Exclusive Q & A with Asad Kamal (Studio 051)
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Q1. Tell something about your education and background.
Asad: I was born in Kharian Cantonment and was raised in four different cities as my father was working in the army and we got posted after every three years. We finally got settled in Rawalpindi and that became my home base from where I got most of my education from college to masters. I have an MBA degree with a specialization in marketing.
Q2. Tell something about your mission and vision statements.
Asad: I never took Studio 051 as too much of a typical business venture, so never designed mission statements or laid down plans to achieve specified targets in a given time frame. Making music was a passion for me from the very beginning. I enjoy doing it and do it on my own sweet will and terms.
Q3. Tell something about your previous, recent and upcoming projects.
Asad: Well, my most recent project was the Studio 051 Rockumentary, a project that I had aspired of accomplishing for the last two years. It is a project that took two months to complete and which I really enjoyed doing. My previous work is pretty diverse from mostly music production in all genres of music for all mainstream and underground artists, some Tele-film music and a track for Bollywood movie too.
Q4. Tell something about your clients.
Asad: Well, I would say almost all the artists from the twin cities one way or another, many come from Lahore too. I would say more than 50 in last four years doing multiple songs.
Q5. Does it support artist from only twin cities or Artists from other parts of the country too?
Asad: Studio 051 was basically established for the artists of the twin cities but many bands and solo artists come here to record all the way from Lahore, Multan, Peshawar and Karachi too. Studio 051 has even worked for artists from Afghanistan too.
Q6. Basically how many people are working for you in the studio?
Asad: It’s just me, I’m the producer, I’m the engineer and I’m the sound designer but sometimes I just wish I could have replacements or dedicated people to share the load of me. Unlike other businesses, here people come for one man and his work, and would never get satisfied if they see any other guy doing their job at his seat, no matter how good he or she is.
Q7. How do you define good mastering and mixing?
Asad: A good mix would be where every instrument would be placed at a proper position in a stereo space from Left to Right, Vocals would be clear and no instrument would be fighting for frequency space within the mix. The major elements like Bass, Kick, Hi-hats and Vocals would by harmonically balanced. It is too technical! Let’s simplify then. To give an example I would say that a bad mix would look something like the Murree Road in rush hours but a good mixing engineer after treatment will make it look like a motorway, clean and organizedJ. Mastering is the final stage where the song is added spice and is made Radio and Album ready. An engineer ensures that it sounds punchy, loud, clean, and crisp and is at par with other commercial songs you hear on any commercial CD.
Q8. Seventeen years is a big time, have you achieved what you initially had in mind?
Asad: A partial yes and a partial No. By the grace of Allah, I have got Studio 051 established in the Twin cities as one of the leading recording and production studios. I have had the honor of working with many mainstream artists, all of which have approached me themselves after hearing about my work. On the other hand, I still want to work with bigger artists and produce better with more and more recognition of my work.
Q9. Share a few lines on Rockumentary.
Asad: The 051 Rockumentary was a project that was on my mind from the last two years but somehow I never managed to go ahead with it. One day, when I decided and started the execution with the entire plan in my head and nothing on paper. The initial plan was a brief 6-minute documentary but as the shooting went on at the studio, more and more artists joined in and then there came a time when the total number of artists went to 24 with the recorded footage exceeding 7 hours.
The shooting alone took one and half month and 15 days went into the editing. To me, the Rockumentary experience was more fulfilling than the pleasure of producing five songs together. From direction to the editing, each frame was a creative experience that was parallel to none. It was loads of fun for me, my team and some people went way out in helping me with the project especially Azmat Waheed, Basit Subhani, Atif Subhani and Farhan Khan.
Q10. What kind of artists do you get at your studio and what kind of facilities do artists expect?
Asad: Well there are three types of clients I get at 051:
First ones belong to the newbie or the wannabe category: These guys don’t know much of what to expect and just want to get a song done for some kind of social elevation in front of their friends, family or loved ones. They usually lack talent but are willing to spend everything on their hopeless dream to fame.
The second category is of artists who have some sort of a talent streak in them and are either partially or completely prepared for the recording experience. Their songs are mostly half cooked and so are their vocals. These guys are coming to the studio on its reputation and the stuff they have heard I did for a band known to them.
Third category is a very rare one and is of the “True artist category”. Such people can be from the mainstream of music or naturally gifted artists. These artists usually have good talent, great brains and have musical ears to identify good production from the average one. These guys know what to expect from a producer even before they walk into the studio.
Q11. What difference or niche does Studio 51 has from other studios?
Asad: Studio can boast many advantages over other studios for example:
a). It’s a one stop facility: you can get your melodies aligned and enhanced, music produced, recorded, mixed and mastered all at one place and in a proper way.
b). Totally Professional: its all in black and white, artists sign a contract, they get their project when they are committed, their songs are secure and the job gets done in the most straight, dedicated and honest fashion.
c). Name your genre: No matter what genre your style belongs to, 051 will do it for you no problems at all.
d). Leading and unparallel hardware: Everything is state of the art and no compromises on quality in the hardware chain.
e). Professional Advisory: Every artist is advised on his strengths and weaknesses and is guided on how to establish himself uniquely and as a brand.
Q12. In seventeen years, what difference in Pakistani music scene and artists, have you noticed?
Asad: The main difference in the Pakistani music scene that I have seen over the years is that it has evolved into a mature industry and its listeners are scattered over more generations. Paki music has now branched out into specific genres and has captured a dedicated listenership among groups of people unlike the yesteryears, when an album needed to have one Bhangra, one tragedy, one Basant and one patriotic song for it to be a complete commercial package we see a lot of specific genre albums today than ever before.
But the down side of our industry is still there. Exploitation of artists is bigger and fiercer than before. Handfuls of record companies are making money on the expense of artists, giving them virtually no monetary benefit whatsoever. Like always, we still have one man which stands as the show stopper, who would take more than a million for a concert while all others strive to make both ends meet. This “one man takes all” phenomenon has to go someday, so that music can become a decent livable profession for other artists too.
Q13. What was the main idea behind the establishment?
Asad: When I had a band in the 90s, we needed a studio and a producer who could guide us on what to do with our piled up compositions and tell us what to make out of the thing we have got ourselves into. We were looking for our mentor in music, quite similar to what Shoaib Mansoor was to Vital Signs but we couldn’t. At the end we had to go to Karachi and struggle for months in accomplishing simple things in a bitter and harder way.
The eventual result was the establishment of Studio 051 in 2005 with the main concept being to provide a one stop quality music production and recording facility under one roof with a totally dedicated, versatile, and professional service.
Q14. What is your message?
Asad: My message would be specifically to all the aspiring singers who want to be the Atif Aslam of future. The biggest favor you can give to yourself would be a true assessment of your talent by a professional and the earlier the better.
If you really believe you have a God-gifted talent and you think you are a living legend ready to be unleashed upon the world, then visit a true and honest professional and let him tell how talented you really are.
Never and ever take your buddies’ untiring admirations too seriously, as they would shower you with accolades no matter how off-tune and horrendous you sound. They are just your friends man, and probably don’t even know half of what you know about singing.
Go to a professional, get a reality check. If he says you’ve got it invest your time and money in it and give it a shot. And if you see the producer looking elsewhere and not towards you while you are auditioning your magic to him for the first time, Buddy get out of this music thing, it isn’t worth it, so eject and be happy that maybe you survived a fatal crash.
