I recently received a message in my Twitter inbox — tentative, hesitant and almost apologetic. “Bro” it began, “Can I ask you something? Do you think if I charge a small amount for my album I’ll be selling out?”

I felt really conflicted by this message sent to me by a young musician, one of many extremely talented and underappreciated people populating the Pakistani underground scene. It’s a scene which is fuelled by enthusiastic and passionate people with the skills of a professional and the career prospects of an amateur.

The message therefore ended up making me sad. It reminded me that for all this talent, we have no modern mechanism for translating it into a profession that people can get something tangible back from.

My initial reaction was anger. It wasn’t for the person who had messaged me, I was angry at those he was afraid would call him a ‘sellout’. It is a term used in the underground scene in advanced economies to refer to people who start making a lot of money and end up losing touch with their artistic credibility.

Underground musicians suffer from bleak career prospects and bashing at the hands of critics who label them ‘sellouts’ for putting a price tag on their music

In Pakistan, where the music industry has always been extremely volatile and unforgiving, very few genuine artists have survived long enough, and smartly enough, to care about money more than their music. To use the term for the underground scene is almost cruel — in a place where musicians have to beg, borrow and steal in order to record music — which is then listened to for free. How can any listener accuse them of being sellouts?

“It’s been a long time
Since we’ve been young
But it’s a simple thing
To miss the days we knew”

— The Streets by Zia Zaidi

Zia Zaidi, the young Karachiite who had sent me the message, was a prime example of the trials and tribulations all musicians — regardless of their quality — who end up having to face tough circumstances in Pakistan. Self-taught and self-financed, his debut album Dead City Dreamer is a work of astonishing quality and self-awareness. I had come across the second track, The Streets, a few months ago and was left nursing a profound sense of nostalgia. Zaidi’s confident, reedy voice delivers stoically melancholic lyrics with a Dylan-esque level of assurance.

And when I spoke to him over Skype a few months later, he was eager to expand on the feelings he tried to provoke in this and other songs. A high concept album, Dead City Dreamer is Zia’s attempt to speak of hope amidst the despair — an emotion so prevalent and pervasive that it has become a part of Karachi’s weather. He becomes noticeably animated as he looks to explain the album, and thus the city, to me. With his voice struggling to summon the gravitas of his thoughts, he puts forth to me the following view of the city by the sea:

“Karachi is basically forward movement impeded by the inertia of history.”

It’s a delicious, weighty idea, and one that is particularly important to hold on to when listening to the album. Set around a character called Convict Wayne, the album is meant to convey the constant juxtaposition between power and impotence, between wanting to change and being trapped by anger, laziness and indifference.

Zia began playing his cousin’s guitar when he was still in his teens, and his level of commitment led the guitar’s owner to predict that “beta tumhare andar bahot keera hai, tum baap banno gay!” (Son, you are very motivated and will do well one day). After initial, unsuccessful attempts to use his music to gain some sort of popularity, he began to channel his energies towards writing original music.

Dead City Dreamer displays an exciting musical range, but what really sets it apart are the lyrics, and the assured vocals they are sung in.

At first, local Karachi bands like the critically acclaimed cult outfit — Mole — left him feeling insecure about his music. But then discovering the more lo-fi sounds of Lahore’s Poor Rich Boy and Karachi’s Shajie encouraged him to feel more confident about his efforts. The money saved from a host of part-time jobs, including fixing laptops and tutoring students, eventually allowed him to record an album.

“And slowly we realise
It’s not the words how they rhyme
It’s the sounds that we hear.”

— Marble & Bone by Zia Zaidi

Produced quite superbly by local musician Ali Suhail, Dead City Dreamer displays an exciting musical range, but what really sets it apart are the lyrics, and the assured vocals they are sung in. Zia is a fan of more classical, riff-heavy guitars with some screaming thrown in. But the album sees a wider range with songs like I’m Just Glad taking on a bluesy, western feel; By The Bones using an austere, sparse approach while Marble & Bone has a layered, indie style (and is in my opinion the song of the album).

Throughout our conversation, what kept surprising me was seeing how young he was, as both his thoughts and his songs belie a maturity far beyond his years. To add to my surprise, Zia told me that his album art, a composite sketch and collage of Karachi and Convict Wayne, was done by a 13-year-old artist, Asmer Safi.

And that brought our engaging and hopeful conversation back to a sombre end. Where is all this talent meant to go? How do we, the fans, express any sort of gratitude to artists like Zia who stand in as the poets of our time? How do we find a way where we can both come away with something tangible?

A few weeks after our discussion, Zia put up his album on bandcamp.com, where one can purchase it for $3. It is also now available on the Pakistani music website taazi.com, where each song costs just Rs10 to download. But even with that, we are not able to come anywhere near being able to do justice to his talents, and those of countless others like him. I had hoped when writing my notes for this piece that by the time I finished it, I might have an answer. I’m afraid I still don’t, but I do know what to do with these feelings of confusion and despair. I’ll go back and listen to Dead City Dreamer one more time.

“And oh sweet children
Of whom I am but one
We weren’t cut out for getting old
Oh sweet child
You weren’t meant to get old,”

— Dead City Dreamer by Zia Zaidi.

Published in Dawn, Sunday Magazine, September 7th, 2014