Two songs of a film by a debutant director and an all-new star cast have turned radio-favourites: Hip Hop Hurray and 'Manasellam'. If that seems an achievement in itself, chew on the fact that these songs, which are from a film 'Kulir 100', are available only on radio and not even in music stores, thus making them precious radio station exclusives.
Surprised? 'Kulir 100' is simply another addition to the number of songs and movies in Tamil cinema, which will swear by the radio as the most efficient marketing tool for a movie. Radio launches, as these are fondly referred to, industry pundits say, are the best new thing to happen to both the music and the movie industry, and the radio’s survival despite the presence of many 24 hour music TV channels, is testimony to its success.
Take Ajith’s 'Aegan' for instance.
The movie’s audio was launched, much like his 2007-hit 'Kireedam', in a popular radio channel, and that helped songs become an instant hit.
This was despite the fact that the movie’s audio launch happened only two weeks before the movie’s release.
“In such a short span of time, radio channels had made the songs immensely popular, especially Hey Salaa.
It was a new experiment for me because the song never had a BGM like in the usual ones, and throughout the song, there were vocals,” an elated Yuvan Shankar Raja explained.
Our radio channels aren’t clearly evolved enough as in the West, where tracks can even be purchased through them, but the mushrooming radio channels play a pivotal role in the film industry which looks upon songs as potential marketing tools.
And it is here that radio channels stand out, by continuously jamming tracks with new music. Obvious examples would be Taxi Taxi (Sakkarakatti), 'Kangal Irandal' (Subramaniapuram) and 'Naaka Mukka' (Kadhalil Vizhunthen). In fact, director SA Chandrasekhar had organized an event to specially wish his music director Vijay Anthony for making his 'Pandhayam' a special hit on radio channels, which he explained had given his movie a new impetus.
It’s not that radio channels in the city are unaware of their importance.
Several marketing initiatives, contests and interviews are being organized to capitalise on their growing importance. In fact, Big FM’s specific initiative of getting RJ Dhina a Guiness Record had won them an overwhelming response of 8,000 calls in a week. This, even without a contest being held that week, when other regular weeks earn less than 1,000 callers in the same duration.
Clearly, music labels now have a new focus: create a good radio market.
High CD sales will surely follow.
sharadha@epltd.com