O-Hum's First Gig in Tehran
Russian Orthodox Church\Tehran\March 2001
 
Review by Omid Elahi
Photography Ali Shahbazyar
 
O-Hum's Underground Concert at Russian Orthodox Church in Tehran

Probably the most weird combination one can imagine but it happened! On March 1st with the support of Russian Orthodox Church in Tehran, O-Hum played its first sold out performance, 'Nahale-e Heyrat' album, in front of 300 people present at the venue. It was the first concert of its kind in Iran. There was no official promotion for the concert and the place was filled just by word of mouth. The place was pretty small with a tiny stage which was packed with guitars, drum set, microphones and keyboards. The PA system was a bit too large for a concert like this,

and as a result, the sound happened to be a bit too loud.But obviously, it didn't bother anybody. As a matter of fact, the crazy crowd loved it! (4 big JBL speakers were driving the performance). Some people were new to O-HUM music, looking curios about what they're gonna play, while others got excited to hear a live version of what they'd heard on CD.

O-Hum opened the set with the song "Darvish" and the crowd went crazy after the first beat. In front of stage all you could see was slam dancing, raging, diving etc.The set went on with songs like "Ala Ya Ayohal Saghi", "Deyr-e-Moghan",a dancy version of "Nahal-e-Heyrat", "Sham-e-Delafrooz" which was a re-arranged version for concert, and "Cho Bad", a track that had been removed from the album. After a 15 minute break, O-Hum opened the second set with the song "Goftam Gham-e-to Daram". it's one of their popular songs, and The interesting point was that although the album "Nahal-e-Heyrat" is not officially released yet, a big number of audience knew the songs and lyrics

by heart. It was finished with a loud and heavy ending which excited the crowd. O-Hum continued with songs like "Eyb-e-Rendan Makon", "Dideh Darya Konam", "Pir-e-May Foroosh" and "Afsoon", which all were from the album "Nahal-e-Heyrat" .at this moment, the crowd started to asking for "Darvish" and few other songs as encore. For the final, a new song called "Hafez Ashegh Ast" was performed. this song has not been released, and sounds a bit different from their last album (it is based on a lyric by Hafez "dardam az yar ast va  darman niz ham..." ).

Unfortunately, the band was only allowed to play until 10:30 pm. Therefore, no encore could be played, even though the whole audience was calling for it (favorite songs were 'Darvish' and 'Eybe Rendan Makon'). 

As far as the technical point of view was concerned, the performance and sound was not perfect but very effective. As some people said, it had a great "vibe". A few boys and girls were so excited after the show that they described that night as one of the best in their whole life! one interesting point of their concert was using samples and drum loops in a live performance. you could hear all those little effects and processed sounds, which make this music sound this way. before this show, I was in doubt if they could re-produce all those sounds in a live performance.

To summarize the whole event, the band and the crowd gave their best to make the March 1st a memorable night for the band members as well as for the people.

March 2001



Band Lineup:
Shahram Sharbaf  [Vocak\Guitar]
Shahrokh Izadkhah  [Guitar]
Babak Riahipour  [Bass]
Reza Moghadas  [Keyboads]
Kasra Ebrahimi  [Drums]