Fresh take on Bappi Lahiri from DFlex with Yaad Aa Raha Hai

If you know Bappi Lahiri renditions from the Bollywood blockbuster movie Disco Dancer then you are as fortunate as I am and as old. If not, then familiarize yourself with a legend in Bollywood Dance Music. DFlex has taken a page out of Bappi Lahiri’s own foray into synthesized music.

During the 80s, Bappi Lahiri teamed up with popular Indian movie star Mithun Chakraborty to showcase what is now known as Indian Disco Music. It was these times that I relished in being a little disco dancer of my own. Ah the frivalry of youth. Growing up in Guyana, Indian movies was a big influence in daily life. Whatever movie was playing that week or weeks, depending how big a crowd still lined up towards the end of showing, was all the talk at culvert corners. (What’s a culvert? It is at the end of a street, normally at an intersect of streets, where people gather to discuss the day’s events. Oh youngin.) I have vivid memories of Mithun shaking on the screen to Bappi Lahiri’s belting out Yaad Aa Raha Hai.

Fast forward 30 odd years later, those beats might loose a little luster. Enter DFlex, teaming up with Mohan Rishi Lakhan of X3me Band and Rick Ramdehall, with his vivid take on West Indian music. Flex has taken some great risk and produced great music. He has done some really interesting work in Reggae and Indian crossovers with Stealth Productions. It is a little surprising and caught me completely off guard that he added a Euro flair with Indian and Reggae undertones. The first few seconds had me taking stance for a full frontal Pitbull type assault. Then the mix came in and I was totally off balance. To take an already heavy dance beat from one continent and mix it with a different genre from another continent then add synthesized and vocals in two languages is no ordinary feat, all along keeping everything liquid.

I’ve heard fragments of this type of mixing in high energy clubs of Singapore and Miami years ago. Musical beats has a way of working itself around, evolving, morphing into a living, breathing being. Throwing caution in the wind and letting the creative juices flow only brings greatness. This mix has the hallmarks of a staggering summer closer and will increase the heat throughout fall as the temperature drops. I wouldn’t be surprised if this beat is heating up your Christmas parties or ringing in the New Year.

Here is an Instrumental Version