Pahle Pahle Pyar Ki Mulaqaten - The Great Gambler by Kishore Kumar, Asha Bhosle

Some songs are made for a single moment. Pahle Pahle Pyar Ki Mulaqaten - The Great Gambler is made for all of them. R.D. Burman sets the tone from the very first bar — it is clear from the opening notes that this song means business.

Every line Kishore Kumar, Asha Bhosle sings feels considered, as though the performance was thought through long before recording began. Amitabh Bachchan, Zeenat Aman, Neetu Singh, Prem Chopra, Utpal Dutta, Helen, Sujit Kumar, Madan Puri are at the heart of The Great Gambler, and Pahle Pahle Pyar Ki Mulaqaten - The Great Gambler captures their dynamic at its most compelling.

Released in 1979, it arrived at a time when Hindi music needed exactly this kind of sincerity. Pahle Pahle Pyar Ki Mulaqaten - The Great Gambler is the song for the end of a long day when you want music that understands something without being asked to explain it.

The concision of Pahle Pahle Pyar Ki Mulaqaten - The Great Gambler — just 4:38 — is part of what makes it work. There is nothing here that should not be. It is, at the end of it, a very good song — and sometimes that is the only explanation that matters.