Story # 2: The Songwriter and the Song

Story # 2: The Songwriter and the Song

In May of 2005, I saw a concert at Stanford University of the world-famous Pakistani rock band Junoon . Their music was like nothing I’d ever heard— a wild combination of South Asian rhythms and melodies with Western rock. The lyrics were in Urdu, so I couldn’t understand any of the words. But the music spoke for itself. It was provocative; it was passionate (for those of you who don’t speak Urdu, Junoon actually means passion); and despite the language barrier, I could tell that their content was deep. At one point, Salman Ahmad— the band’s co-founder and lead guitarist— told the story behind one of their hit songs “Bulleya”; originally a poem by the mystical Sufi poet Bulleh Shah that the band set to music. (I never thought I’d see the day when a group of scantily clad college girls swooned at the mention of a Sufi poet!)

Through a strange set of circumstances, I found myself sitting down to dinner with Salman and a few others in North Beach the following night. I had never met a rock star before, and didn’t know quite what to expect. But any expectations I might have had, he broke and exceeded almost instantaneously. He was warm, down to earth, extremely kind, and extraordinarily socially- and self-aware. We drank wine and talked about art. He also mentioned his solo album, Infiniti, which was soon to be released. A few months later, when he came into town to do a screening of his documentary film It’s My Country Too, I got a copy of the album and gave it a listen.

Again, the lyrics were in Urdu, so I had no idea of the meaning of the words. But the music mesmerized me all the same. One song in particular struck me above the rest. It was, of course, “Sagar”—track 10 off the Infiniti album. It started with an ethereal, lilting guitar riff. Then all of a sudden, a low and heavy bass beat kicked in. The song went back and forth between these 2 opposing melodies until about three-quarters of the way through when it dove into a fast, fierce, Led Zeppelinesque guitar solo. What an enchanting tincture Salman had brewed! It captivated me completely, from first note to last.

Later, he told me that sagar was the Urdu word for ocean. “Wow,”, I thought. “That song I fell in love with is about the very thing that stirs my spirit to the core.” Immediately, I thought of my experience out on the Fort Bragg sand dunes in November of 2004.

A few months after this conversation, I was involved in a show called The Faith Project, a collaboration about religion and faith. I wrote about my Fort Bragg dunes experience, and with the help of the director, Susannah Martin, turned the story into a spoken word poem, which I performed as a "sermon." As we were building our characters for the show, Susannah asked us various questions, including our characters’ theme song. Mine came pretty instantaneously—without a doubt, Sagar was it.

When the show was over in May of 2006, I put the story and song to rest for a little while. But again, they have reincarnated themselves in a different form.