This 5 members’ band has all the ingredients to entertain any person. It has the break dance like of the king of pop Michael Jackson, the rap music of Will Smith, the voice of great oldies Boney M and ABBA, and last but certainly not least the oratory skills of Thomas Jefferson.
This is a called a performing band with the title ‘FEW Collective’ that is a potpourri full of art and entertainment stuff. As a part of its cultural diplomacy programme, the US embassy brought the FEW Collective, a hip-hop troupe from Chicago to Islamabad, where they danced, rapped and recited poetry to a Westernised, educated elite audience of young Pakistanis. On late Tuesday, when ‘FEW Collective’ performed in a live concert at the luxurious auditorium of Pakistan National Council of the Arts (PNCA) in front of capacity rather over crowded hall, hardly a single spectator was of the view that the show was boring – as the Islooites usually utter.
US Ambassador Cameron Munter with his spouse Dr Marilyn Wyatt were the chief guests while diplomats, officials of US embassy and PNCA and a number of students and art lovers attended the programme. Founded by core members DJ – Man-O-Wax (Asad Jafri), Alsarah, Aquil Charlton, Manal Farhan, Daniel Haywood, Jonathan St. Clair, the collective includes many interchanging members across disciplines and genres.
The ‘FEW Collective’ is on a 10-day tour of Pakistan that aims to use the worldwide popularity of American music to show that there’s more to the US than military interventions and unpopular foreign policy positions. And it seems to be working. In a non-stop performance that lasted over 2 hours, the members of band presented almost every element of performing art including dances of all genre, singing English, Urdu, Arabic songs, and sharing English and Urdu poetry. The fusion of Eastern and Western music was the main feature of when a Pakistani tabla player Ustad Muhammad Ajmal joined the party and sung Sufi songs like ‘Chap Tilak’ and ended the night with ‘Jhooly Lal’ while the two break dancers continued to hit the floor while enthralling audience.
It was observed that the crowd was unexpectedly was not up to its decency level. They hooted a lot at the very beginning of the show and when Alsarah rendered an Arabic song ‘Jamila’ with her resonating voice, crowd started yelling ‘Sheela’ and ‘Shakira’. Similarly, when female band members started singing a song ‘Will You …’ and invited audience to join their voices, majority of youngsters with their shrill voices shouted ‘Will you marry me’.
On the occasion, A Pakistani youth from audience also joined the hip hop party and danced equally well with the professionals in the band.
According to a member of ‘Few Collective’, Alsarah the lead vocalist, their purpose in Pakistan is not only representing the United States, but empowering young Pakistanis to find their own voices. “This is my visit ever visit to Pakistan and I am overwhelmingly enjoying the excursion.” “Food, dresses, people and not to forget- the Jewellery, everything is awesome,” she remarked while talking to Pakistan Today.
Alsarah, who moved to the United States as a child after fleeing political oppression and war in Sudan, said hip hop was “a movement of the people”. “It’s a culture of resistance to oppression,” she added. “I feel like there’s a lot here that’s brewing under the surface and a lot of things that people, especially youth, might really want to express that are not necessarily easily expressed or allowed to be expressed,” jeans-clad Alsarah said with a big smile.
As hip hop culture, the other members of the team acknowledge the evolution of music, visual art, the spoken word, and dance as basic elements of the culture and knowledge as a master element. “FEW Collective combines the spiritual with the physical and mental to give divine order to their work,” they said. When asked why this band is given this particular name, they said, “Some know us as Fifth Element Warriors (FEW), others relate because we are From Every Walk, but they know themselves as always Finding Eternal Wisdom. ‘FEW Collective’ specialises in hip hop theatre, concert performances, art workshops, team-building sessions and leadership development. “The multiple non-stop performances gave me an eternal impression. You rarely find such events in Pakistan- to pump up the youth by bringing something new. It was surely a new concept of entertainment and I really enjoyed it, thank you US embassy and thank you PNCA,” commented a young viewer, Waseem Elahi.
According to a US embassy official, the United States is trying to use break dancing to break down stereotypes around the world by partnering with ‘FEW Collective’. “Its latest stop is Islamabad,” she said.
