Malayalam songs recording quality these days.

[hifitoaster]

There was a huge improvement in recording studios/recording standards across the globe in the last 10 years. Since I am from South and I mostly listen to Tamil, Malayalam, Hindi and occasionally Telugu and Kannada. The quality of recordings in malayalam is nowadays really good imo. Most songs released in the last 3-4 years have great recording quality. If there are like minded people like me, we can share what we have noticed 'audiophilic' in those songs. May be the artist never intended and quality came by accident. But still there is. There are lots of places where all other languages are discussed. How about keeping this thread for just malayalam?

I can start with an example:

Liked the part with clarinet part on this song :

https://soundcloud.com/rexvijayan%2Faakashame

.. Tonally I found it very pleasing. But, yet to find a place to listen this in better quality. What I liked is the purposefully messy beats to make it different, which kind of chasing the tune at times. Rex always does this

 

[kingfisher]

I don't know much about malayalam music but movies are really nice. Angamaly diaries,maheshinte prathikaaram, Drishyam and lots of movies.They score better in cinematography, editing, direction in par with Hollywood and world movies.

 

[kingfisher]

https://soundcloud.com/antonyyesudas%2F22-female-kottayam-chillane

Liked this one. Movie also good.

 

[hifitoaster]

I don't know much about malayalam music but movies are really nice. Angamaly diaries,maheshinte prathikaaram, Drishyam and lots of movies.They score better in cinematography, editing, direction in par with Hollywood and world movies.

Thats a list of some realistic movies. If you enjoy sound design of movies while watching them, try watching this movie called Annayum Rasoolum. It realistic, but a bit slow. There are lot of things to like about this movie if you look behind techinical details https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Annayum_Rasoolum. It was one the best sounding malayalam DVDs I have came across.

My artistically favourite movies are :

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Njan_Steve_Lopez
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Kammatipaadam
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mayaanadhi
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Second_Show
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Thondimuthalum_Driksakshiyum
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Take_Off_(2017_film)
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Memories_(2013_film)
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mumbai_Police_(film)

The above movies can be enjoyed without knowing Malayalam. All of them are technically well done, so you may enjoy on orginaly DVDs. Being a keralite I like lot of others but, these are the top picks which my Kannadiga friends told me that they enjoyed They didnt quite understand the other movies I suggested !

I am a die hard fan of AR Rahman. I enjoy Amit Trivedi, Clinton Cerejo for their arrangement. Also, like Santhosh Narayanan for his recording quality.
So my similar picks from Keralite artists who care about quality arrangement would be yakzan Gary Periera , Job kurian, Shan Rahman, Rex Vijayan and so on.

Some examples with rich arrangements could be:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vbmlBGX0pao

https://soundcloud.com/vishnugopalan/thaniye-mizhikal

I think these guys are underrated :
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=RRZ-5tZ1PCA
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=K0ESKTVMtAI
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0i6o0tt89iw&index=5&list=RDtNaVUxj3-nI

 

[hydrovac]

Evergreen Malayalam Boat Song... liked the most, out of various versions of this.

Malayalam, such a beautiful language I don't understand a single lyric but I love to listen.... love from Telugu.

 

[Selvin]

Not from today. From early 90's onwards I feel the recoding quality of Malayalam music are top notch. Remembering the full bodied warm sound of cassettes from companies like Wilson, Sargam Speed, Johny Sagariga. Still I am using few reference tracks from those cassettes to check my system performance.

 

[hifitoaster]

Not from today. From early 90's onwards I feel the recoding quality of Malayalam music are top notch. Remembering the full bodied warm sound of cassettes from companies like Wilson, Sargam Speed, Johny Sagariga. Still I am using few reference tracks from those cassettes to check my system performance.

But compared to 90s music which had very less instruments and the newer ones to my ears are more instruments with its natural tonality. The difference the equipment (recording) quality has improved over years. The thing I enjoy about Rahman is his , non-monotonous arrangement, non repeating passages, choice of new instruments and his experiments with new singers. The similar trend is what gives freshness to tracks. I personally can identify M.Jayachandran or Vidyasagar or Ilayaraja or Gopi Sunder easily because they are always comfortable with certain instruments, and they keep using them in their tracks again and again. If you look at something from 90s though tunes were ok, everything just few instruments heavily eq'ed. But, there weren't any distortions. Pre 90's is fun to listen! Abrupt cuts, imperfect chorus due to lack of retakes and so on...

 

[ItsMe]

If you have cassettes from Tarangini, especially the ones like - Utsava Ganangal, Grameena Ganangal, Vasantha Geethangal , Onappattukal, Bhava Geethangal, Childrens songs vol1 etc , the recording quality were top notch. I still enjoy those songs on a regular basis, though I lost those cassette collections

 

[sunilkm]

Recently liked these songs by Harish Sivaramakrishnan ( Agam band )

Rangapura Vihaara: The instruments are too good so is his vocal.

Sreeragamo

 

[jmascreen]

If you have cassettes from Tarangini, especially the ones like - Utsava Ganangal, Grameena Ganangal, Vasantha Geethangal , Onappattukal, Bhava Geethangal, Childrens songs vol1 etc , the recording quality were top notch. I still enjoy those songs on a regular basis, though I lost those cassette collections

I still have Utrada poo nilava, rest all miss placed. Its a pleasure to listen to them

 

[hifitoaster]

Recently liked these songs by Harish Sivaramakrishnan ( Agam band )

Rangapura Vihaara: The instruments are too good so is his vocal.

Sreeragamo

One of my favorite. Also this song

from 03:37

 

[hifitoaster]

New favourite : the last song by Raghu Dixit :

I wait for that drum roll at 24:24 to say I really liked the drums throghout that song. Feels like listening to something like Ed sheeran/ Cold play.

Also for midbass lovers from 2:14

https://soundcloud.com/alex-varkey%2Fiyobinte-pusthakam-raave

 

[jmascreen]

Is majority of malayalam songs recorded having singer standing first and all other musician behind?
I was just listening to lailakame and koode songs

 

[Ashenden]

I was listening to this beautiful revival of Jerry Amaldev’s classic

 

[Ashenden]

Another revival from the 90s, Venugopal and the Quintet. I’m not so familiar with the songs these days, still love the 80-90s

 

[ANILKUMAR]

Remembering the old days...................

 

[sunand777]

Remembering the old days...................

Wow nice collections....

 

[Ashenden]

But compared to 90s music which had very less instruments and the newer ones to my ears are more instruments with its natural tonality. The difference the equipment (recording) quality has improved over years. The thing I enjoy about Rahman is his , non-monotonous arrangement, non repeating passages, choice of new instruments and his experiments with new singers. The similar trend is what gives freshness to tracks. I personally can identify M.Jayachandran or Vidyasagar or Ilayaraja or Gopi Sunder easily because they are always comfortable with certain instruments, and they keep using them in their tracks again and again. If you look at something from 90s though tunes were ok, everything just few instruments heavily eq'ed. But, there weren't any distortions. Pre 90's is fun to listen! Abrupt cuts, imperfect chorus due to lack of retakes and so on...

I disagree. If you consider the composers/lyricists from the 80-90s, like Jerry Amaldev, Shyam, Bombay Ravi, ONV Kurup, Johnson, Raveendran, Kaithapram, there was nothing monotonous about their arrangement. It had the rhythm, melody, poetic lyrics and majority of them had semi-classical and folk influences, which were part of the story they were trying to paint. They are still considered evergreen, and cherished by music lovers. I'm not much familiar with the current crop of musicians, but the few I heard were nowhere close to the titans we had earlier on.
When it comes to the complexity of the arrangement and the instruments used, the current bunch might have an edge and may shine on expensive gear, but what's the point when the lyrics is poor/catchy. I had a hard time remembering a song even few days after hearing it! This is akin to having a very good paint job and exterior finishing on a house which is about to crumble down due to poor foundation There could be exceptions now, but it is like finding needle in a haystack.

My useless 2 paisa worth of opinion

 

[hifitoaster]

I disagree. If you consider the composers/lyricists from the 80-90s, like Jerry Amaldev, Shyam, Bombay Ravi, ONV Kurup, Johnson, Raveendran, Kaithapram, there was nothing monotonous about their arrangement. It had the rhythm, melody, poetic lyrics and majority of them had semi-classical and folk influences, which were part of the story they were trying to paint. They are still considered evergreen, and cherished by music lovers. I'm not much familiar with the current crop of musicians, but the few I heard were nowhere close to the titans we had earlier on.
When it comes to the complexity of the arrangement and the instruments used, the current bunch might have an edge and may shine on expensive gear, but what's the point when the lyrics is poor/catchy. I had a hard time remembering a song even few days after hearing it! This is akin to having a very good paint job and exterior finishing on a house which is about to crumble down due to poor foundation There could be exceptions now, but it is like finding needle in a haystack.

My useless 2 paisa worth of opinion

Musically I dont know.(personally I dont like the semi classical malayalam stuff as to me sometimes I wonder those singers are crying or singing) but recording quality was total bullshit. Most 90s stuff were very treble boosted. Hardly few recordings had real timbre of any instruments. Also with there were many recordings with improper cut between individual instrument tracks. Compared to that , the newer song recordings are on par with some English hi quality recordings. Music is personal, all u told about rhythm and so on can be right on a poor recording too. What I mean is a tabla Sounding like a tabla, guitar sounding like a guitar.. good techniques in placing instruments, experimenting lot of new instruments. Every 90s song had just 3 or 4 instruments all eqed not to sound real. Although some tracks like sreeragamo - sharath had good recordings the voice of yesudas still was distorted at places.


End of the day, it's about different people different taste. I cant stand most of 90s stuff except few.. But it's more like the lyric style has changed.

 

[Ashenden]

Musically I dont know.(personally I dont like the semi classical malayalam stuff as to me sometimes I wonder those singers are crying or singing) but recording quality was total bullshit. Most 90s stuff were very treble boosted. Hardly few recordings had real timbre of any instruments. Also with there were many recordings with improper cut between individual instrument tracks. Compared to that , the newer song recordings are on par with some English hi quality recordings. Music is personal, all u told about rhythm and so on can be right on a poor recording too. What I mean is a tabla Sounding like a tabla, guitar sounding like a guitar.. good techniques in placing instruments, experimenting lot of new instruments. Every 90s song had just 3 or 4 instruments all eqed not to sound real. Although some tracks like sreeragamo - sharath had good recordings the voice of yesudas still was distorted at places.


End of the day, it's about different people different taste. I cant stand most of 90s stuff except few.. But it's more like the lyric style has changed.

I don’t see a need for a large number of instruments to be present in a recording, making it more layered and complex and hence sound better. In my limited experience, a vocalist with minimal and at times even no accompaniment can give the listener goosebumps, on a well composed track. A couple of instruments is all it takes to have all the variations you need. Also, I found many of the recordings from late 80s and early to mid 90s to be warm and full bodied, not shrill at all. The digital transfers were pretty well handled as well.

Like the German TV series, “Dark”, this discussion can end up going in circles, without any end in sight