Sajid and Zeeshan: second time around

By Madeeha Syed

They’ve been missing from the scene for some time now. It turns out that while the industry suffered from a lack of concerts because of the sociopolitical atmosphere gripping the country, Sajid and Zeeshan were working on the music for their second album. They’re currently undecided on how to release the album — whether taking a traditional route by signing with a record label or going the more contemporary way by releasing their album online (as in the manner of the percussion-band band Overload).

During Zeeshan Parwez’s trip to Karachi, I managed to get a sneak preview into what the second album will hold. The music of this album is more upbeat and a livelier shift from the first one, One Light Year at Snail Speed (2007). The tracks are somewhat uplifting and although Zeeshan might disagree, but some of them are danceable as well. On a track titled Black on White, Sajid opens the song by (sort of) rapping into the intro. “It took me five months to work on the electronic sound of this song,” says Zeeshan.

The entire album is “very guitar-oriented. I’ve kept it this way,” he adds. They have also collaborated with two other musicians — a trumpet player from Switzerland, Beno, who the band interacted with during his visit to Peshawar and local drum-maestro Gumby.

Other songs in the album are titled Start with a Scratch, an upbeat number with a definite contribution where the drumming is concerned. Personal Beat sounds almost sounds like a song that’s about innocent, puppy love. Their track Desperation starts slow in the beginning but picks up tempo. It has a very slight late ’80s George Michael’s kind of feel to it. It seems that this song has been heavily produced as the music fades in and out here and there, and metaphorically speaking it becomes blurred in the middle. This is the track that Gumby collaborated on with the band.

The album is very different from their previous work. It does not have that Counting Crows influence in songwriting or style of singing that their debut album did. The band is working on the videos and hopes that it will find a release sometime this year.

After launching their first album, Sajid and Zeeshan won several awards for their music and videos, performed at music festivals in Europe and have had a mention in Rolling Stone Magazine (Italian edition).

Source: BandBaji | Madeeha Syed