Moin Akhtar was the host, and displayed his usual satiric wit. As the affair was being shot for TV, it was lip-synched which caused a couple of obvious gaffes during Afridi's performance. Helping Tanveer perform was a troupe of neon yellow wearing toughs who danced a jig to the Pathan's percussive funk. Various celebrity guests such as Faakhir, Saleem Javed and others offered their praises to Tanveer as well.

Saleem made an interesting point that nowadays sponsors are in control of an album's destiny, inferring that the artist is slowly losing creative control. As the night progressed and the guests were served high tea (at 11:30pm ?), Moin sparked off howls of laughter when he observed that if the audience had payed as much attention to the show as they were paying to the food, it would be a different experience.

Later on, in much less hectic surroundings, Tanveer took time out to explain how he started training as a professional singer in 1989, stating that "In my first phase, I started learning music from a small academy. It was a one-room operation in a kutchi abadi operated by Ustad Zulfiqar." Tanveer admits he established a solid base from there, but his thirst for knowledge made him restless.

He soon studied ragas and "in 1993 was taught by Nisar Bazmi, eventually getting my first break in a programme called Music Challenge. This led to the inclusion of one of my songs on Adnan Sami's Dekho Jan-E-MunMusic Channel Charts I debuted the O Chacha video, the making of which cost around Rs. 15,000."

The video worked wonders for Afridi and gave him the confidence to release his first album in 1995, which included such reworked gems as Bunder Road say Kimari.

"In 1997, I followed up with the Eik Larka Awara. As much as I liked the record, it was a huge commercial flop," laments Tanveer.

Because of the records poor performance, he was forced to take various advertising jobs. Bouncing from job to job, unable to fit into the rigid regimentation of the 9 to 5 corporate world, Tanveer decided to give stardom another stab. In 1998, he wrote a song for Basant, but at the brink of signing a sponsorship deal, to his hard luck, the video was banned on TV. Making one final stand, he wrote a song called Guddi, and took it to the sponsors. They gave him the trial by fire; he was to perform at the 14th of August free show at the Minar-E-Pakistan headlined by Sajjad Ali.

"When we got to the venue, Sajjad dropped a bomb on us. He insisted on performing first, which meant I was to close the show. After Sajjad Ali, who would listen to me, an unknown?"

A nervous wreck Afridi was goaded on stage in front of a frenzied audience just having been treated to Sajjad's Sohni Lag Di. "I prayed to God. When I took the stage, I played diplomat and announced to the Lahori's that Guddi was written especially for them." The crowd loved every bit of it and according to Afridi, he felt that was his night.

"I am a singer of the masses. That is why I was accepted," claims Tanveer, and backs up his claims by adding that he does a lot of free shows, especially in the Punjab where the average concertgoer cannot afford the Rs. 500 or Rs. 1000 tickets. "I give the same production value in my free shows as I do to regular concerts."

He often gets miffed when sponsors ask him why local artists can't do what the Indians are doing. "We can do even better. Are you prepared to promote our videos on fifty channels? Are you prepared to spend twenty crores on marketing alone? When we do an album and a video, and PTV bans it, that finishes us!," Tanveer vents.

In the works is a remixed national song and a melody oriented new album, for as most of his hits have been energetic bhangra tracks, he wants to present a new facet of himself. "The new album will bring out Tanveer Afridi the artist, who trained for ten years," he proclaims. Afridi is also a big proponent of inter-provincial cultural exchange. "A Punjabi can sing in Punjabi.

An Urdu speaker has no problem singing in Urdu. The challenge is singing in a tongue that is not your own. Cultural exchange helps create national unity. I am a Pathan, but I sing in Punjabi, Urdu, Sindhi and, soon, in Pashto. People say to me that I am an Afridi, but I sing Punjabi. I say so what? If we were to divide along ethnic lines, that would be a disturbing trend."

He has various causes to rail against, including music piracy and the lack of respect in the industry for people like Nisar Bazmi and Sohail Rana, as well as the deplorable state of local cinema. Along with his politics, one must not forget the energetic bhangra-beat that he has mastered. With time and the right exposure as well as a widening of his musical territory, it's not hard to see Tanveer Afridi as a household name.