Did you know? Strings almost passed 'Hai Koi Hum Jaisa' to Haroon

Bilal Maqsood revealed they were encouraged by Pepsi executives to complete the 2003 World Cup anthem

 

With all the talk about great anthems doing the rounds since the release of PSL’s latest, Agay Dekh, former Strings member Bilal Maqsood revealed in a recent Instagram video that one of Pakistan’s most iconic cricket anthems, almost didn’t happen.

Speaking about the hit 2003 Pepsi World Cup track Hai Koi Hum Jaisa, which continues to be a fixture in stadiums and match screenings till date, Maqsood told his viewers that Strings did not feel comfortable with it and tried to pass it on to another big name in the music industry at the time.

Explaining how Strings did not identify with the vibe of the song, the singer shared, “There’s a fun fact about and story behind Hai Koi Hum Jaisa. It was made according to a brief by Pepsi back in 2003. The brief for the song, which was being recorded for the World Cup taking place in South Africa, was to include an African chant.”

He added, “When we were told to make this song, [Strings] had released the album Duur, which included songs like Anjane, Kuch Tou Ho Gaya and Jaane Do, and we weren’t sure whether we should do Hai Koi Hum Jaisa. The first thing we did was do develop the 'ae oh ae oh ae oh ah' chant, after which it went into recording.”

 

 

 

 

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A post shared by Bilal Maqsood (@bilalxmaqsood)

Maqsood added how his then bandmate Faisal Kapadia felt the same way. “All the tracks were done, the music had been laid down. Faisal was about to go into the vocal booth, and I was thinking, ‘What are we doing? Are we doing the right thing or not? Should we do this or not?’ So, I said to him, ‘I don’t think we should do this song. This isn’t our feel.’ Faisal agreed with me. He said, ‘Okay. If both of us feel this way, we shouldn’t do the song.’”

The Mera Bichra Yaar crooner then called the Pepsi representatives from a studio with Kapadia but they were encouraged to continue with the recording. He shared, “We called the marketing director of Pepsi at the time and told him that we had decided not to do the song. Haroon was also a brand ambassador for Pepsi back then, so we requested him to get Haroon to do it. We told him we’d call Haroon in and he could do the vocals and finish the track.”

But to Strings’ dismay, his answer was, "Please, do the vocals. We’ll talk about this later.” The phone call ended with Maqsood and Kapadia pulling up their socks to completed the song without knowing if they were being true to themselves.

Now, reflecting on the anthem’s stellar and enduring success, and commenting on how sometimes listening to marketing executives may be the best way forward, Maqsood concluded, “Everyone knows what happened afterwards, how popular the song became. But with all that I came to understand that the decisions made by directors, marketeers and corporates aren’t always wrong. They fight with the ego and integrity of the artists. We hadn’t agreed to the song till the last minute. If the marketeer had agreed with us at the time, Haroon would've sung the track that today, happens to be one of the biggest songs of Strings."