Vinaayak Sasikumar: A lyricist in his own right

Straight from his college, Vinaayak Sasikumar landed to the safety of a cushy MNC job in Chennai. It couldn’t hold him tight for more than a year, since his calling was to be a writer. He quit. One of the youngest lyricists in Malayalam cinema, Vinaayak is fully into writing, not just songs, he has in mind a good script too. While talking to us, two songs he had penned for Aashiq Abu’s Mayaanadhi were out, both winning appreciation on social media and lakhs of views on YouTube.

“All I do is writing these days. I shouldn’t reveal how or what my script is about. Everyone, including my parents, was startled when I left the corporate job to become a full-time writer. They got used to it now. It was not hard labour I had at work, still there wasn’t space to take a break and write,” he says.

Mayaanadhi is his second movie after leaving the job, the first being Parava. Besides, with the movie, the Vinaayak-Rex Vijayan chemistry comes to work once again. Looks like the five-film-old relation is being looked upon as a lucky charm. The journey from Neelakasham Pachakadal Chuvanna Bhoomi via Sapthamashree Thaskaraha, Lord Livingstone 7000 Kandi and Parava, lands at Maayanadhi.

“He is not an interfering type of musician, least bothered about what should be there and what should not. The norm being composition first and lyrics second, usually, the lyricist has a tough task at hand. He is happy if the lines suit the metre. It seems, that’s why we get offers together,” he explains. He considers shifting base from Chennai to Kochi a big blessing, since it creates more bonhomie between the people behind the screen. He narrates the experience of penning a song for Shyamaprasad’s Hey Jude. It was a day-long thing, where writing, composing and locking took only a few hours. He got a call one fine morning and there they were; the director, composer Rahul Raj and Vinaayak to do some quick abracadabra.

“I got explained about the situation and penning the lyrics started with three of us sitting together. By afternoon, we finalised how the song should be. It’s an advantage of coming to Kochi. Otherwise, mostly it is some exchange of notes over WhatsApp,” he says. Vinaayak has a few more projects coming up – Rosapoo, Kuttanadan Marpappa and Trance.