AR Rahman’s Jodi Jodi flips Ramayana music backlash into praise

AR Rahman’s music for Nitesh Tiwari’s Ramayana has taken a sharp turn in public sentiment — from early doubts to public apologies. At the film’s album launch in Chennai, the wedding song Jodi Jodi, performed live by Chinmayi Sripada, became the moment fans used to re-evaluate the score. Composed by AR Rahman with lyrics by Kumar Vishwas, the track has been praised for its devotional texture and is being called the strongest song from the film so far.

From Ravana Tandav criticism to a change of heart

Before the album event, the makers had released Ravana Tandav on Dussehra. The sequence features Yash as Ravana performing to a Shiv Stotram, but the music drew a mixed response. Some listeners went as far as asking producer Namit Malhotra to consider a different composer for the sequel.

The Chennai launch changed the mood. After live performances of songs such as Jodi Jodi and Mangal Rang, several fans who had criticised Rahman publicly apologised. One listener wrote that the track was “god-level stuff,” while another called it “Oscar-level stuff.”

Why Jodi Jodi is connecting

The praise centres on a quality fans say has been missing from many recent soundtracks: a plain, emotional melody carried by the voice. Clips from Chinmayi’s live performance are circulating online, and listeners have compared the sound to the emotional Indian film songs of the late 1990s and early 2000s. Others have described it as having a “Mithila wedding” flavour rooted in the story’s setting.

• Devotional feel: Fans are reading the song as a wedding track that respects the source material’s tone.
• Nostalgic melody: Comments repeatedly connect it with an older, melody-first era of film music.
• Live-first rollout: The full tracks are not yet on YouTube, so performance clips are doing the discovery work.

Part of the excitement is scarcity. Since the official audio is not out, fans are sharing phone-recorded clips as proof of the album’s quality. That turns concertgoers into early advocates and gives the film a wave of positive chatter before a single full song has been formally released.

What this means for Ramayana

The shift matters because Ramayana is one of Indian cinema’s biggest bets. Reported as a two-part saga with a production budget of around ₹4,000 crore, the film stars Ranbir Kapoor as Lord Rama, Sai Pallavi as Sita and Yash as Ravana, with a wider cast that includes Sunny Deol, Lara Dutta, Kajal Aggarwal, Arun Govil, Ravi Dubey, Rakul Preet Singh, Sheeba Chaddha and Vivek Oberoi. The first part is scheduled to arrive in cinemas on November 5, 2026.

For fans, the album launch has become a reset moment. The remaining tracks, including the Vanvas theme and Mangal Rang, are not officially released yet, which means the next test is how the full soundtrack lands once it is widely available.

Source: Hindustan Times

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#AR Rahman#Bollywood Music#Chinmayi Sripada#Jodi Jodi#Kumar Vishwas#Ramayana#Ravana Tandav