Laal Kabootar director Kamal Khan discusses the role of music in his upcoming film

Music plays a vital role in any good film. The soundtrack needs to elevate the narrative while the background score needs to convey the unsaid; it can add the necessary emotions in any circumstances - be it tension, panic, joy and much more in any scene - when done right.Think Chris Nolan’s Interstellar or Inception and Hans Zimmer’s background score for it or Black Panther’s original soundtrack as beautiful examples. Director Kamal Khan, who worked on Coke Studio in the visual department in its early years, and has gone on to direct gritty and memorable music videos such as ‘Wake up/Jaago’ from Ismail Ka Urdu Sheher by Zohaib Kazi as well as The D/A Method’s ‘The Desert Journey’ understands this intricate relationship better than most. It was palpable in the short film he wrote and directed for Sharmeen Obaid-Chinoy’s Home 1947 exhibition last year in which the background score carried the pain of migration much like the rest of the short film and added character. Now of course, Kamal Khan has a much bigger canvas to play around with and as Laal Kabootar, his first full-length feature film releases next month on March 22, Instep speaks to the director about how he assembled the music team for the Karachi-based crime thriller.Taha Malik, who produced the debut album of Mauj and is also known for Kostal, among other things, is producing the music for the film. Danial Hyatt, the Karachi-based music producer, multi-instrumentalist who founded the label Del/Ser and has been making music in recent years under the moniker of Nawksh and is contributing to the arts scene as well, has been roped in to produce the background score. Both make compelling choices certainly but also surprising given Pakistani cinema’s current brand of music, which tends to veer towards a Bollywood-esque sound [popular as it maybe] with anomalies such as Cake. “In a film, there are so many little things like micromanaging people and it’s fun but also very tough; I hope I get to do it again,” begins Kamal as I catch him on the phone on a working day. The trailer, he explains, is tentatively set to release later this month. As for why he roped in two different musicians for two different roles in the music department, notes Kamal, “Danial and I worked on this short film on partition that Sharmeen Obaid-Chinoy had commissioned me to do last year. That was basically a musical and I had my lead actress, Faiza [Malik] – who is also in Laal Kabootar - sing a song live onset. A lot of people were like you can’t do this, people do dubbing, how will you do a song? But we pulled it off in one-take and Danial did the score for it, which I thought was amazing and gave soul to that short film. In my head, it was like a pilot that if this works out, I might think of Danial to do the score for my film and that’s why I did it.”“I’ve always thought the score is the unseen element,” says Kamal further. “The things audience should be feeling come from there and I approached him because I’ve always found his work very interesting. I had faith in him and my thing was that he’ll score it in a very unique way. I can’t say it’s good or bad because score is so subjective but I can say that it’s different and a score like this hasn’t been done over here or at least I haven’t heard it.”As for the soundtrack, Kamal Khan has roped in Taha Malik. “Taha is interesting because Taha and I work on every commercial project,” he says of the choice. “I always go to Taha and he has produced all my jingles or whatever you call them. He has always done a fantastic job and the music is better than the visuals I make. I knew in my head that if I ever do a film, I’ll get Taha to do the songs. He’s done a great job. You’ll definitely find consistency in our songs.”Kamal Khan adds: “Like the visuals, the score and soundtrack should have consistency. Danial and I spoke a lot about instrumentation. Taha has done four songs. The fourth one is like a score/song.”It is music that Kamal Khan admits he would listen to in his car. And given just how much he judges his own work [by his own admission] Laal Kabootar’s music sounds as promising as the film itself. Watch out, this one is going to be very special.

from The News International - Instep Today http://bit.ly/2StdaZK