reached over 22 millions hits and counting on the video sharing website, as well as 3.6 million Facebook shares and #Kolveri hash tag trending on Twitter amongst fans, journalists, celebrities and industry barons.
In just 2 weeks, ‘Why this Kolaveri Di’ has become an overnight success, prompting many to brand Dhanush as India’s very own Justin Bieber.
Already attracting attention from international media, including the BBC, the video received 83,000 Youtube views within 24 hours after it was first released to now become the most viewed video on the website.
Composed by Anirudh Ravichander, the song is getting attention for the slang term, Kolaveri, which means ‘murderous rage.’ So much is its popularity that the term is being picked up by marketers and brands and people in other parts of the world as a form of expression.
The viral video is the first in India to be replicated by fans, who have taken to Youtube to share their own versions of the song. Even Bollywood playback singer Sonu Nigam’s four year old son made up his own rendition, which has already notched up over 1 million hits.
Asian World caught up with Dhanush to discuss the lyrics, the track’s online success and of course, his upcoming film 3, which is directed by his wife Aishwarya.
Tell us about your new track
The song is called ‘Why this Kolaveri di’ and it is about this guy who’s been dumped by this girl. He’s really drunk and he starts laughing and blabbering, which is why the lyrics are a little disjointed.
What inspired you to write the song?
This song is for the film 3, which we are filming right now. The inspiration is from the situation of the film. The director wanted a funny song for the scene, in which guy that been dumped by his love interest. But the director felt that a guy who’s been heartbroken by a girl can’t sing a funny song, so I came up with the concept of a guy getting drunk and coming out with all of these funny things. So it was a light-hearted twist on what is considered a serious situation.
Yes, it has been reported that the song is a soundtrack to your upcoming film, 3. Can you tell us a bit about the film?
It’s a romantic film that been turned into a thriller. The film deal with a situation in which everything falls into place and everything is right, but the question arises: ‘What can possibly go wrong?’
The track has become an overnight success; you must be pleased with the outcome.
Yes! We couldn’t have asked for more. We expected to attract half a million views maximum, and we would have been really happy with that. But the song has attracted over a million views now. We don’t know what happened. Nobody can plan this sort of success, nobody can predict it. It has just happened to us and we are really, really glad that this has happened.
Fans have re-created their own versions of the viral video. Have you seen any of them?
I have seen every single version on the internet. I like this R’n’B version by this American, I like that version. There is also a video of some 8 or 7 year old singing that song – that is another favourite and I also liked the ‘Everyone’s angry about Kolaveri’ spoof.
Which out of the three is your favourite?
I really liked them all, but if I had to choose, I would say the R’n’B version.
The track has become an overnight success. How important are mediums such as Youtube and Twitter?
Youtube and Twitter have played an important role in the success of this song. Social marketing is playing a vital role in marketing these days and when it comes to Kolveri, the attention is it getting globally is mainly down to social marketing. I feel the song is a brilliant concept and I’m really happy that people are listening to it. It was worth finding a different route in bringing this song and film to the attention.
Do you think that Youtube makes it easier for some people to become superstars?
I don’t know about that. You never know how it (public attention) turns out. It depends on the quality of the song and if people connect to it and the singer. Sometimes they do, other times they don’t.
The track is getting a lot of attention for its slang terms. Whose idea was it to include the word Kolveri in the song?
I really didn’t think about it much. It is such a stupid word. ‘What is this Kolveri’ was the first thing that came in my head and I started singing it over and over again and thought it would fit in well with the funny concept of the song.
How is being a recording artist different to being in the Tamil film industry?
I would not consider myself a recording artist. I’m an actor and the song was something I got into by accident. There was nothing to feel about it, it was a small project that was part of a film I was doing. I am focused on my acting and I’m concentrating on that.
