Pak singer Asim Azhar makes waves with ‘Habibi’

Jamil Khan, Senior Reporter

Asim Azhar, the young and talented Pakistani singer, is in Dubai to promote his latest hit ‘Habibi’ and said that the appreciation he is getting through various social media platforms is creating new popularity records.

Talking to Gulf Today in Dubai, he remarked, “Habibi has got huge appreciation on various social media platforms since its release. I’m grateful to my fans around the world as my new song is making records in Pakistan and is also ranked number two on YouTube with around seven million views in just a couple of days. It is also on number four on Spotify and trending number one on TikTok,” he added.

The song was written by Azhar and his team member Ramis.

He got the inspiration for his new song from his fiancée. Azhar recently got engaged and started a new chapter of his life. “With my engagement I’m learning new things in this relationship and the inspiration behind the song came from all these new experiences. I learned that one should accept his or her past mistakes and we should start communicating with our loved ones to avoid further misunderstanding and most importantly say sorry,” he said.

“This is my second song, part of my upcoming album which will be released next year as me and my team work continuously,” he said.

His first song was ‘Kabhi Mein, Kabhi Tum’ and the music video was filmed with two prominent Pakistani actors, Fahad Mustafa and Saba Qamar. It received heaps of praise from not just fans in Pakistan but all over the world too. “The first song also created various records of popularity as it crossed the 67-million mark on TikTok within two weeks of its launch. It was for mature audiences and also got appreciation from fans on various social media platforms and gave us the motivation to continue our work,” he said.

Another song by Azhar, ‘Ghalat Fehmi,’ became the first Pakistani song to top Spotify’s global chart in 2021 and the singer became the Spotify Global Ambassador in 2022.

He has been singing since childhood and launched his first song at the age of 15, and at 18 he became the youngest to be featured on Coke Studio.

He tells fellow budding singers to continue their efforts and produce more and more songs as God will reward their efforts sooner or later.

Responding to a question, he said that the online platforms are helping singers ahead of the mainstream launch of their albums.

It also needs to be mentioned that Asim Azhar has a huge presence on social media platforms with 2.6 million followers on Instagram, 1.7m on Facebook, 2.1m on Spotify, 0.8 million on YouTube, 0.3 million on Twitter and around 0.3 million on TikTok.

Besides his singing career, he also appeared in a TV drama ‘Sinf-e-Ahan’ (Women of Steel). “The drama was all about a group of young army cadets and women empowerment presented by ISPR (Inter-Services Public Relations, a media and PR wing of the Pakistan Armed Forces). I also recorded the title song of the drama which was a huge success across the country and millions of fans watched around the world on various social media platforms,” he said.