Accused by his ex-band members from Aaroh of attempting to sell their music across the border without their consent, resurfacing some four odd years later, Nabeel tells his side of the story and more.

You`ve been missing from the music scene for a very long time, why take such a big break?

Music is my passion and always will be, but by profession I`m a software engineer. It was by chance that during my bachelor`s, my music and creativity touched the masses. I got a massive response but at the same time I figured that making music my bread and butter would lead to a lot of compromise with my music.

Our music industry does not have any infrastructure and the music that sells is purely commercial and based on what people want. But for me, making music is entirely based on my inner satisfaction and so I decided to leave the showbiz industry and remain on the music production side.

I haven`t left music; I have been constantly producing music for the last four years for foreign bands and foreign media.

What international projects in particular are you talking about?

I was in the UAE for the past three years, where I was working as a music producer for a very renowned studio called In the Mix. The owner of the studio was the official sound engineer of the legendary band, Iron Maiden and I learnt more about music and production. Side-by-side, I also produced a band called Point of View which mainly comprised of British and Indian musicians. Other than that I`ve been involved with other Yugoslavian bands on the production front.

Lastly, I was also busy in composing and producing my own stuff as well. So, yes you can say I took a break from showbiz. In fact I`m not really a person who likes fame and other things that the showbiz industry offers.

We`re often given Farooq`s side of the story about your falling out with what is currently known as the band called Aaroh, what do you have to say about that?

I`ve been listening to the inaccurate picture my ex-colleagues have been portraying of me. I have always been asked to say something about it but previously I refused to discuss it as I don`t live in the past.

Everyone knows that the band Aaroh was my brainchild and after my departure from the band and release of their second album, even those who didn`t know could easily identify the difference. There was a huge difference in my musical direction from the rest of the band-members from Aaroh due to which I left the band. I was never satisfied with the vocalist who sang my songs but because of the sponsorship and the contract, I was bound to release my first album with him and rest of the guys.

Secondly, I never registered or copyrighted my songs because I trusted my ex-colleagues. One fine day, my manager informed me that all of the songs (which were written by me) were officially registered by the other band members without my knowledge. That was a turning point for me and I decided not to work with people who can cheat with music.

After the breakup, I was offered many projects out of which I did one project called Rakht. And it was at request of Mahesh Manjrekar — an Indian director.

In addition to that after experiencing working in the Pakistani music industry experience, I decided that I couldn`t take working in the showbiz industry as my only source of my bread and butter. I decided to go my own way as I knew that no one could take my music and creativity away from me. I can produce many bands like Aaroh.

Any regrets?

What kind of regrets? In fact I was and am really happy that I left the band as it was destroying my image and I was bound to do amateur, commercial music that I can`t do. Music is not at all about fame and money. It is my passion and I want to keep it this way.

The first Aaroh album, Sawal, had songs that were predominantly written and composed by you and hence had a very strong Nabeel Chisty touch to them, how would you compare that to Aaroh`s second album which wasn`t influenced by your songwriting and composition skills?

Obviously, Farooq and Khalid are not composers. Everyone knows that. They have to depend on another person for composition and lyrics. The new guitar player that they had hired had a totally different style and hence resulted in a completely different sound for the band. In order to be successful, the new sound should be better from the first album and in fact, if it`s releasing after four years, it should be far more mature musically, if not in its composition. Naturally, in the gap of four years, the technology became better, making music got easier, so I was expecting that they would come up with something better as compared to my old work. But what I heard from other people were mostly negative remarks about the second album.

I mentioned to my ex-colleagues at the time of my departure that they should come up with a different name in order to be successful and leave Aaroh as history in a good way.

I wasn`t just the composer but I wrote all the lyrics, played instruments, mixed and engineered the album as well. You can say I was doing the work of five people at the same time. So obviously, unless they don`t gather these five resources on the same level, they won`t be able to deliver the sound up to the level of the previous album.

Anyway, it was their decision and sadly, my ex-colleagues haven`t been able to maintain the level of the band and at present, Aaroh is all gone and is now a c-class band. I listened to some of their songs and saw some of their videos and I personally think they have lost their direction.

Are you planning to form a band anytime soon?

I decided a long time back that I can`t limit myself with one band. I am a versatile musician and my music is totally experimental, I can`t have one vocalist fulfilling my requirements for my whole music career. It needs a commitment and because I am an IT professional and can`t commit for a long period with one band, I want to remain on the production side of music and keep producing good music for myself as well as other talented vocalists. My aim is to do an album with different local as well as foreign vocalists and musicians and try experimenting with different genres of music.

Rumour has it that you`re working on your solo album... are you?

You got it right actually. My album is almost recorded and would need another two or three months for me to finish giving it the final touch. Including bass and drums, this time again everything has been played, recorded and mixed by me at my personal studio. Except for two or three songs, I also wrote most of the songs in the album.

It is an experimental album. Each song represents a new and different genre of music which does not follow any existing genre in the West or the East. I have tried to fuse eastern classical music with different genres of Western music in an experimental guitar-oriented environment.

I initially wanted to feature different vocalists in the album. But I have changed my plan and am looking forward to collaborating with simply one vocalist to sing all of the songs in order to make my life easier when playing live. For this, I have short listed a very talented musician and a vocalist Rahat Ali Khan.

Rahat is a tremendous eastern classical singer and I may experiment different kinds of vocal styles with him this time. Hopefully, if it works out great, I would finalise him as my lead vocalist for this album.

“Everyone knows that the band Aaroh was my brainchild. After my departure from the band and release of their second album, even those who didn`t know could easily identify the difference. There was a huge difference in my musical direction from rest of the band members due to which I left. I was never satisfied with the vocalist who sang my songs but because of the sponsorship and the contract, I was bound to release my first album with him and the rest of the guys.” — Nabeel