Pakistan’s Farhan Saeed on breaking away from JAL and heartbreak: 'I slept as a normal kid and woke up as a star kid’

Dubai: Pakistani singer and television actor Farhan Saeed walked into our Gulf News headquarters in Dubai like a man who had already lived three days inside one morning.

Sunglasses on, jawline sharper than the Dubai skyline, hair behaving as if it had a dedicated glam team. He had been in a new city, on almost no sleep, squeezed in a workout, and was down to his last interview of the day. He looked every bit the exhausted rock star who has performed his life on repeat.

“This is the last interview today,” he sighed — and then smiled like he had saved his best jokes for me.

I teased him immediately.
“So… are we meeting a musician or a diva who wears sunglasses indoors?”

He didn’t blink.
“Well, I am quite the diva,” he shot back with a grin. He was back in performance mode.

Walking away from JAL — and waking up at zero

So did his popstar journey begin with the iconic disbanded group 'Jal' that also boasted Atif Aslam.

“I slept as a normal kid and woke up as a star kid,” he says about the early days when Aadat and JAL catapulted him from Lahore boy to international sensation.
He didn’t hustle to the top, nor struggle in anonymity. Stardom was instant. And then he left.

When I ask why, he doesn’t hesitate.
“In JAL, my job was simple: sing, come home, play PlayStation, sleep. For 10 years.”
He wasn’t part of the business side. He was the voice, not the machine.

Then came restlessness — the kind that makes you choose pain over comfort.

“At 28, I wanted to do things we couldn’t do as a band — acting, experimenting. We were about to record our third album. And I thought if I recorded it and then left, that would be wrong.”

He walked away before the album began.

And suddenly, the star kid was a nobody.

“I didn’t get work for one whole year. Everybody would call JAL. I never introduced myself as Farhan Saeed. I would say, ‘I’m the vocalist of JAL,’ and I took pride in that. I never thought it would come down to this.”

His father called in Ali Azmat, Junoon’s legendary vocalist, for advice — a classic South Asian dad intervention.

“He asked him: ‘He’s deciding to leave. What do you think?’”
Ali Azmat didn’t sugarcoat it.
“He looked at me and said: ‘He’s already decided. There is nothing you can tell him.’”

Farhan laughs remembering it.
“Music you can’t do with a double mind. If you’re not okay inside, you can’t pretend and keep going.”

The album that took years to happen

For seven to eight years, he lived in a no-man’s-land of singles: charting, touring, but never committing to something as vulnerable as an album.

“Pakistan moved late to digital. YouTube was banned for three years. The whole world became digital while we were stuck between CDs and internet cafés,” he says. Then came acting — another full-time beast.
“Album takes time. Acting takes time. I couldn’t find the balance.”

The balance found him. A six-to-seven-month break.
“I went into the studio. And I did this. Stressed? Hell yes. Nervous, excited — all the adjectives. But very, very happy.”

Enter: Khat — the metaphor that hits

His new album doesn’t mourn romance through handwritten letters — it mourns everything you ever stored in your chest.

“Khat is so poetic, it will never be outdated,” he says. “But it’s a metaphor — feelings, messages, memories. All the things we have to let go. Which is very difficult.”

The song itself is theatrical — rain pouring, shirt unapologetically white, torso unapologetically shirtless.

“I’m a shy guy,” he protests. “The studio was full of people. I said, I’m not doing this.”
Enter his wife — the true creative director of this project.
“She said, ‘What the hell are you doing? Why not?’”

He kicked everyone out — diva mode activated.
“Only five people left. After a few minutes I got comfortable. Then they asked for double-speed lip sync — now they were pushing it.”

He insists it wasn’t the rain that broke him — it was unbuttoning the shirt.

Behind the rain: no salt, gym, Riyaz, repeat

For that three-second seduction on screen, he lived like a monk.

“No salt. Strict diet. I can’t skip my Riyaz. I can’t skip my gym because of the camera. It’s a lot of work.”
He laughs, the sunglasses glinting.
“I don’t know anything else. I have to earn from this only.”

Algorithms may make stars, but fame still has a face

He’s blunt about the influencer era.

“This is the best time. You don’t need anyone. Not even a mic — record on your phone and upload,” he says.
“But getting noticed? That’s the hardest thing now.”

He has seen viral songs whose singers remain invisible.
“The song is everywhere, but nobody knows the artist. Maybe they know the name, but not the face. Becoming a star FACE is the real struggle now.”

For him, the opposite is true:
“We release a song — eyes and ears already come to us.”

Privilege of legacy, he acknowledges.

The superstar next door

Then came TV, and the seismic impact of Suno Chanda.
“After that, my concerts changed.”
He paints the scene:
Front rows full of parents, then kids, then the young blood at the back — his original crowd.
“They didn’t even know my name. They knew Arsal was singing.”

Acting rewired his brain.
“One day, something switched. The crew disappeared from my head. It was just the scene. I tasted blood.”

He won Best Actor. Then came Mere Humsafar.
“Now I want another drama that becomes a rage again.”

He is addicted to momentum.

Dubai, distribution, and heartbreak as a hobby

Dubai, to him, isn’t a tour stop — it’s a catchment for the entire region.

“After Pakistan and India, this is the city where all our audiences live — Pakistani, Indian, Bangladeshi, Nepali. It’s a second home.”
His distributors — Warner and Spotify — sit a taxi ride away.

And yes, the concert plans are brewing.
Arena talk. Global Village talk. He lights up like he’s already rehearsing the encore.

Before leaving, he sings live — and suddenly the tired rockstar disappears. The newsroom stops breathing. No gimmick, no edits, no playback — just Farhan and heartbreak in stereo.

The lyrics sting. I ask the obvious.

Who broke your heart?

He smirks behind the glasses.
“That’s where the acting comes in. The lyrics aren’t mine. But when I sing, I become that person.”
He pauses.
“Look at these words — who wouldn’t feel them?”

Then he delivers the line that should come printed as a warning label on Spotify:

“For some, this song will heal. For most… they will call their ex.”

So yes — Farhan Saeed is back. And he’s about to break hearts again. Only difference this time? He’s doing it solo, with sunglasses on, and absolutely no apologies.