Experimenting with psychedelic rock: Sounds Like an Infection

The band sets to create structure-less, free-flowing musical compositions taking root from multiple genres

Nowadays, Pakistani bands are seen experimenting with different kinds of genre, ranging from rock, pop to techno and house. ‘Sounds Like an Infection’ plays and employs all these genres in their music and have even produce the music score of a short film Dissolve directed by Anna Fantuzzi.

The band comprises Sheharyar Malik, Ali Ashra and Zaviaar Shah who claim that their “goal with this project was to create structure-less and free-flowing musical compositions.”

“We’ve been jamming and playing gigs since we were kids so we’ve developed a musical connection since then. We started out as a heavy metal band but our genre has grown and diversified over the years,” says Zaviaar Shah speaking to The Express Tribune.



After the band completed its first album and music videos, it just released its first single, Placebo Effect and is currently working on the second album. They say they want to “evoke emotion” through their music.

Inspiration, experimentation and genre

When asked about the inspiration behind the name of the band, Ali Ashraf said, “We decided to stick to sounds like an infection because we wanted our listeners to be overwhelmed in the atmospheric spaces we create through sound much like how a virus takes over your body.” Band member Sheharyar Malik added, “I think the music itself is the inspiration. We tend to experiment with very strange and disorienting sounds. I think the name just manifested itself because of the nature of our work.”


The band sets to create structure-less and free-flowing musical compositions, take root from multiple genres. “We've had innumerable arguments leading to existential questions like 'what are we? What do we sound like? Where should we place ourselves?' But in reality, what really mattered to us is to use sound as a means to express ourselves”.

Calling themselves the “architects of audible spaces”, the trio claims that psychedelic rock explores all boundaries of musical compositions. “Psychedelic music has best catered us to explore musical boundaries and structures,” says Ali Ashraf.

“As a musician, I feel you can’t categorise music in different boxes or genres. That being said, I think Sounds Like an Infection is so much more than just psychedelic rock. We tend to be experimental with not only the sounds we’re producing but with our songwriting process as well, so I think there’s a little bit of progressive rock and avant-rock present in our music as well in addition to psychedelic rock,” Zaviaar Shah tells Express Tribune.

When asked of their musical journey to date, Sheharyar Malik tells us, “Well we’ve just finished up an international soundscore for a horror film called Dissolve, with our longtime collaborator Anna Fantuzzi, who has also done music videos for us. Film scoring was a terrific experience and Dissolve has won an award for Best Cinematography in Nontalo Film Festival.”



Fantuzzi appears in the band’s Somethings Never Change and directed the music video as well. The visual art in their music video Rivers in the Sky was also Fantuzzi’s who used milk as the base and poured paint into the mix to create the desired effect. “We’re all coming from different professions. I guess this is what you get as a product of mixing film-making, art, and writing stories together,” Ali Ashraf says.

When asked how they describe their music, Ali Ashraf said, “a painting”, Sheharyar Malik followed that up with his own description with, “a story”.  The band also had advice for budding and new bands, “Just get in a room and do it! Start with practicing covers but I think it's important for musicians to harness their own creativity and create originals as well. That way you'll be able to find your own unique sound as a band.”

“The public doesn't influence our music. But we hope our music influences them.”