You will either love this track or hate it. And that holds true for long-time Faris Shafi fans as well. Jashn-i-Hip Hop is one of Faris Shafi’s more recent productions. He released this song in collaboration with Raftaar.

This is a cross-border collaboration as Raftaar is the stage name of popular Indian rapper, lyricist, dancer, music composer and television personality Dilin Nair. He mostly raps in Hindi and Punjabi and became popular with his breakthrough hit Swag Mera Desi in 2013. Most consider the song as a low-key diss track towards another uber-famous Indian hip hop artist, Yo Yo Honey Singh.

Jashn-i-Hip Hop has several sections. It’s many things trying to cohesively be one song. Part one is a sound sample of a typical vintage, high-pitched, South Asian dance film song opening complete with tabla beats.

Part two is when Raftaar opens the song with his performance. You immediately know it’s a non-Pakistani in this section because he pronounces phir [then] as fir. Raftaar is talking about the similarities he shares with Faris in just how great they are at what they do and how they are absolute shoudas [show offs].

Faris Shafi and Raftaar from India come together for Jashn-i-Hip Hop, an unusual cross-border collaboration

It’s an unpretentious look at their whole experience, nay their whole life, as hip-hop stars. It’s about how they live to entertain. Yet, they try to intimidate people (through their songs) from inside an air-conditioned studio while their family pays for their bills.

Part three is where Faris’ familiar, less aggressive — in terms of how he performs — section comes in. Lyrically, he’s less forgiving towards their haters (or whoever they’re targeting) than Raftaar is. Faris’ section predictably is the one that has the more explicit lyrics. In short he’s telling Raftaar that it’s not worth wasting his breath on their haters, they just won’t get it. His degrades them and asks his fans not to make him listen to ‘their’ music.

Part four, finally, is the chorus. In this Raftaar makes references to important places and icons across the borders in an effort to connect them somehow:

Dilli ke laundon ko pasand hai kurri Lahore di/ Likhi kavita Tagore di/ Rumi ne choomi jawani/ Ibaadat se saadat ne likhi kahaani thi haur di/ Sidhu ne phorr di/ IK di shirtaan Dior di/ Chachi di chappal Peshawar di/ Gore vi labde si Rick utte Morty/ Saanu siyasat ni jorr di, jorr di

[Boys from Delhi like girls from Lahore/ They wrote love songs like Tagore/ Rumi kissed our youth/ From worship to grace we wrote a different story/ Sidhu got shot/ IK’s shirts are Dior/ Aunt is wearing flip flops from Peshawar/ We searched for Rick and Morty even in the grave/ Politics does not connect us]

And we go back to Raftaar delivering another performance after this. Overall, while the structure of the song might seem a bit unconventional — so many different parts joined together to make one song — it’s fun to listen to. And it’s nice to see cross-border collaborations finally happening.

Parental advisory for this song, as it contains explicit lyrics and graphic descriptions of what you should do with various body parts. You can thank Faris for that.

Published in Dawn, ICON, January 29th, 2023