Chennai’s Sudeep Swaroop enters Bollywood as composer

Independent rock singer and guitarist Sudeep Swaroop from Chennai is breaking into Bollywood with the upcoming film X:Past is Present, scheduled for release on November 20.

Swaroop has scored the music for the film, which has eleven filmmakers narrating eleven sub-plots in different genres, yet are bound together as a main story.

Sudhish Kamath, a film critic and one of the eleven filmmakers “made it easy for me,” says Swaroop. “He gave it to me as one script with flashback stories.”

X:Past is Present tells the story of an ageing filmmaker who meets a mystery girl who reminds him of his ex-girlfriends as well as his wife. Narrated in flashback mode, each segment focuses on the filmmaker’s past life and his relationships.

The different segments were shot separately by Bollywood’s Rajashree Ojha, independent filmmakers Anu Menon, Hemant Gaba, Sandeep Mohan, Qaushiq Mukherjee, Pratim Gupta, Suparn Verma, Abhinav Shiv Tiwari, critics Raja Sen, Sudhish Kamath and Tamil director Nalan Kumarasamy (of Soodhu Kavvum fame).

The soundtrack has five songs and singers include none other that Usha Uthup. Newcomer Divya Prasad sings Kaali Raatein and Kuch Raaz Hain, with Uthup singing the latter in Hindi and Tamil.

“Working with Usha didi was an interesting experience. She has a great sense of humour,” said the 32-year-old composer, whose love for music goes back to his teenage years when he used to compose tunes and record them on tape. Learning to play the guitar whetted his appetite for more music and he formed his own band at 17.

Swaroop sings two numbers, Oh Anjaani, a high-octane song, and Woh Kaun Thi, rendered in a husky voice set to a jazz beat.

Lyrics for the album were written by Pratyush Prakash, Sudhish Kamath and Raja Sen.

“Owing to budget constraints, I used some of my live shows to record some clips of beats. Almost 60 per cent of the creation of music happened across various home studios. Since we couldn’t use pirated software we used live instruments for guitars, violin and piano. We went to the studio only for vocals and mixing and mastering the music.”

X: Past is Present features Rajat Kapoor in the lead as ‘K’ an ageing film director. The supporting cast includes Anshuman Jha, Aditi Chengappa, Bidita Bag, Gabriella Schmidt, Huma Qureshi, Neha Mahajan, Parno Mittra, Piaa Bajpai, Radhika Aapte, Pooja Ruparel, Richa Shukla, Rii Sen and Swara Bhaskar.