The music of Bollywood spans a history of over 100 years; it is ever-evolving and cannot be restricted to one or two genres. Key numbers hold perennial and significant cultural relevance all over the globe, from West Africa to China. Bollywood music is neither a trendsetter nor a tastemaker; it was formed on reactionary pragmatics. Directors are constantly experimenting in incorporating popular genres in their films, as songs are perhaps the most important selling point of Bollywood movies. If you don’t have a killer joint in there, your movie might as well cease production immediately.
Just as the West’s interest in the '60s hum of psychedelia began to wane, India’s did too. People were no longer demanding a followup to the drug-fuelled anthem of Dum Maro Dum. Almost mocking the contemporary fad of George Harrison and other musicians embarking on spiritual pilgrimages to India, Asha Bhosle slurs "Morning and night, say 'Hare Krishna, Hare Ram'" over slick staccato guitars. As evidenced here, Bollywood music directors subvert musical trends, be it Western or Eastern, to create this sub-genre of a marriage of cultures that’s appreciative, not appropriative.
Disco’s prominence in the 1970s was not exclusive to the West; its influence was salient in India too. Record stores were stocked with disco hits and bootlegs. What marks Desi Disco as a significant genre in Asian music history is that out of it, iconic figures and game-changing artists and producers left a mark on India that influenced and shaped Bollywood films and the way they used and approached music entirely. Here’s a short guide to the crucial figures and moments in Desi Disco.
Biddu and Nazia Hassan
Similarly to Western disco reaching India, the effects of Indian disco were not only palpable in the East. Indian music director Biddu Appaiah, known mononymously as Biddu, saw success in the West composing and producing Carl Douglas’ mega hit "Kung Fu Fighting" amongst other minor hits such as "Smile for Me" by the Tigers.
Taking this influence back to his homeland, Biddu found a muse in Pakistani songstress Nazia Hassan, for whom he wrote and produced. Perhaps their most standout hit was the rather light and bouncy "Disco Deewane".
Their collaboration saw so much success that Hassan continued to work with Biddu on her solo records and they collaborated for the film Qurbani on "Aap Jaisa Koi". Biddu toned down the key elements and proponents of disco that resulted in this delicate interpretation of the genre; he was disco without being overtly disco, which was rare in the audacious ostentation of Bollywood.
Bappi Lahiri
Taking a contrasting approach to Biddu, Bappi Lahiri, who even refers to himself as the ‘Disco King’, can be credited with kickstarting the disco trend in India.
In the eponymous seven-minute stomper of a song from the movie Disco Dancer, what starts out as a flamboyant dissension of colors riding on the tacky hedonism of disco fluctuates between this and a tabla-heavy chorus interspersed with antiphonal communication between Vijay Benedict singing "Life is my song" and saxophones, never losing sight of its key influences.
Relying on the nonsensical "zoo zoo zooby zooby zooby" to carry the chorus, "Zoo Zoo Zooby Zooby" is another famous Lahiri number from the film Dance Dance. This song is more in line with the Western default standards of disco; the bouncing synths of ABBA’s "Gimme! Gimme! Gimme! (A Man After Midnight)" ring reminiscent of a sped-up version of this.
R. D. Burman and Asha Bhosle
R. D. Burman sought to create a middle ground between disco and psychedelia with the assistance of his wife, Asha Bhosle. Burman and Bhosle were an iconic muse-mentor power couple whose careers and relationship span beyond disco. Burman would write the songs, Bhosle would sing them.
Whilst Bhosle’s sister, Lata Mangeshkar, is hailed as a national treasure and praised for impeccable ability to create soft, demure beauty with her voice, Bhosle is dichotomously known for embodying brash, sensual, sexy vixens. Burman’s eclectic techniques involved utilizing heavy hocketing breaths, big brass sections, and chiefly his wife’s vocal skills to cement himself as the guy to hire for your film’s standout track.
As Lahiri’s reign of the disco period crept in, we saw Burman acclimatize to this phenomenon that was unlike his usual style. Though not absent of Burman’s affinity for brass and psychedelia, "Pyaar Karne Wale" sees him capitalizing on the popularity of that Moroder-esque arpeggiated synth, framing the song in a manner that was minimalistic in Bollywood’s eyes. Burman tried to find a middle ground between Indianized psychedelia and disco, simultaneously bridging the gap between the two distinct genres.
Laxmikant-Pyarelal
Whilst there was a significant divide between Lahiri’s full focus on disco and R. D. Burman’s reluctance to fully adapt in the face of a changing scene, composer duo Laxmikant Kudalkar and Pyarelal Sharma played with traditional Hindu and Sufi religious motifs for the film Karz and infused them with disco in an effort to keep up.
"Om Shanti Om" serves as a nine-minute exploration into the nuances of late '60s to early '80s Indian pop music: the repetitive chant of "Om Shanti Om" layered over signature components from wah-wah guitars to synth slides to that fall to the floor drums. There's even an epilogue-esque solo to carry the film over to a level of intensity which Bollywood can never have enough of.
"Dard-E Dil, Dard-E Jigar" hangs onto the psychedelic overtones of the previous craze, taking traditional lyrical elements from Qawwali with a Persian title and layering it over funk guitars.
"Hungama Ho Gaya" from Anhonee is a stomping ode to the bridge between psychedelia and disco and feels a lot more sure of itself than Burman’s fusion of the two.
This period of Bollywood music saw an interesting variation in styles as many music directors tried to process and incorporate disco without losing what made them famous in the first place. Whilst psychedelia had borrowed elements from Indian spiritualism and therefore was easier to reclaim and incorporate back into Indian music, disco was something entirely new. Indian disco’s influence on the post-disco period were not immediately visible. The mid-'80s to '90s saw music directors revisit traditional sources of music whilst retaining the powerful beats and basslines evidenced throughout the disco period. Only now have we seen musical nostalgia trip to this period as music directors attempt to distinguish the modern era, whether it’s homages by way of sampling or some attempt to namecheck disco in the mess of the '00s. Disco was a standout and important genre for contemporary, current and future Bollywood.