The latest from the Multinational band, born in the Middle East, is a stunning collection of electronic pop songs, full of adventurous soundscapes and huge hooks.
Caravan Dream are: Hadi Assoum (Lead Guitars & Piano), Radi El Zouhby (Lead Vocals & Guitars), Rami El Zouhby (Bass Guitars) & Oleksandr Banashko (Drums) - a four piece multinational Rock band formed in 2019 in the Middle East while living as expats in Qatar. The band is an embodiment of many eclectic musical influences ranging from Rock, Pop, Psychedelic Rock, Funk, Hardrock and Metal, all fused together in an incredible musical melting pot of credible pop rock. The band release their debut album “Fantasy” on 13th October 2022.
It was during the rigours and uncertainties of the various lockdowns at the beginning of the COVID19 pandemic that the band transformed from what was essentially a covers band, into a whole new creation. Hadi had penned an original composition inspired by the heroes of the pandemic “Heroes Dreams” which was then arranged and self-produced by the band. It was then, looking for a ‘liberation’ or ‘journey’ from the broken dreams left behind in their homes in Lebanon & Ukraine, they decided to call themselves Caravan Dream. It was a defining moment.
The album “Fantasy” is a collection of distinctly modern, thoroughly unique takes on modern pop/rock. Thoughtful, uplifting, and universal in its messages, the album will resonate with listeners everywhere and showcases their gift for using music as a unifying force around the world. Each of the tracks has a distinctive life and personality of its own.
“Moonlight”, is spacious, grandiose, and almost esoteric in its form. “Fantasy” provides a ‘perfect virtual space’ that we can all retreat to and escape the harshness of the real world. “Constellation” is an intricate instrumental cosmic dream, punctuated with soaring vocals, “Lines” is dark and groovy while “Home” is a true power ballad. “Rock n Roll Girl” is a female empowerment anthem. Meanwhile, “Into Your Maze” reveals the band’s ability to compose stadium sized melodies, with a more overtly rock tone to underscore the sense of inner turmoil and conflicts.
Caravan Dream are the sum of all genres, music, countries and reflections on the world around us. Their album “Fantasy” is a musical haven where we can hide from the troubles around us and find musical joy in a safe space.
Tracklisting: 1 Moonlight 2 Fantasy 3 Constellation 4 Lines 5 Home 6 Rock And Roll Girl 7 Into Your Maze
Music News caught up with main man Hadi Assoum to find out more...
You have an unusual band name: how did it come about? Indeed! The reason behind the unusual name of our band is the unusual times that we were going through when the band was born. We were in lockdown in the peak of the Pandemic, that was very unusual. Also, the four of us were born and raised in magically beautiful but broken countries: Lebanon & Ukraine; these home countries have carried a lot of pain and sadness over years, decades, and centuries somehow. We, obviously, needed to explicitly express our desire and wish to take it easy, to slow down the pace, to just switch off the daily routine world, and to hop onto a Caravan like ‘world’ where the journey is more important than the destination and where things are simpler. It is a virtual, metaphoric way of the haven lifestyle that most probably anyone would aim for and dream of in today’s supersonic rhythm of life and its growing materialistic requirements. That what Caravan Dream is.
Your debut album is called 'Fantasy'- tell us about it ‘Fantasy’ is our debut album; it is therefore the beginning of illustrating the story of ‘Caravan Dream’. The process of making the album was so natural and organic and contains songs written in 2020, 2021 and 2022. We selected 7 songs to be included in the album out of tens of demo tracks that we generated over the past two years. The second track in the album is called ‘Fantasy’ which the album was named after. We consider ‘Fantasy’ an album that is light, dreamy, positive, full of love, easy to listen to, natural, and not overly produced. Most of the songs discuss genuine subjects and emotions as they highlight real stories from our actual life in addition to fictional and imaginary drift in some of the songs. ‘Fantasy’ is a Pop Rock collection, however in each track you can notice a different coloring in style and genre, sometimes as bold as you may notice it in the song ‘Lines’ for example which swings from grunge riff-based taste to Funk groove in the middle of the track.
If we are to describe the seven songs in three words each, it goes like this: - Moonlight: Happiness, Love, Lust - Fantasy: Escape, Surreal, Desire - Constellation: Connection, Space, Romance - Lines: Contemplation, Awareness, Motivation - Home: Warmth, Feel Good, Emotional - Rock And Roll Girl: Feminist, Empowering, Driving - Into Your Maze: Self-Conflict, Insecurity, Duality
The focus track is also called 'Fantasy'. Tell us about the meaning of the track and the concept making the video We feel like the world for past years has been wild and crazy enough, full of conflicts, sadness, and uncertainty, it is turning more and more to a fully digitalized and emotionless world! We needed an escape, and this is where ‘Fantasy’ came from. While writing this song, our lead singer Radi has shaped his own surreal world that he wishes to escape to another version of it where life is simpler, warmer, slower, more colorful, more soulful, and less robotic. Nowadays that simple version of the world is a ‘FANTASY’!
How would you sum up 2022 and what do you hope for in 2023? 2022 has been great to us, it is the year we have started bringing our little dreams to life. We have just released our first album and during the process, met a lot of amazing people who we are grateful to. We have received loads of support and love from fans and friends around the world and great feedback about what we are doing. We have already a crowded calendar for the rest of 2022, we are happy and excited to be selected to play at multiple fan zones and miscellaneous events at the Football World Cup 2022 that is taking place in Doha, Qatar and we are looking forward to playing upscaled concerts varying in crowd size from few thousands to 20k+
In 2023 our responsibilities are growing and so are expectations. We are working with our team on finalizing some tour dates between the beginning of spring and the end of summer 2023 in different venues and countries. We have few lined up in France, Spain, Ireland, and the UK; in addition to couple of touring projects in the US are currently being discussed. We’re going to kick start our creative process again towards the beginning of the year to work on new material and possibly releasing our second album next summer.
