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Baba unlimited

What's keeping our very own rapper Baba Saigal busy these days? SANGEETA BAROOAH PISHAROTY finds out

THE SPUNKY PUNK Baba Saigal Photo: SHANKER CHAKRAVARTY

Way back in 1992, he gave us "Thanda Thanda Pani", a clean copy of Vanilla Ice's Grammy winner, "Ice Ice Baby." The rapper group soon had to part with the Grammy on charges of lipping a canned number sung by somebody else (and that almost finished Vanilla Ice), but it launched Baba Saigal's musical career in the Indi-pop ring. An electrical engineer from G. B. Pant University of Agriculture and Technology, Baba aka Harjeet Singh Saigal took no time to kick his job at DESU to look punk and sing rap, bhangra, reggae and calypso numbers with a lot of spunk. He even has the credit of dressing up as a Madonna look-alike complete with a slit skirt and fishnet stockings. And his numbers, say "Aaja Meri Gadi Mein Beth Ja", "Rukmani Rukmani" (for Mani Ratnam's Bombay), "Baba Deewana", "Jugni Mast Kalander", "Hakuna Matata" (for the Hindi version of the Disney film, The Lion King) and "Pinga Pinga" did circulate well among listeners of Indi-pop scores across a decade and a little more.

Basking in the glory of releasing 21 music albums till date, a fervent Baba, over time, has extended wings to other arenas too — acting, directing film music and hosting shows on the box.

"Though acting in a telly soap and composing for movies are new profiles for me, I had hosted shows on TV before. I did Superhit Muqabala for Zee TV. I did Phillips Top Ten too for close to a year," reminds Baba.

Adding to this list of telly shows is yet another show now, he informs. Come this Monday, Baba will co-host with radio jockey Siddharth Kannan Santa And Banta Unlimited to be aired on Zoom.

"It will be a chatty show, very conversational, very informal with impromptu lines between me and Siddharth. It's not gossip but banter on a lot of subjects including music, movies, celebrities and sports, done in a humorous and witty manner," explains Baba. He is the Santa of the piece and Siddharth is Banta and their banter has no script, just pointers.

Originally meant for radio, Siddharth says he just sought an opinion from the channel's creative head, Sunil Sajdani on a demo tape of an informal exchange between Baba and himself, and Sunil took no time to turn it into a telly show. Bappi Lahiri is the celebrity guest this Monday.

Lot more

Moving on to other things that are keeping his professional life active, Baba mentions telly-acting and composing music for a children's film. These days, he is seen role-playing in the STAR Plus serial, Dil Chahe More though he had made his debut in acting long back in a feature film, Miss 420.

"Also, I am composing music for a children's movie called Bhoot Uncle. There are four songs in it, three are sung by kids and one by me," he informs.

Apart from stage shows, Baba is excited about his 22nd album, which comes after a gap of five years. "It will be called `Welcome To Mumbai' and will have eight tracks spanning different genres and will be released this July," he says.

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