Gulistan (Janoobi) / Side Down

A review of Zohaib Kazi's latest folk & electronic album

Zohaib Kazi’s producer album puts folk musicians in the spotlight, with an electronic arrangement underneath. Gulistan (Janoobi) / Side Down is a sequel album to Gulistan (Janoobi) / Side Up from 2023. 

Presenting Pakistan’s folk music in a modern accessible medium is not a novel concept; it has been done extensively in Coke Studio. Pakistani folk music has dedicated audiences on Youtube. But it remains separated from mainstream Pakistani music influenced by Western styles. Coke Studio’s success was in successfully bridging these two worlds of music. In Rohail Hyatt’s Coke Studio era, artists like Mai Dhai and Banur Band collaborated with Atif Aslam, Saeein Zahoor featured with Noori, Chakwal Group with Meesha Shafi. These artists gained popularity and brought some indigenous music into the mainstream. 

Zohaib Kazi produced Coke Studio for one season, alongside Ali . In this season Coke Studio tried something new called Coke Studio Explorer. This mini series focused on seeking out the diverse music across different regions from Pakistan.In addition to this, Kazi was part of Coke Studio’s production team for many years prior to taking the reins. So he is intimately familiar with the project of making mainstream music with folk artists.

While the ethos may not be new however, this album is still refreshing. The artists featured hold their own in this album without a corporate-sponsored music platform or a mainstream artist forced into a collaboration. Rohail Hyatt’s initial Coke Studio format was revolutionary when it began, but in later seasons of Coke Studio more has remained the same instead of evolving drastically. The show is still presented in fragmented ways removed from the rich tradition and communities that Pakistani folk musicians actually belong to. The music doesn’t transcend beyond the Coke Studio framework and sound. The artists, removed from their indigenous settings, travel to sets in Karachi which mimic other regions of Pakistan. It’s refreshing that Zohaib Kazi instead bets on a travelogue – creating an album that actually takes us across different regions of Pakistan rather than just alluding to it. He has also continuously collaborated with artists like Riaz Qadri, Shamu Bai, Babu Bai Sheedi and Bhagat Bhooro Lal from Coke Studio Explorer to his own albums. As a result, Kazi avoids the trap of showcasing artists and then leaving the whole enterprise to itself.

Stereo Punjab stitches Punjab from both sides of the border with a message of friendship from Zohaib Kazi’s voiceover. The audio is supplied by Pakistani Punjab and the nostalgic visuals are rendered by Avani Rao -- a filmmaker from Mumbai. This song welcomes us to the rich eclectic sounds of this album that blends together eastern vocals and music with modern rock and electronic sounds. 

Riaz Qadri is a folk Punjabi singer and became a sensation in 2002 for his mesmerizing rendition of Tere Ishq Nachaya (better known as Supreme Ishq). This music video ran constantly on Pakistan TV channels. With no social media and a non-existent music industry, he was forgotten until Zohaib Kazi worked with him in Fanoos and Coke Studio 11. Since then he has been a frequent collaborator with Zohaib Kazi and features extensively on this album. With artists like Qadri, who become well known for a signature style, producers and audiences can often push too hard to recreate the same magic. In this case, while building on the legacy of Supreme Ishq is critical, it is also important not to pigeonhole a versatile artist like Qadri into just one style. This ends up limiting our own understanding of the vast eclectic make-up of folk and classical music of Pakistan. 

Retrolore is groovy and one of the more experimental tracks intertwining a Hindi bhajan in Shamu Bai’s vocals and a Pashto rap by Mustafa Kamal Khan. This track loops over Shamu Bai’s “Doornagri, Bari door nagri” electronic beat repeatedly underscoring the quest to reach outwards of yourself.There is some jazz  instrumentation transitioning into Mustafa Kamal Khan’s slower groovy rap.

Umerkot Beats is beautiful in its simplicity and has a percussion rhythm that punctuates Mai Dhai’s mesmerizing vocals. I like how this song builds around Mai Dhai’s emotive style of Rajasthani singing and magnifies the powerful raw texture of her voice. Lofi Mehboob has more mainstream electronic sounds and is ornamented by Mehr Qadir’s soft voice. We go deeper into Sindh’s music of longing by Haji Fakir. This song always makes me pause and puts me in a state that is best described in the lyrics “Kehri gal karyaan, dil waran ji // What stories should I tell of my loved ones”.  

Romantic Desi makes you want to get up and dance. The song is bright and festive. Ayesha Ijlal and Riaz Qadri’s voices blend beautifully, adding color to the music that is evocative of the onset of spring. And yet the symphony still centers the classic Sufi message about losing oneself in the pursuit of love and God. Riaz Qadri’s presentation of Sufi kalams reflects the strength of his training, and this song showcases that in an upbeat way.

Phantom Poets is my favorite track on this album and stylistically similar to Umerkot Beats. The song will put you in a trance. The slow buildup and symphonic layering of folk instruments throughout this recording transports one to the scene of a live performance. Bhagat Bhooro Lal, previously featured in Coke Studio’s Dastaan-e-Moomal Rano with The Sketches, is hypnotizing against the percussion.  Ali Hamza is a surprise feature here and enters at just the right time. He continues the temperature and leads us to an unfamiliar territory by softening the edges in both the vocals and the words being sung. This Ali Hamza feature reminded me of his song Maare Kakkya in its simplicity. As the name suggests, Phantom Poets wakes up your inner trepidations of where we are headed.

Bokeh of Karachi features Moiz Ayaz and Babu Bhai Sheedi. Moiz Ayaz is a trained Qawwal and is sounding more and more like his father, Fareed Ayaz, everyday. It was refreshing to hear his solo feature without the Qawwali party magnifying his vocals. This song is more restrained, shying away from using a full qawwali chorus and instead relying on electronic percussion to keep you on edge. Mehr Qadir’s voice cushions the stunning impact that comes with Babu Bhai Sheedi’s chants, which end the song on a high.

This album lets us indulge across Pakistan and its many rich sounds through our headphones. It leaves me looking forward to more from Kazi. This album provides a good template for integrating folk musicians into urban pop music. The musical experience that modern Coke Studio provides doesn’t fully allow folk musicians to represent their music and communities. In the bigger picture, Pakistani music will only be enriched with greater understanding of our diverse of folk music. For example, it would be exciting to see Pashto and Balochi music brought into the fold of electronic music in similar ways.

We need to work more on giving folk musicians space to grow independently while respecting their practice and traditions. The delightful stories of success are few and far in between. One heartwarming story is that of Balochi benjo artist Ustad Noor Baksh, and his musical partner Doshambay. The duo recently toured Europe, after being sought out by ethnomusicologist Daniyal Ahmed. Here’s to hoping that we can learn about more of Pakistan’s communities through the eyes of musicians playing in them.