From South Indian star to global viral phenomenon! Are you on top of the world?
It feels REALLY nice, especially because this is not something that we were aiming at. It was a humble, honest attempt and it paid off splendidly. I must say that the response we got was completely unprecedented.
Whose idea was it to record a video of a recording session and put it up on YouTube?
Well, what happened was that a rough version of the song was somehow leaked from our computer on to YouTube. We didn't want to the public getting their hands on an unfinished version like that. So we decided to release it officially on YouTube as well.
It was around midnight and we were exhausted after an entire day of shooting for 3. But we still managed to shoot and record it in about 30 minutes. To tell the truth, we simply recorded a regular jamming session. It's not like we laboured over the lyrics and the composition for hours. We didn't rehearse, there were no retakes or anything like that. I think that the video reflects the simplicity of the song itself.
When did you realise it had gone viral?
In about two or three days. Suddenly, we were getting swamped with calls and messages. When I saw the number of views on YouTube, my heart jumped into my mouth.
You have your fair share of critics who say that the song isn't really that special. Why do you think it has become such a rage?
I really think it's because of the funny lyrics...
You wrote them yourself, right?
Yes, I did. I just strung together the most commonly used English words in the Tamil language.
The irreverence of the song, the Tamil accent, the mood, the simple tune... I think these are the things that broke all barriers and made it work.
It's crazy to be a part of something like this! Have you sung playback before?
Oh yes, I've sung about six to eight songs in various Tamil films here and all of them have been hits regionally.
So what's next? Bollywood?
(Laughs) You know it's funny. Last year, I won the National Award for Best Actor for my Tamil film Aadukalam. No one there knew my name.
It's amazing now that when I visit other parts of the country, people say “Oh, you're the Kolaveri guy!“ That said, I'm getting a lot of offers to cut an album... they want Anirudh (the composer of the song) and I to make different versions of the song...maybe even a Kolaveri sequel! Also, the pressure to release the film nationally has now gone up, so we're looking into that as well.
No comments:
Post a Comment