Rough Guide to Bollywood Legends: Mohd Rafi

Mohammed Rafi | Format: Audio CD

Product Details

• Audio CD (April 26, 2004)
• Number of Discs: 1
• Label: World Music Network
• ASIN: B0001F6WTM
• Also Available in: MP3 Download
• Average Customer Review: 3.5 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (2 customer reviews)
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #106,546 in Music (See Top 100 in Music)

Editorial Reviews

Over the years, Bollywood’s dream-weavers have adopted many faces and many voices. Since the late 1940s, people have known, or suspected, that the face in close-up on the screen is probably lip-synching to a ‘playback singer’, and in the annals of Bollywood, Mohd. Rafi’s star shines bright. Decades after his death in July 1980 (at the age of 56), he remains one of the four most influential playback singers ever, alongside Asha Bhosle, Kishore Kumar and Lata Mangeshkar. His voice brought fantasy to life, and he continues to inspire succeeding generations. This album pays tribute to his overwhelming influence in the subcontinent and beyond.

Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

18 of 18 people found the following review helpful:

2.0 out of 5 stars Beware - most of these are truncated versions, July 20, 2004

By 

sagebrusher - See all my reviews

This review is from: Rough Guide to Bollywood Legends: Mohd Rafi (Audio CD)

These Rough Guides to Bollywood Legends looked like really good sets with their quality packaging and extensive liner notes. Unfortunately, only 3 or 4 of the sixteen songs are the complete versions. The rest have been truncated and fade out unnaturally, generally just past the middle of the song. Most of the songs run about five to seven minutes in the original. On these Rough Guides, some suddenly fade out after barely three minutes.
I'd guess this must have been in the interest of putting sixteen Hindi film songs on a single cd which would be impossible otherwise. But nowhere on the packaging is it stated that these are not the complete versions. Pretty misleading on Rough Guides' part.
If you're looking for samplers to hear what these legends sound like, maybe they're good enough. But if you're a serious fan, you'll be very disappointed when the fade out comes just as the song is hitting stride. Go with the 'Golden Voices of the Silver Screen' comps instead, or just buy the originals.

2 of 4 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars Rough guide to Bollywood Legends: Mohd Rafi, June 20, 2004

By 

T. Mitra "radio lover" (Aiken, SC United States) - See all my reviews
(REAL NAME)   

This review is from: Rough Guide to Bollywood Legends: Mohd Rafi (Audio CD)

The rough guide to Bollywood Legends

Before I thank World Music Network, I owe my respect to Jowi Taylor who conducts "Global Village", one-hour show on music from all over the globe. Global Village is a production of Radio Canada International. You can hear the program via Internet or if you have a short wave radio (every Sat, 7 PM to 8 PM, 13785 kHz).
Month of May was celebrated as the Asian Heritage month. In one program, Jowi honored, Asha Bhosle, a female singer from India with narratives. One of her songs was also played. There was a quiz about Asha. If anyone could answer the quiz could win three CDs offered by Jowi.
I did not have the answer for the quiz. I decided to buy them. That is when I had the chance to know World Music Network and their beautiful compilation of songs from Bollywood. I bought these CDs from Amazon.com. These CDs are produced in Great Britain. Each CD comes with a booklet nicely tucked inside the front cover of the jewel case for the CD.
This booklet is a piece of history of Bollywood's movie making and the role of fabulous play back singers. I do not recall history to be written so good, so methodic, on a movie making industry. All the songs have narrations to detail the situation, the mood.
Back cover of the jewel case has nostalgic posture photo, going back even half a century. I find another music lover and scholar, Ken Hurt, in addition to Jowi Taylor. A team of other experts has captured the vivid details about the human face behind the songs.
One not only gets the songs in a CD, but a good flavor contemporary Bollywood. This is not a typical CD, mass-produced, commercially. Price is right. You will love them, if you have any degree of passion about Indian filmy songs.