Our upcoming album Budget Cuts is to be debuted exclusively on Patari. The cat is out of the bag. The following cat as a matter of fact.
And before you skeptics ascertain that we favoured Patari due to mutual love of cats (…No!), there is a much bigger and deeper picture behind it all.
6LA8 started in 2010 as a carefree, PG-13 venture between two good friends. We played music because we loved listening to it, and wanted to reciprocate in the same medium. It was a hobby, and as a result we have always kept our music free (or pay if you like).
We could not have possibly conceived the amount of love we have received from our listeners in the past years since. Thank you, seriously. The idea that our convoluted products could actually brighten someones day is just…overwhelming. And we can only make more music for you as gratitude!
But, coming from Pakistan (yes, we are from Karachi), there has always been this bittersweet realization of being unable to reach out to our compatriots. When you make something cool, you definitely want to share it with your friends and acquaintances and garner their reactions, get some much needed ego boost. This goes on a global level too, and we can’t share it with other people of familiar ecosystems and manners of life.
Hang on, what about the soundclouds and facebooks? can you not share through that?
Why yes little Kamran, (forgive me) we can. But these are social media sites on a global level, and we require a desi village of sorts.
And, unfortunately, expansion of arts is being seriously throttled down in Pakistan. Any opportunities for expression through music, film, arts in general are being smothered. Which is so infuriating and despairing, because we have an unbelievable amount of cool musicians (among other artists) releasing great music!
Further cumulate the banning of youtube and its ad revenue, lack of services like paypal that make any prospects of getting earnings online zilch, and some (upcoming) insanely pervasive cyber crime laws….not to mention facebook’s pay so all your fans can receive your news policy….
It seems like as the world is progressing and we are finding awesome music around the globe, our ability to share with our immediate proximity is getting all the more arduous. It’s ridiculous.
Enough complaining! Enter Patari.
It is basically a spotify-esque haven for Pakistani music. It does not discriminate between Mathira and Mekaal Hassan (think Miley and Malmsteen), and it has a huge song database, including, (they’re mad I tell you, mad) all our discography.
This is a monumentous occasion. There has been so much music released in our country, but finding them has been hellish, not to mention even worse with no Youtube. Promoting it in a digital age which is an aversion for local music industries. Patari attempts to solve these aversions.
And Patari has a very sensible and clean UI, an exemplary search engine that can understand differently spelled song titles (avoid any translating issues) and multitudes of playlists, categorized by moods, top charts and genres (with notable inclusion of indie artists)
There are still some minor issues, (like comprehensive folk and ethnic songs, closed invite only beta version and native apps), but these will be addressed in time. And they also have a very engaging and frank, honest customer service.
We feel that we should definitely appreciate the fantastic job they have and are doing on promoting our local music village, and thus we are releasing our album on Patari exclusively for a week or two, after which it will be made public on bandcamp et al.
So please, we urge any Pakistani music lover to give this a spin, and give them feedback on your experiences. This is also THE place to start if you are keen on how music has been journeying on this far side of the global island.
Thanks for this opportunity, Patari.
A brand new track from our release is already up there, and the album will be coming out in a matter of days!
Link to Patari beta: http://beta.patari.pk
Link to our new track (and eventually album) on there:
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