Jonita Gandhi: The hook step of ‘Arabic Kuthu’ with Thalapathy Vijay and Pooja Hegde is infectious

Jonita Gandhi

The viral hit ‘Arabic Kuthu' from ‘Beast' featuring Thalapathy Vijay and Pooja Hegde, has been voiced by Jonita Gandhi and Anirudh Ravichander. Jonita tells us everything you need to know about the number in conversation with mid-day.com.

How did ‘Arabic Kuthu' happen?
I got a call from Ani (Anirudh Ravichander) and recorded Arabic Kuthu in Toronto, it was just a scratch version. At that time I thought the lyrics would be changed because somewhere I knew the lyrics I was singing were gibberish. The final recording happened in Chennai where we also shot the video. Jamming with Anirudh is always fun, we did Chellamma (Doctor) and that was received well. Maybe that's why we wanted to bring back this combo for Arabic Kuthu. People have exceeded our expectations with the amount of love they have been showering on us. We tried including the ethnic element in the video. The hook step with Thalapathy Vijay and Pooja Hegde is infectious.

Fans have been wondering if you plan to make an acting debut too…
I've always been open to it because I've done a few acting workshops when I was younger. I did some musicals and acting workshops for fun but my goal was always music. I do like exploring acting when it comes to my own music, it helps tell the story of the song. It's more believable when you are the person singing and in the video.

You sing in multiple languages, how do you pull it off?
I spend a lot of time and surrender to the process. One has to have patience and a good ear, besides good people around you. If you have all of that you're fine. I ask them if I sound like someone who natively speaks the language, if the answer is kind of, I say lets do it again! I don't want people to get distracted by an accent when they are listening to the song. Over the years it's become a bit easier but I do take more time to dub Tamil songs than Hindi and English.