Ashoor Z.Moradian

 We’re Pink Floyd fans through and through… but we never do covers…!!!

 Mim Mesle Musighi (M for Music) – Amirhooshang Amirshekari:

– When did Haman start out?

We started in 2003. None of the band’s original members are still with us, apart from Afshin Aram (keyboards), who joined Haman in 2004.

– Why did you call the band “Haman”?

Purely by chance. We were really just looking for a name…

– Does it have any special meaning?

It’s just a name. We wanted a Persian name, so we went with Haman.

– Could you introduce the full line-up?

Sure…

Afshin Aram plays keyboards and synthesizer in Haman. He arranges and composes electronic music and has released a lot of work… He is also a highly respected, officially recognised sound engineer in the Iranian music industry, and his name appears on many pop albums…

Sina Mousavi holds a bachelor’s degree in music from the University of Tehran’s Faculty of Fine Arts and sings with the Tehran Choir, among many other activities… His main instrument is guitar, and he has also studied singing.

Amir Ahmadi, who like Sina Mousavi has a bachelor’s degree in music from the University of Tehran’s Faculty of Fine Arts, is a guitarist by training and works with the band as composer and guitarist.

– And you’re the drummer, of course?! (laughs)

Yes, I’m the drummer (laughs). And finally there’s Milad Jowzi on bass guitar  (who has played with me in Mazyar Fallahi’s band and with many other singers).

– What was the idea behind forming the band? A group of professional musicians who wanted…?

No, it was never about being top or professional! We were much younger, only 20 or 21, when we formed the band and started working, and it came together purely out of our love for this style.

– What’s your style? Rock?

When we started it was space rock. Then it changed a bit: at a time when everyone was eager to play technical rock, we started playing progressive rock. Later, as the line-up changed, so did the sound, and today we still play a bit of space rock but mostly pop rock, so we can reach a wider audience, and the structure of today’s music has changed overall…

– Who were your role models in this style of music?

Pink Floyd. We’re very Pink Floyd (laughs!!!). If Amir were playing in one of these rooms right now and you couldn’t see him, you’d think someone was playing Pink Floyd… that’s how much we lean towards Pink Floyd!!!

– Generally, far less rock is made in Iran than pop.  Why is rock so under-represented here? Some bands still work underground! It hasn’t made it onto the stage or into the music market. Is that because it has few fans, or because nobody has invested in it?

Look, I’ve said it everywhere:  the word “underground” isn’t right… Let’s just say other bands haven’t had the chance to present their work… Thank God things are a bit better now; some bands are performing in the form of research concerts… but they have to reach a certain level before they can present their work.

It’s good that bands  can operate legally, and in my view any work whose lyrics and music are fully up to standard deserves a permit to be released and performed.

As for why this style has fewer albums and concerts than pop and so on… it’s because the public, and our own artists, still know little about this kind of music. And I have a complaint about producers…

Producers look for popular, money-making music to invest in. But if they trusted this style and invested in it, they would certainly see results. One reason it gets so little exposure is that producers don’t invest, which is why bands drift towards pop rock to reach a wider audience. Like us… we want to reach more listeners, and once the audience grows, sponsors and investors will surely turn to this style too and put on live shows.

– What about the changes at the Ministry of Culture and its Music Office? Do you think they will help music grow, especially this style?

Thank God, the changes I’ve seen so far have benefited everyone…

All over the world, music is like a tree, and the different styles are its branches: if the roots and trunk grow strong, the branches will surely benefit too…

– Compared with ten years ago, do people know more about rock and its different branches, or…?

Yes, a lot has changed. The atmosphere at home was a bit different for me… but my friends who came to play with me got scolded by their grandmothers (laughs)  who said, “So you want to go and worship the devil?!!!!”

But that misconception has existed all over the world, and still does; it has faded with time.

 

– I think music is the most influential art. What do you think?

100%. I believe I should research whatever I do. If I want to be a musician, I should find out why people in society listen to pop, why they listen to rock… you have to understand how society works. Apart from religion, which elevates people, music elevates them unconsciously, without anyone telling them to, because it has a beautiful, heartwarming sound and brings peace…

– I don’t think there’s anyone who doesn’t listen to music, is there?!!!

Yes, everyone listens. Many religions have even used music to their advantage: music entered the church, for example… and if you pay attention to the Quran, its recitation has melody and is performed within the modes of Persian music (the dastgah)…

– Even so, music still hasn’t reached the ideal state it should, and people still don’t know many styles, do they?!!

No, they don’t, because there’s little information and no outreach. We hope that changes… the media should give more support!

– Is anyone making rock in Iran right now?

No… for now Iran’s listening culture doesn’t have room for it… and of course there’s no pure rock either, because if you look at how music has evolved, each decade has had its own popular style.

For example, the 1960s and ’70s were the peak of rock, followed by funk rock, disco and so on… and in the ’80s  heavy metal was officially people’s popular music.

– You have plans for an album and you’re recording. Are you in the final stages?

Yes, you’ve caught us recording, but we’re not at the end yet. We’ve started, but since everyone is a professional they are very demanding, which I think is great. If it has taken a while, I think the result will be a good piece of work for you to hear…

 

– Will the album be released?

Thank God, we’ve got the permits for our lyrics. Mr Mehdi Mirzabagherian has been very helpful, and we’ve entrusted all responsibilities to him and to Avaye Sooteh Delan… I think, as the band has planned, we’ll finish recording by the end of this year, and the next steps go back to the Ministry of Culture and the permit process for the album as a whole…

– And after that you’ll get ready to perform in concert?

100%. But we certainly can’t do 20 shows in Tehran like pop artists (laughs)!!! We’ll try to put on one or two shows for our fans, whom we love very much.

– I believe that when someone does something, they must love it. If you had to choose between pop, traditional and rock, which would you pick?

Rock, definitely.

– So why do you play in pop bands?

It’s about business as well as passion. First of all, I’m happy to play in a pop band whose music is different from the rest, and I don’t want to be misunderstood… but Mazyar Fallahi’s band plays truly elegant, pleasing, high-standard music, and I’m happy to be working with the top pop singer.

I should also say that 80% of the musicians currently playing for our professional singers are, in one way or another, into rock music in its various genres.

As for other styles and traditional music,  I have to say I’m a devoted fan of Master Shajarian and Mr Nazeri…

 Good music is always worth listening to…

– So if you were listening to music on your own, might you put on Mazyar Fallahi’s songs?

Yes, 100%, I do.

Even though we’ve performed all these songs so many times, there are 3 of Mazyar’s songs I really love and always listen to: “I Love You” (Toro Doost Daram), “I Love You to the Brim” (Doost Daram Laba Lab) and “For Baran” (Baraye Baran). I think “For Baran” is one of the best songs in Iran today; I put it in a class of its own…

 

– Do you think instrumental rock has more impact, or rock with lyrics?

Unfortunately, melody doesn’t have the impact that lyrics do. So many years have passed, yet everyone still sings “Cheshm-e man bia mano yari bokon” (“My love, come and help me”). Many people have no idea who sang it or who arranged it… but they remember the lyrics.

For the lyrics on this album we have 6 songs by Mr Hassan Alishiri, who is a very good friend of mine, 1 by Keyhan Hekmat Shoar and 3 by Sina, the band’s singer.

I’d like to give special thanks here to Hassan Alishiri, who kindly  gave me and Haman his best lyrics, which the country’s leading musicians had been asking him for.

– What makes working in rock harder than pop?

If we go back a bit, we see that the first and biggest problem is that young people working in  rock have no backers and no place to rehearse,  and may not even have decent instruments. They may live in some remote town, yet they have talent and ability…

The next stage… “lyrics” – that’s where it gets harder… because there’s a framework: when you listen to rock, you expect meaningful, profound lyrics backed by rich music…

– Just because it’s rock, do the lyrics have to be highbrow, obscure and difficult? Or, like other artists in this style, should you use poems by Hafez, Rumi and so on…?

No!!! There’s an unfortunate notion that the lyrics have to be heavy or political… not at all. It depends on the person and what they want. Many great rock artists around the world have love songs, Jim Morrison for example, who is well known to everyone and whose books have been published in our country. Mr Morrison himself, one of the legends of world rock, is famous for his love songs…

– Wouldn’t it be better, to attract producers to invest in rock, to perform poems by Hafez, for example? That way the previous generation would also listen, drawn by poetry that is nostalgic for them, set to new music…

That’s nothing new. Mr Shahram Sharbaf did it in 1997–98 with the band Ohaam. I worked with him on a project, and he is a very knowledgeable musician with excellent taste.

– Do you want your audience to come from all walks of life?

We try to appeal to all  tastes, because that makes it sweeter.

– These days everyone sings songs about heartbreak (laughs) and so on… there’s a lot of that kind of work, and it doesn’t really appeal to the generation before us! What do you think about that?

Look, what matters is the singer’s signature on their work. Mazyar Fallahi sings love songs, for example, and his signature is on his work; Mr Yeganeh’s signature is on his work… We want people who hear our music to say: that was Haman, that was Haman-style rock…!!!

– In pop right now we have people who have covered songs by foreign bands. Do you have a role model, or might there be covers in your work? How much of your work resembles Pink Floyd?

Our job is a bit hard because we don’t want to sound like them. They are our role models, but we don’t want to imitate or cover them…

But as for covers, many bands around the world… Clapton, for example, covered (reinterpreted)  a song by “Bob Marley”, and both are the best in their own style… Everyone has covered everyone: new bands have covered older ones, and so on…

– There’s a big difference between covering while hiding it and openly announcing that the songs are covers, isn’t there?!!!!

I can’t comment on that (laughs)
We have to be fair  and put ourselves in the shoes of the person whose work has been copied…!!!

– You’ve talked about the background of all the band members, but could you tell your audience more about yourself and your family?

I studied computer programming and have academic training in sound engineering, which I owe largely to engineer Ord Enzabipour. I’m a member of the Sound Engineers’ Society of the Iran House of Music and the designer of the world’s only Iranian digital drum kit. My father was a drummer in the 1960s and ’70s, and I’m happy to be following in his footsteps…

– How old were you when you started playing?

At 20 or 21; I started a bit late… Until I was 20 I only listened to music, but it no longer satisfied me and I had to play (laughs)…

– Why did you choose the drums?

Well, my father was a drummer. I was drawn to the drums just by looking at his photos; we didn’t even have a kit at home. And of course because of my huge love for “Nick Mason” (laughs)!!!

– When you wanted to go into music, did your family encourage you or discourage you?

Given the circumstances back then, my father was afraid of me going into music, because he thought it wouldn’t work out and I wouldn’t get anywhere. But thank God, good things have happened for music over the years, and I hope it gets even better…

– How does Ashoor Moradian see the future of rock?

I hope the future of Iranian rock is bright, because we’re now hearing work from musicians inside the country that is truly admirable…

– Is Ashoor Moradian religious? What is the album’s mood like? Are there religious or social lyrics?

I have my own religious beliefs, and I consider faith in God and His greatness the key  to my success.

 On this album we have both social and mystical lyrics…

The album mostly deals with people’s inner, introspective themes, wrapped in a mystical layer.

– As a final word, is there anything on your mind you’d like to say?

 I hope the day comes when the country’s music officials and producers put their trust in rock music…

Photo: Amirhooshang Amirshekari