Abhijeet Bhattacharya mocks AR Rahman’s ‘unsystematic’ method of working: “I recorded at 3:33 a.m. for creative purposes…”

Abhijeet Bhattacharya, a controversial vocalist, has spoken out about his less-than-positive experience working with Oscar-winning composer AR Rahman. They only cooperated on one song, “Ae Nazneen Suno Na,” and claimed that Rahman kept postponing the recording and was finally absent from the studio. He alluded to Rahman’s rumored predilection for working at unusual hours, saying that not every practice can be excused in the name of innovation.

In an interview with Bollywood Thikana, the singer was asked why he has collaborated only once with Rahman. He said, “During that time, I was getting calls from all the major composers. Anu Malik would be on the line, and then Anand-Milind would call, and then Jatin-Lalit would call. I was busy dubbing all the time. I went (to meet Rahman) and was left waiting at the hotel.”

Abhijeet said that on that day, an assistant of Rahman’s was at the studio, and that he was the one in charge. “Because of the air-conditioning in my room, I had a cold. But he insisted that I sing. I’ve done a lot of hit songs for super-flop movies, and this was one of them. Nobody watched the film. The song belongs to Rahman,” he said, giving credit where it’s due. He added, “I kept asking for Rahman, but didn’t get a firm answer. An artiste doesn’t become big or small by doing these things… I was told that I should have waited for him and left later. But I told them that I had prior commitments.

Abhijeet also spoke about almost doing playback in the film Rangeela, and said that this was the first time that he saw Rahman working at regular hours “They called me saying the song has been changed, and since Udit has already sung for the character, your vocals will be used in a different way. I realised that this is not a place for music. He was just recording patches,” he said.