Saroor: A long time coming

Masood Bano (The News)

Masooda Bano talks to ex-Vital Signs' guitarist, Rizwan, and asks him about his new band, Saroor, and more importantly, their debut album - (THE NEWS)

After over three years of hard work Saroor's first album, 'Tere Gali', has finally made it to the market. The album was released in Karachi in the last week of February followed by releases in Lahore and Islamabad. But, while it will take time to determine the response it gets from Pakistani pop fans, the group-basically a duo featuring Rizwan ul Haq and Ahsan Qizilbash-itself is very optimistic about its future. Much of this optimism springs from the success of the video of the 'Tere Gali', the title song, which was released a month ahead of the release of the album.

"Not only is this song being aired on MTV and Channel [V] but it has also entered the charts. It came on 47th number on the top fifty songs of MTV's viewers choice. This has really given us a great boost. Songs by some other Pakistani pop bands have also come on MTV or Channel [V], but ours is the first song to have entered a countdown", says an excited Rizwan.

However, the duo has no inhibitions in admitting that this breakthrough has not come easy. "We have worked very hard on making Saroor in the past three years. I really had to struggle, despite the fact that I was with Vital Signs before. I received no help and actually had to start from square one and had to put in a lot of effort to put Saroor together. At last, by God grace the album is out and Ahsan and myself hope that people would like the stuff we have done'," he adds.

The two have faced all kinds of problems in launching their first album. "Actually we had funding problem at the recording stage. Then the two of us have done all the work ourselves. Even the sequencing of songs has been done by Ahsan himself. Also, as we wanted to give it our best try we were more keen on trying till we got what we wanted rather then rushing out with an ill-prepared album," explained Rizwan.

The album, whose songs have been sung by Ahsan and Rizwan as a duo, is basically a collection of sweet love songs. There is no attempt at experimentation with some new music trends or coming up with an entirely new approach. Instead, the songs have very typical sweet love song melodies. But, as compared to most of the Pakistani pop bands the treatments of the songs is quite good and over all the album presents some nice, melodious songs. "All that we want to do is to produce the music which appeals to the common man. We are basically romantic guys who want to use music to soothe the senses and convey a relaxing note rather then making it a tool to convey political messages. We understand that this might be termed commercial by some
people but we do not mind this if the music appeals to the masses," says Ahsan.

Tairee Gali, Saroor, Chori Chori and Phoolon Kay Mausam Main, Har Dham are few of the key songs. All the songs have been sung by the duo. "There has been no race to outshine each other. We have listened to each other's ideas, and compromised in favour of the best". Ahsan and Rizwan have played the guitar, with the former also having done the sequencing on the key board. The only other instruments used in the album are dholki and tabla, for which professional instrumentalists were engaged.

In the near future the duo expects a lot of activity coming. "We will be busy shooting the videos for the others songs of this album. We will also be holding concerts pretty soon. Now people will basically judge us through our performance on the stage. We are optimistic that Saroor is going to stay. In 1998 Saroor is going to be in the limelight. I hope while listening to the album people will recognise me as Rizwan ul Haq of Saroor and not of Vital Sings," adds Rizwan. But, things might have been better for the group if PTV had a more encouraging policy towards pop bands nowadays. This is the group's first album and the kind of mass exposure they need can only be provided by an indigenous TV channel.

"We wish things were better at home. At the moment it seems unlikely that we will be able to air our video on PTV but then it is some consolation that MTV and Channel [V] are viewed all over South East Asia. By appearing on these channels we hope to get introduced to a broader audience," says a hopeful Rizwan.