Many years ago, Mani Sharma's career was almost dead when three big-star films of his failed to have hit songs. Without a flurry of hits, in those days, composers used to find it hard to find work. In the 2010s, the standard of music drastically fell. These days, composers have to deliver just one or two hit songs in an album. The rest and the BGM can be substandard.
Devi Sri Prasad, one of the most durable music directors of our times, knows which films to do and which not to do. That explains why he surprises us with a 'Rangasthalam', an 'Uppena', a 'Waltair Veerayya' and a 'Pushpa' every time we write him off. This year is going to decide whether he will be around for a few more years or he will be replaced by someone else.
He is doing 'Pushpa 2', 'Ustaad Bhagat Singh', 'Thandel' and the Dhanush-Nagarjuna-Sekhar Kammula movie. All these will be out in theatres this year. Sukumar-Allu Arjun's movie is his most prized one. If he scores a hit album, he will be unbeatable. Pawan Kalyan's movie will have to have at least two blockbuster songs.
'Thandel' and the Kammula directorial are different. The former is an intense action drama and we can expect him to deliver a melody or two involving Naga Chaitanya and Sai Pallavi. A pathos song will be par for the course. Kammula's film is another project whose music could be superb.
