Strand Three Profiles and Interviews - Mr Deeder Zaman

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Mr Deeder Zaman

Age: 27

Interview date: 25 _ Apr _ 06

Interviewed by: Jamil Iqbal

Mr Zaman was nine years old when he first started making music and performed his first live performance aged eleven. He became the lead rapper of Asian Dub Foundation. The 1998 album,‘Rafi’s Revenge’was greeted with great critical acclaim and received a Mercury Prize nomination as well as the BBC Asian Award for Music. He left the band on New Year’s Eve 2000 and is currently producing his new album ‘Minority Large’.

Deeder Zaman

Interviewed by Jamil Iqbal

My name is Deeder Zaman and my occupation is self-employed musician. I used to be the front man of Asian Dub Foundation (ADF). My age is twenty seven.

How did you get involve in music?

I got involved through the workshops. My brother Sam Zaman of ‘State of Bengal’ got called through the tutor Aniruddha Das who was the bass player for ADB. I went along to the workshop / documentary. It was a documentary focusing on young Asian musician getting into music industry. Obviously, it was also through my father’s record collection and lot of Indian movies. I also listened to lot of stuff my brother used to bring as records, lot of the early reggae and hip hop.

How old were you then?

I would have been about six. I used to break dance as well and my family used to do a lot of that in workshops and youth clubs. I was also a member of Joi Bangla (band), when I was younger. I used to rap with my sister, Parul, and that was our first band. That’s how I got into music.

Tell us a bit about your involvement with ADF?

It was actually through this workshop. The bass player and I went on to write music and I would turn up to a place called Community Music House at Farringdon at that time, where people come in and do jamming and music workshops. We started ADF there and then we went to getting more and more members involved and then when there were five of us, the line up was complete.

Can you remember any memorable event of ADF?

Yes, I can actually and I feel very proud. To be proud I would say one of the Japanese gigs. One of the biggest gigs would have been the Glastonbury Festival where there would have been hundred thousand people. So I am glad that I could not see the back of the crowd there. Another gig which I am really proud of--is where I was dodging a lot of cans coming in my way with my hands in Bradford Mela. What we have done is played a remix we have done on Nusrat Fateh Ali Khan and obviously it was a jungle punk remix and there were all these young Asian kids whatever their orientation maybe, Pakistani majority of them, who though what the f… is this! So the crowd said “we are not having this”. The crowd started pick up stones, sticks and cans and started throwing at me. In one hand I had my microphone and with the other hand I was dodging these things. I was kind of proud about that. Another thing I was proud about was a show we played at Farringdon and it was an adventure play ground which was right next door to a fascist pub and we came on and played Strong Culture. One of the lyrics in Strong Culture is something like that“because I am a f…… Paki lover!” and you could tell that the guys in the pub had all their kids sent to us to cause some troubles and again stones started throwing and we had to get a police escort out of there. This was early 1993, same time Derek Beacon was getting into power, BNP in Isle of Dogs. These are the three very memorable events.

How will you describe your music?

Lot of people will see, as I come out of ADF, expect me to have Asian sounds and I have got lot of Asian sounds in my music but not in majority of my music. I would say lot of it is hip hop, reggae and ragas based but lot of traditional sounds are coming in lot of the tracks. For me in the ADF days, it would have been punk or jungle punk but now it is more kind of roots based, lot of early reggae and nyabinghi types of influences. Nyabinghi means like some of the early drumming music that would have come out of Jamaica that would have called for repatriation. That was also heavily influenced in ADF, that’s where the Dub comes from.

When you mix music, you tend to lose the traditional or the original music?

Well, my father listens to my music and he really likes it, so I really do not know what that’s about. That is about purity and it is to be expected if I am to move up North and in a few years I would have a northern accent so you can’t really tame that down in any way and whatever happens, it happens, for a reason and you can’t really do nothing about that. If you are living in India and listening to your sound beat filtered out, I am afraid you have to deal with it and you have to move with time. We are not necessarily making it for you! We have our own crowd and it is a way for us sticking to our roots. So people should be glad really.

Do you like traditional Bengali music?

I love it! I really like Paban Das Baul. I really like some of the Baul songs coming out of Bangladesh. Few years ago Chittagong drummers came to England and there was collaboration with the ADF at the Barbican Centre and we had to take a few of them to a different room away from their management, so that we don’t have to pay the management and the drummers got paid properly. I like all of the rhythms and the chanting on and the vocalist side of things and if anything that’s needed is that it needs to be spread more in England and in Europe. My brother is added to that with his collaboration with Paban Das Baul. I don’t know if you have heard his album ‘Tana Tani, it is a prime example of East mix West. I think a lot of the Bengali youth today will get a lot of the album. I think a lot of this stuff needs to come about and in general I like all of that and I like Nusrat Fateh Ali Khan and the Sufi side of things. I have always been blown away by his delivery on stuff.

Tell us about the difference of music in the late 1980s and early 1990s when you were growing up and the music now regarding Bangladeshi youth in London?

The scene is always changing because in early 80s lot of music were mixed into the scene like Acid House or break beat era and lot that changed into the form like the jungle scene. When the jungle scene exploded in London, you heard a lot of so called Asian Underground come about. You would hear the next step up from the Acid House era into the jungle / Asian sounds coming about. Lot of the jungle scene is still around but I don’t know if it has moved on since then. After the jungle scene you had the speed garage era. I haven’t heard anyone going into that and mixing stuff. I think the scene was soon moved on again and we will hear a different change in sound.

Do you think young Bangladeshis are engaged with your kind of music?

I will say a few of us are. I haven’t heard anything recently. People who are in the scene for quite a while are still keeping up with it. I don’t really know. I think it stems down to family links and if you have musical family then you will end up, like my older brother was, into music and so that’s a part for me to get into it, because of the record collection for example.

Who was your role model?

I have many! Nusrat Fateh Ali Khan, Lata Mangeshkar, Mohammed Rafi and many original rappers who never ever got the fame they deserve. I like Public Enemy, Tony Rebel from Jamaica, lot of reggae music, lot of hip hop and lot of early jazz, I like Paban Das Baul. It is pretty much mixed.

Please tell me about your albums?

I have done about five albums. I still have two more albums coming out. The first five albums were with ADF and all of that was in an era, the early ADF, where I mentioned earlier, when Derek Beacon of BNP was getting to power and Kuddus Ali was put into a comma (after a racist attack). It was basically when Asian where not considered as cool and that’s the time we came about. TH9, one of the songs in the first album, was about Tower Hamlets nine who got put away for demonstrating outside the Whitechapel Hospital and basically put ourselves in position in one of them and writing a song out of it and one of the first line is "The police… chase …, The beast can’t catch me, When I see his big stick, him deal me a lick, Tower Hamlets Nine have to go free, Not even a fine for the Tower Hamlets Nine". It was basically talking about issues that affected us directly through music. It was until a band called Primal Scream, which is a big band, came about and started talking to the press for us, saying stuff like "if we were five White guys with guitar we would be famous by now". It was because of them that we got into the lime light so to speak. In one of the later album there was a track called ‘Free Satpal Ram’, which was about a young Asian guy in Birmingham, who had defended himself in a racist attack and have been imprisoned, he was, I think, in his 13th or 14th year in prison by the time we got out that track. This hyped up a lot around that case and got a lot of people across the globe writing to the Home Secretary, because we had like cards within our albums that you can write in like petition to the Home Secretary. I think he was released from prison after quite a long case but I think he has gone back in now which is a regular occurrence, with kind of people who live in prison whole of their lives. I don’t know why he went back in. So majority of the tunes have been articulating ourselves as young Asians.

Have you participated in Bengali or Bangladeshi Melas?

It is one thing we have never been invited to. We played in one mela near here, I think it is the Newham Mela and the Bradford Mela. I guess our experience with melas have just not been so good. I guess we have stayed away from them. Other bands, like Apache Indian, have travelled to India and gone to exotic Islands, that’s one thing ADF really did not get to do it, more of inner city in Europe, USA and Australia and those types of places. I would love to play in melas. We have played a few melas but never a Bangladeshi mela.

Have you done any gigs in Bangladesh?

No. We have only played with the Chittagong Drummers in Barbican Centre. That’s it. If I am invited to play in Bangladesh, I would go. I think it is down to the economy. I remember, after I left ADF, they have gone to Cuba but didn’t get paid for the show out there, just the expenses we covered to get them out there. I think it is down to the economic situation.

Do you play any instruments?

Yes, I play percussion, I play bass, in regular occurrence I play guitar. I produce, that means I write beats and everything in the computer and putting the sounds together. I sing and I rap. If you give me an instrument, I may work it out! I like playing bass and percussion a lot.

What do you think of the new generation of Bangladeshis here in the UK?

I would say, get involved at any level you can and basically have faith but don’t get involved with gun mentality. There are lot of, especially know, as we evolve into further and further generations, you see a lot of the US rap, gang mentality. For example, Fifty Cent and lot of us are picking up on that. It is inspiring us and basically I don’t want to get phone calls from people saying I’ll come around and kill you. I am sure none of them who are hearing it want to hear it either. Basically keep it clean and have faith. If I can make it, so can you.

What was your ambition when you were younger?

I never thought I would be a musician. I am glad that I am musician. I liked arts and crafts from a young age and guess I come from a talented family where everyone was involved in music one way or the other.

Tell us about your new album coming out?

It is variegated and has lots of style. It is lyrically poignant and also I don’t think lot of people come up these days with these lyrics. You hear a lot of throw away lyrics these days. I think the root scene will be a bit shaken up by this album. You are hearing a lot of hip hop being mixed by reggae. I think it will be fresh for some of the listeners.