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With effervescent arrangements and a simple, lovely tune, Premani impresses instantly. The friendship song, Dost, goes one level up - bubbly, catchy and excellent orchestration conjured by the debutant composer. Karthik’s vocals are very apt in the world-has-hope melody track, Leletha puvvele while the techno number Tell me, albeit lyrically interesting, is routine, in terms of tune. The remaining three songs - the mellow Aalagake, the small’ish Neelo mediline and the soft Aaranavvulenduko are just about bearable. Vinu Thomas’ debut is no doubt impressive – the first three songs showcase his confidence in composing and working on zingy arrangements! Welcome Vinu!

Keywords: Hari Yelleti, Nikhil, Megha Burman

The title song is stylishly catchy, Krish’s vocals working neatly, but Dhannale thalli and Mata mataki, beyond the instantly appealing sound, are rather routine, with slightly archaic arrangements. Karthik and Harini’s Naa prema (and it’s another version by VV Prasanna) is soft and very tuneful, with the backgrounds reminiscent of the composer’s famous uncle. Priyatama’s ballad style composition works too, along with Sonu’s amazing singing. Chakori has Prakash working within a trademark Telugu-styled, techno composition and is not bad at all! G.V. Prakash Kumar makes a safe and confident Telugu debut in Ullasamga Uthsahamga, sticking to conventional and simple tunes.

Keywords: Yaso Sagar, Sneha Ullal, Ullasanga Uthsahanga

Guchchi guchchi is all techno with a tune that merely supports the catchy rhythms while Sude sude’s backgrounds evoke strong memories of Rahman’s cult friendship track, Mustafa. Sandeep’s stylized singing of the hush-hush tunes in Sude and the vastly similar Dhadak dhadak and Love me are entertaining. Chitti aayire is the most massy of all tracks, with crowd-pleasing rhythms. However, the supposed Rajnikant-anthem, Talaiva, in a mish-mash of languages and nonsense lyrics, is a shoddy, insulting parody of the superstar. Bujjigadu’s soundtrack has Sandeep working with a consistently ambient sound drawing from interesting world music’ish backgrounds for modestly native tunes.

Keywords: Prabhas, Prabas, Trisha, Rajinikant, Bhujjigadu, Made in Chennai

The hero worship in the title song is plain crazy despite the ominously haunting music while I go crazy, despite those corny lyrics is reasonably interesting for the mix of classical notes right in between! Janthar manthar engages intermittently with its backgrounds and Raamare is the routine, now-done-to-death mass track no Telugu film will do without. Manisharma reuses his Tamil Pokiri track in Vayasunamy and it impresses as much as it did in its original form. The highlight is however the super zingy Ammaho - pleasant orchestration, splendid vocals and a mesmerizing tune – this one literally holds Kantri’s soundtrack together!

Keywords: Junior NTR, Hansika Motwani

Despite Devi Sri Prasad’s perennially repetitive style, Jalsa’s music actually is solid fun. Right from the choice of Baba Sehgal to croon the rocking title song, to Kay Kay taking the rhythmic delight, My heart is beating to new heights - Devi gets it right, big time. You & I and Gaallo thelinattunde are, however, trademark and overdone Devi, even though the former has some groovy arrangements. Chalore’s a neat, short inspiring track while Jennifer Lopez is fantastic, foot tapping material. Jalsa’s OST is no classic – but Devi’s crowd-pleasing music is bang on target and suits Pawan’s image amazingly well!

Keywords: Pawan Kalyan, Iliyana, Ileyana

Telugu producer MS Raju may have the remake rights of the Kannada trendsetter Mungaru Male, but that doesn’t give him the license to avoid Mano Murthy’s name for the four tracks his composer (Kamalakar) has lifted in the Telugu version. And worse, the cover versions are bland and lack all the zing of the Kannada originals - the retuning of Suvi suvvali after using the same prelude, is plain stupid and no reuse of Onde ondu saari!! There’s more… Rahman’s Meenaxi number, Rang hai becomes Unnatta Lennatta! Miraculously, Sirimalle vaana saves the soundtrack. But, this director-composer make a despicable duo!

Keywords: Vinay, Meera Chopra, Ganesh, Pooja Gandhi

Sayankala and Adharam have stock tunes while the backgrounds do not help in anyway at all. Ninu kori reeks of many Tamil songs of the composer (including Vaa vaa anbe, from both Eeramaana Rojaave and Agni Natchathiram) and it gets over before we complete our guessing game. Thankfully, Ningilo neelimaa saves the soundtrack - vintage Raaja in every facet - tune, interludes and the flow. Nee bandabada is pathetic as the veteran stoops to the standards set by Srikanth Deva and Praanamaa merely evokes sympathy for the composer for choosing this film. Barring Ningilo, the rest of the soundtrack is merely farcical!

Keywords: Aditya Music, Kamalakar, Abhishek, Suhasini, Ilayaraja

Karthik pitches his best in the slow and enticing, Arey rey, whose chorus pieces blend beautifully with the melodic phrases, while the rock’ish college-life track Jil jil jinga borrows mildly from Queen. The ballad-styled title song’s rock version has Naresh Iyer in top form with Mickey supporting him ably in the chorus and in the evocative backgrounds. O my friend is a mellow ode to friendship and Ye cheekati is a tad commercial, but predictably catchy. Shekar Kammula’s move from KM Radhakrishnan (despite Anand and Godavari!) to Mickey J Meyer seems to have earned him commendably interesting results!

Keywords: Mickey J Meyer, Shekhar Kammula

Actress Mamta Mohandas springs a super surprise in the bouncy Aakalesthe where the composer lets his best orchestral ammunition loose. Adnan Sami’s Bhoogolamantha however is assembly-line. Chitra does the appropriately-modified Pal pal, Chandamama kosame - Devi Sri cleverly retains certain elements in the backgrounds for recall, while completely re-inventing the tune. Chiru and Srikanth’s playful banter works well in Jagadeka veeruniki, even as Mano looms amazingly over the song. O Bapu too has the young composer’s inventive touch while Divya and Shankar Mahadevan are at their lively best in Good morning. SDZ’s music is unpretentious and total fun.

Keywords: Chiranjeevi, Mega Star, Srikanth, Karisma Kotak, Lage Raho Munnabhai

Allantha doorala with its simple rhythm and basic, but captivating interludes, is a nostalgia trip down to the Ilayaraja songs that we grew up with - SPB adding significant appeal. Adnan rocks in the romping Cheli chamaku. Yuvan brings his punchy techno stuff back, in the haunting Manasa mannichamma. Naa manasuki also adds pep with those little techno tweaks but this one’s a sweet melody worth the rewind. O baby sounds labored, but the sober Yemaindi rounds off the soundtrack well with its ambitious interludes and classical/ ghazal’ish feel. Yuvan does very well in AMAV, ably supported by Selvaraghavan’s unconventional approach.

Keywords: Victory Venkatesh, Venky, Trisha, Selvaraghavan, Sriraghava, Sri Raghava, Srikanth, Sriram