The reunion that stole Rafa’s big night

Launching a full-fledged album is as rare as spotting a unicorn these days, when releasing anything beyond singles runs against the grain of where music is heading globally. Raef Al Hasan Rafa — perhaps because he grew up when making and releasing an album was the greatest validation a musician could earn — chose to announce, quite out of the blue, that his band AvoidRafa would drop a full-length album on Friday. 

He paired the launch with a full-fledged AvoidRafa show that paid homage to the artists and musicians he had built his career rubbing shoulders with, as they shared the stage with him across different songs through the night.

But the crème de la crème — the headliners, if we may call them that on what was billed as a solo show — was the reunion of arguably Aurthohin's most revered and beloved line-up: the quartet of Bassbaba Sumon, guitarists Ibrahim Ahmed Kamal and Shishir Ahmed, and Rafa himself. 

Better known as the Aushomapto line-up, they united for one night after almost two decades. And with no disrespect to Rafa's solo endeavours or the revered artists who shared the stage on Friday, it was this line-up the crowd stayed well past midnight to witness — a first for many, ourselves included, who had heard them on record but never seen them in person.

Held at InterContinental Dhaka and organised by Dhaka Broadcast, the "Eto Boka Keno Tumi" album launch kicked off around 8pm, after a nearly hour-long delay against the intended 7pm start.

Snippets of Rafa's individual brilliance over the past decade were in full motion as he ran through his best hits, steeping in a couple of tracks from the new album. Fans got Rafa singing and playing in full flow, exactly as expected from his solo show.

It was a welcome surprise to see another favourite — Pritom Hasan — in action as Rafa handed him the duties to sing "Cholo Arekbar Uri." Pritom did the heavy lifting and surged in with renewed energy to get the crowd jumping, while Rafa took on lead guitar, playing both the solo and the chorus melody on his six strings.

Another warm moment came when Rafa was joined on stage by his elder brother, Saadi Muktafi, during the crowd favourite "Ami Akash Pathabo." Rafa credits much of his musicianship to Saadi, who nurtured and pushed his talents long before Bassbaba Sumon picked him for Aurthohin.

As Rafa left the stage after that song, the audience knew what was coming — the very moment most of them had shown up for. During the 10–15 minute break, the crowd kept chanting Bassbaba's name; at one point the entire 1,500-strong crowd sang the lyrics to "Aushomapto" themselves as the screens played snippets of a documentary interview with the Aushomapto line-up, just as the quartet took the stage.

The band kept the pleasantries brief and opened with a song Bassbaba proudly said "he never has to sing the lyrics to on stage" — for the moment Shishir hit the first few notes on the keys, the entire InterContinental knew they were about to sing "Aushomapto" in unison.

Aurthohin kept things simple, dividing the set into three parts: two medleys — one acoustic, with just keys, drums and Bassbaba's vocals, carrying songs such as "Amar Proticchobi," "Jodi Konodin" and "Epitaph," and one heavy-metal medley featuring their heaviest hits from the two albums — and, in between, four full songs including "Aushomapto," "Anmone" and "Adbhut Shei Cheleti."

That "Aushomapto" made generational strides in pushing heavy metal into the Bangladeshi mainstream was on full display when Rafa hit the signature drum roll into "Nikrishto" and the entire auditorium growled the song back in unison. Part of the heavy-metal medley, "Nikrishto" transitioned after the chorus into "Guti (The Finale)," followed by snippets of other songs such as "Shurjo" and "Cancer."

They ended the night on their mega-hit "Chaite Paro 2," but what truly stood out was the unity and brotherhood this most revered Aurthohin line-up displayed across the 60–80 minutes they were on stage. Such reunions and musical nights are all the fanbase craves — and on Friday night, they were treated to a stellar one.