Hansal Mehta’s scathing criticism of ‘godawful’ remixes after Masakali 2.0: ‘Stop consuming sh*t, people will stop producing it’

Hansal Mehta has blamed the public for making remixes popular, making producers invest in such projects.

Filmmaker Hansal Mehta has joined the latest online controversy - the debate around remix of AR Rahman’s Masakali from Rakeysh Omprakash Mehra’s Delhi-6. Featuring Sidharth Malhotra and Tara Sutaria, the new version was released online to scathing reviews from critics as well as music lovers. The original track was penned by Prasoon Joshi and sung by Mohit Chauhan for Abhishek Bachchan-Sonam Kapoor starrer 2009 film.

Criticising the new version of Masakali, Hansal Mehta has urged people to avoid giving it all the views on YouTube.

Urging the public to reject recreation of old songs, Hansal wrote on Twitter, “This ‘recreation’ of old songs can stop if the public rejects them. The numbers on YouTube for godawful versions of old songs are huge and hence music companies keep producing them. Stop viewing the videos. Stop listening to the songs. Stop playing them at events. They will stop.”

He further tweeted, “We are complicit in this bastardisation of old songs. It is seen as a small price to pay for getting your film produced. Truth : it is a travesty. It is an insult to the original creator by an ecosystem that thrives on shit. Stop consuming shit. People will stop producing shit.”

He also confirmed in a tweet that he was talking about Masakali 2.0. “Yes. I am reacting to the awful, ear shattering #Masakali version. But check its YouTube views in 48 hrs. Then see how DJs blast it at events. And how people groove to the godawful version. S**t sells. While we cringe, somebody is laughing his way to the bank,” Mehta wrote on Twitter.

On Wednesday, Bhushan Kumar’s T-series launched the remix of the song. Titled Masakali 2.0, the new version has been composed by Tanishq Bagchi and Tulsi Kumar and Sachet Tandon have lent their voice for the song.

Just hours after the song came out, AR Rahman tweeted a link to his original song and wrote, “No short cuts, properly commissioned, sleepless nights, writes and re-writes. Over 200 musicians, 365 days of creative brainstorming with the aim to produce music that can last generations. A team of a director, a composer and a lyricist supported by actors, dance directors and a relentless film crew.”

This is not the first time that Rahman’s songs have been recreated. Earlier this year, Varun Dhawan-starrer Street Dancer 3D had featured a remixed version of Muqabla. The trend of remixing old songs peaked last year when almost every Bollywood movie featured a recreated song. Tanishq has previously recreated popular songs including Humma Humma, Ole Ole, Ankhiyon Se Goli Mare, O Saki Saki and Tamma Tamma among others.

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