5 Minutes With Yasir and Jawad (Interview)

We sat down with the band that has recently gained popularity through Uth Records and talked about their work, experience with Uth Records and possible future endeavors

1. How did the band begin? How do you define your sound?

The band began with Yasir on Rabab and Jawad on Acoustic Guitar in 2008, which was an experimental stage, where both would try to blend the sounds of the two instruments and try to create folk music with a contemporary feel to it. The results were pretty good. People liked the blend. It was in 2010, that Wali Aurakzai joined the band as a lead vocalist, and as a result of further experimentation, the three created Pashto folk melodies with a very modern feel to it.

The sound of our music is Pashto folk melodies put into the perspective of Pakistani contemporary modern music. Our aim has always been to portray Pashto music in such a modern way, that people almost forget the language and enjoy the Pashto feel of it.

2. What influences your music?

All of us three are open to all kinds of good music. More specifically, Jawad is influenced by western style of rhythm guitar playing (Dave Mathews for instance), and tries to create unique riffs for our songs. Yasir plays rabab, but has been fascinated by creating his own unique style of playing, and not follow the regular pattern of Pashto rabab playing (which is rabab tuned to a very high pitch to create dance beats). Our music goes well with a lower key tuning, to create a sort of dark feel and at the same time something melodious.

3. How do you find Uth Records? How was your work experience with them?

Uth Records has been a very amazing experience. We’ll probably not forget the time we spent with Gumby, Momo, Zeeshan, Shahrukh, Bilal and Agha all our life. Because it was work along with a lot of fun. It was our first time working in such a professional environment and studio, of course we had to face bit of difficulties with the recording procedure, but the overall experience was amazing. We learned a lot, and it gave us huge lot of confidence. We never knew that such amount of effort and perfection can be brought into a single track. We’re highly impressed with the dedication of Uth Records team, how they facilitated us, helped us, and worked with us in such a friendly environment, it was beyond our expectations.

4. Have you been contacted by any big name other than Uth Record?

No, for the time being, we haven’t been contacted by any big name other than Uth records.

5. Any new upcoming projects?

Well yes, we love music, and we love creating something for our audience. So we’ll always stay in touch with this business, alongside our studies and stuff. We’re definitely looking forward to bring out more of our tracks to the people with the same quality as ‘Reidi Gul‘.