January 13, 2002

It was in the last ten days of December, that Karachi reawoke to the deafening sounds of concerts. The city’s music chords had been shut down the whole of November due to the month of Ramazan.

Still, the year ended with an even bigger bash when no less than five musicians, local as well as international, performed at the National Stadium, Karachi, in front of a patient audience of four to five thousand.

Aziz Warsi initiated the show, that was as usual late to take off. He came, sang, (actually lip-synched, mostly) and walked off to a decent applause. Ali Salman and Mickey were the compering duo for the evening, and hard as they tried to cover up for the main singers who had not arrived, one thing was becoming too obvious — they were in fact wasting time. Time-wasting has become a regular habit of concert organizers in Pakistan. Four artists were already sitting in the waiting room of the main pavilion, during the time people were kept waiting under the open sky. Hence, one really couldn’t understand the logic behind the stalling.

 

Humera Arshad’s performance was the longest and the toughest for the singer had to deal with the ruffians, as soon as she ended each number. Rahim Shah became the apple of everybody’s eye as soon as he stepped on to the stage
 

Three female singers one after the other, incidentally all from Lahore, tried their hand at the killer-Karachi crowd. Appreciated they were, for their singing, they were however booed off from the stage at the end of their sessions. Naghmana Jafri and Humera Arshad were especially offended by the behaviour.

“Why are they getting angry? commented one person. “After three hours, I think that we have a right to a bit of hooliganism.” The man did have a point! However what he didn’t know was that Sukhdev was not coming at all. The Indian, presumably had cancelled his tour due to the present political situation between India and Pakistan. An insider revealed that it was money that had stopped his tracks, since the organizers had failed give advance payment.

The dressing room of the National Stadium was another place full of surprises. One saw Sajid Hasan frantically talking to somebody on the other end of the phone. “We have a generator but no generator-man! Where is he?” Surprisingly, Sajid was not the main host. The only time he made his presence felt, officially, was when they needed somebody to announce Bombay Vikings on stage. Otherwise the man was all over the ground trying to make sure that things went according to the plan.

Back to the pavilion, it was Naghmana Jafri who was busy entertaining the crowd. Ali Salman, in his comments had previously announced that Naghmana was the back up vocalist in Shaan’s latest starrer, Moosa Khan. The lady sang Lagi dil mein lagi, a duet from the movie, that sounded a lot like Sushmita Sen’s hot number Mehmoob Mere. Attired like Hadiqa Kiyani in black leather jacket, trousers and long hair, Naghmana’s feisty figure drew mean cat-calls from the nearby crowd and this was not at all enjoyed by the singer.

Humera Arshad’s performance was the longest and the toughest for the singer had to deal with the ruffians, as soon as she ended each number.

Rahim Shah became the apple of everybody’s eye as soon as he stepped on to the stage. His presence and performance was mind-blowing as the crowd went totally out of control when he began his act. For Rahim, the show proved to be an excellent show of strength for his critics because his singing was far better than Bombay Vikings.

Neeraj came at exactly half past one, in the morning that is, and began with Lover Boy, the English version of the old Indian hit, Mere sapnoon ki rani. Surprisingly Neeraj’s act was not as thrilling as Rahim’s who had sung all his hit songs: Ghum, Saba Ru and O Peera, O Peera. His Pushto-cum-Urdu ditties were a hit as well even though half of the lyrics went over everybody’s head. Another factor which went to Rahim’s credit was that he had a live band and was singing live too — unlike the other participants. Neeraj aka Bombay Vikings, too sung live, but had to muster up support from recorded music. His band consisted of the beautiful Ms Victoria, who danced through most of Neeraj’s numbers.

Angel Eyes, Jambhola, Kya Soorat hai, all were ‘happily’ heard but the amount of sensation and liveliness as witnessed during Rahim’s stint, was not seen during Neeraj’s performance. The dancing Ms Victoria however, managed to attract a lot of eyes!

An overall evening of fun and glamour was experienced by the entertainment-starved community of the city, but the delay and Bombay Viking’s dry performance as well as Sukhdev’s absence did put a damper on things. The show was on till half past three when this scribe decided to call it a day.

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