I wanted to be a singer, ended up as lyricist: Amitabh Bhattacharya

Mumbai: Amitabh Bhattacharya revolutionised lyrics-writing with songs like ‘Emosanal attyachaar’, ‘Ainvayi ainvayi’ and ‘Aali re’, but the lyricist never intended to become a writer. Instead, he came here from Lucknow to become a singer.

"It was not that I thought of pioneering the cause of changing everything about lyrics writing in the industry. It so happened that the projects I got required those kind of lyrics," Bhattacharya, who landed in the city of dreams 11 years ago, told reporters. "My personal rule is that when I`m doing a film, I go through the script and dialogues because I need to know the language used by the characters in the film. "I came down to Mumbai to become a singer and writing was accidental. I had never written before. I used to make music and write dummy songs to sing and eventually became a lyricist. So I was never under pressure to show how good a poet I am. "Melody inspires me and 99 percent of songs I have written are based on tunes. If I can hum a song, then automatically the lyrics come out," he added. Bhattacharya has written lyrics for films like ‘Aamir’, ‘Dev D’, ‘Chance Pe Dance’, ‘Housefull’, ‘Band Baaja Baaraat’ and ‘No One Killed Jessica’. Recently he penned lyrics for Yash Raj Films` ‘Luv Ka The End’ and attracted attention for quirky words in the song ‘The mutton song’. "The credit goes to Ram (Sampath). He suggested the word mutton. It`s an interesting idea and a quirky song. In the song, a boy is completely sloshed and is doing a contemporary mujra of sorts. So it was challenging as far as the lyrics are concerned," said Bhattacharya whose inspiration is Javed Akhtar. Bhattacharya has not become a full time singer yet, but lent his voice to a couple of songs including ‘Iktara’ in ‘Wake UP Sid’ and ‘Mitra’ in ‘Band Bajaa Baaraat’. What about full time singing? "I should, but I`ve just become lazy. I have understood one thing, life and destiny have its own course. I resisted being a lyricist, but I became one. If something comes my way, I will give it a shot, but right now busy with writing," he said. IANS