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No matter what the political scenario might be
between India and Pakistan, over the years it has become pretty
clear that the one thing that has blurred the borders between
the two is music. Listeners across the country have embraced the
sounds of Pakistan’s rich musical talent, from the legendary
Nusrat Fateh Ali Khan, to massive favourites Strings and Junoon,
and finally newcomers Atif Aslam and Jal, to name a few. Next in
line comes Call – four young men and their melodic alt-rock
musings on the 11-track debut release Jilawatan.
The invitation to listen to the band lies in their name itself.
According to their bio, ‘Call, the name, implies an invitation;
to an abstract and theoretically boundless world of human
possibility and play.’ The band has been preparing for their
breakthrough for years now. Influenced by artists as varied as
Pearl Jam, Nirvana, Pink Floyd, Peter Gabriel, A R Rahman,
Linkin Park, Creed, Metallica, and Nusrat Fateh Ali Khan, the
band started out playing live in 1994. Says guitarist/backing
vocalist Xulfi Khan, “Back then we used to perform our own
original English-language songs. We used to play for a small
crowd in Lahore. Then the band actually disbanded for a while
and later we created this new line-up and decided to go
mainstream. We started again in 2002 and decided to work on our
new sound. We did want to be accessible to the audience. I don’t
really know what we are bringing to people that is different
[from other Pakistani bands]. But we just do music the way we
want to do music. And I believe that whatever we are doing will
be different because it will have our essence in it. If someone
else did the same thing it would be different because it would
have their influences and methods in it. So at the end it has to
turn out different.”
The early years saw a band with a mission – to change the
musical scene of the country. Explains Xulfi, “When you are
young you always have big dreams and you want to do really big
things. And I think an aim in life is important. If you don’t
have aim or direction then you don’t end up doing anything. So
we all made sure that whatever we did was always to the best of
our ability. I play very simple guitar – I don’t show off with
virtuoso playing - but whatever I play I do very nicely. We want
to perfectly implement everything that we try.”
They did a decent enough job to impress none other than The
Chosen One – The Matrix’s Keanu Reeves, whom the band thanks in
the liner notes of their debut album. Says Xulfi, “Yeah, our
music had been sent out by our manager to a lot of people abroad
some time ago and he got some email back where there was a
mention that Keanu Reeves (he is also in a band himself) really
liked our music so we decided to thank him for that message in
our album.”
- THE RECORD MUSIC MAGAZINE -
India
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