Lyrics: Anwar Maqsood
Models: Akhmad Anatoli and Jane
Director: Jami
D.O.P.: Zain Haleem
Producer: Ahsan Qureshi
Editor: Sarfaraz Khan
Trailer
SOUND CHECK: Made in Moscow
By Madeeha Rizwan
Marking the end of Jami’s two-year hiatus is the Strings’ video of Hamsafar.
Some people might say that Jami shoots with a photographers’ eye. He is known for the frames that he works in and his often, almost abstract concepts (look closely at the videos he makes and every second carries a hidden meaning waiting to be explored and discovered). On a visual level, every single frame is a masterpiece — his videos are truly composed of ‘moving pictures’.
So where does Strings come in all of this you wonder? To begin with, Jami and the band go way back. When Faisal and Bilal made their oft-remembered comeback, Jami shot their title video of Duur. Years later, the duo is still working with this director and from its current album, Koi Aanay Wala Hai, has managed to drag Jami out of his almost two-year sabbatical from music videos to shoot the video of Humsafar, a song from their current album.
In our last interview with Strings, (No strings attached, published on May 19, 2008), Faisal Kapadia had mentioned that “the second video, Jago, is a fun song and we’ve shot it in Karachi with Jami. It’s still being edited. The third video we shot with Jami in Moscow.” The latter is now complete and is slated for a release on the airwaves soon.
A band once mentioned that they like their videos to be complex because every time they see it, the viewers find something new, another interpretation that they can take back with them. Considered creative, the same can be said of Jami’s visual interpretation of Strings’ Hamsafar.
For this sneak preview Images ventured into Jami’s crayon-coloured (artwork courtesy his children) editing room to see what he had to offer. And we weren’t disappointed. A fan of post-war, black-and-white French cinema, Jami chose to shoot the video of Hamsafar in Moscow, taking advantage of the colonial architecture predominant there. Featured in the video as the protagonist couple is Anatoly and Jane, the model duo imported from Russia who are slowly but quietly carving a niche in the local fashion industry.
The story within the video is fairly simple at first. We see Jane waiting in a café and she is visibly upset. Anatoly arrives at the venue, he and Jane quarrel and Jane leaves. She is then seen crossing a street and the next shot is of her visibly horrified expression as she turns around to face the (expected) vehicle crashing into her. Anatoly soon arrives at the scene of the accident and is (obviously) devastated. Love quarrelled and in the end it lost.
But just when you think you’ve seen it all, we’re taken back to the café and the story repeats itself in somewhat of a loop. Each time we’re shown a little more, extra clues and another detail to the story is revealed, and this goes on making the time frame of each repeating story a little longer. It culminates to reveal a completely unexpected and very different ending initially assumed. A spoiler would be to compare it to the Nickleback video of Someday.
A band once mentioned that they like their videos to be complex because every time he/she sees it, the viewer finds something new, another interpretation that he/she can take back with them. Considered a creative individual, the same can be said of Jami’s visual interpretation of Strings’ Hamsafar. There is something new to be found every time. The video is expected to go on the airwaves around the time this article appears in print.
Watch & Download New Music Video: Strings - Humsafar
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