He is the dark horse of the Peshawar music scene and the featured artiste in the last episode of Ufone Uth Records. Rahim Saranjam is a self-taught musician who took up vocal training from Ustad Mehfooz Khokar. Although he keeps a low profile, he has a reputation as a somewhat moody but incredibly gifted musician. He is a founding member of the band Jum, a vocalist for the band Above and continues to collaborate with various other musicians in Peshawar. Rahim is also a business graduate and introduces some of his old classmates from his alma mater later on in the episode.

As a featured artiste in the second season of Coke Studio, Rakae Jamil is a sitar maestro who learned under the tutelage of Ashraf Sahreef Khan, Ikhlaq Hussain and Shujaat Hussain from Delhi. He’s been playing the sitar from the age of 12 and is a graduate of the National College of Arts. “Rakae is one person I was very excited about working with,” said Rahim, “because I had wanted to fuse eastern and western music and I could really communicate with him.”

Although Rahim had rehearsed quite a few tracks, in the end, his original song, Afsos, ends up being selected as the one that would be featured in the episode. “Nobody wants to live their life in regret and that’s the main theme of the song,” said Rahim about Afsos. “But whatever they do they somehow end up in regret—he (the protagonist of the song) tries to avoid regret, but he can’t seem to.”

“Initially, when I heard this track I wasn’t sure which direction it was going in. But it is a track that will grow on you,” said music producer Gumby.

Afsos heads off to a beautiful start with Rakae displaying his musical dexterity on the sitar throughout the song adding a whole new dimension to it. “I think his choice of notes and his attitude really clicked with Rahim, and I think they became really good friends,” said the music producer.

“I think Rahim initially had a great song but then Rakae came and really shone on the song,” audio engineer Mohammad Agha said before he was interrupted by a loud pistol-shot sound—only to look up and find a member of the crew laughing at him.

At least in this song, it appears that more than his vocals, Rahim Saranjam’s main strength lies in his musicianship and compositional skills. Another musician who shows off his virtuosity is young Bradley who is a very talented bass player. He is the son of another musician from Karachi, Russell, who has had a longstanding relationship in working with LJP studios. “He’s way better than his father. I know Russell is going to kill me for this. But he is way better than any bass player out there right now in Pakistan,” said Gumby.

Afsos may talk about regret but the music accompanying the lyrics are too ‘happy’ to realise the gravity of the lyrics. It’s no Reidi Gul (the song by Yasir, Jawad and Wali, featured in the first season and which became one of the defining songs of 2011) but Afsos is definitely one of the better songs to come out from this season.