LONDON: A British-Pakistani band is making waves among music aficionados by playing Christian worship tunes and singing in Urdu here at the metropolis' churches.
ABBRR band, whose single "Arzian" was recently released, is majorly inspired by leading Pakistani bands and describe their music as soft rock/funk mixed and gospel, with groovy rhythms and Asian atmospheric melodies.
Formed in May 2013, the band comprises seven members, growing strong ever since and proving to be a great live act. With Rocky Bahadur on the lead vocals and acoustic guitar, the percussion includes Naseer Chaman on drums and Noman Inayat on tabla and dhol.
Ronald Robin and Bradley Ditta are on lead and bass guitars, respectively, while Sharoon Shamim plays keyboard and piano and Abraham Adam provides the backing vocals. Despite professional work commitments, the band comes together to play at the worship events in London churches, which are mainly frequented by Urdu- and Hindi-speaking Christians.
This correspondent caught up with ABBRR during one of their live performances at a church in East London, where the band sang new tunes in light of the upcoming Easter celebrations. Chaman, the drummer, has been performing professionally in Pakistan for over 20 years before moving to the UK in 2014. He has played with many big names, including Abrar ul Haq, Faakhir, and Hadiqa Kiani.
Robin, the guitarist, started playing in during his college years back in his hometown, Farooqabad, Sheikhupura. On the other hand, lead vocalist Rocky Bahadur says ABBRR was inspired by Pakistani artists such as Strings, Junoon, Nusrat and Rahat Fatah Ali Khan, and Atif Aslam.
“We are big followers of Coke Studio, Nescafe Basement, and Pepsi Battle of the Bands," he said. The diverse music coming out of Pakistan is so encouraging to us and we take inspiration and creative ideas even from these new acts like Ali Sethi coming up to the surface in the Pakistani music scene.”
Bahadur said his band has had the privilege of working with two well-known, award-winning, UK-based Pakistani music producers who helped ABBRR produce and release their first album. “It has been a privilege to work with Alan Sampson — who has gained a lot of recognition in R&B music from his work with Jay Sean, Zayn Malik, and Craig David — and Aamir Yaqub — who is a Grammy-winning producer/engineer known for his work with Rihanna,” he said. He went on to explain that all the band members started taking interest in music from their links to churches.
“As you know, live musical worship is a big part of the regular Christian church service and this is what put instruments in our hands at very young ages. "However, commercial music also shaped our musical taste and opened our minds to diverse genres of music,” he said.
The band leader said Christian worship music has become a genre in itself in the worldwide church community, which has, in turn, modernised the Christian worship music from its traditional style.
“Over the last 10-20 years, the global church music has evolved significantly with huge bands like Hillsong, Bethel, and Jesus Culture surfacing in the media. "Hence, our aim as a band is to apply this to the Pakistani and Urdu speaking churches in a way that is relevant to our community and culture. "So far, we have only written Christian worship songs; however, we have performed covers of commercial songs (English and Pakistani) in a number of live music venues across London, such as Granary Square King Cross, Covent Garden, and Westfield Stratford.
"It is safe to say that our primary focus is Christian worship music,” he added. Bahadur said personal and changing world circumstances inspired the band’s music and lyrics, and that playing in Pakistan and having strong links there helped the band evolve.
"Playing live concert is a great buzz. Even though days and days of rehearsals [ahead of] concerts are tiring, playing the actual concert is fun and the musicians feed off each others' energy. We always look forward to playing live,” he said.
Some of the songs released by ABBRR are "Labda Tainu" and "Jumbash", all of which are available on iTunes, Amazon, and YouTube, along with the rest of the first album Labda Tainu. Noting that they aim to release Arzian, their second album, by the end of 2018, Bahadur said: "We are in the process of arranging a UK tour at the start of 2019, followed by a UAE and Pakistan tour.
"Perhaps, in the years to come, we would get the opportunity to tour the USA as well." He added: "Music is an art form that has the ability to impact people's lives and connect to their emotions and feelings but it is also a tool that can be used for devotion in worship. "Songs last longer than the artists or the bands, so our aim is [to] write songs now that will be relevant for the generations to come.”
