Dream To Fly

Singer and songwriter Hamdan Al Abri has teamed up with the Dubai-based DJs and record producers Adriano K and Megadon Betamax to produce an album of chilled out soul, house and reggae.

The singer Hamdan Al Abri is sitting on a couch in the recording studio of Adriano Konialidis drinking tea with Mostyn Rischmueller. “You know, before I started working with these guys I was going through a creative block,” he says, gently stirring his tea and adding honey. “I wasn’t really coming up with any music. I didn’t feel like I had anything to talk about or sing about. After Bull Funk Zoo [a previous band he sang with] I didn’t know what to do with music and I stalled. I didn’t know what direction I wanted to go in musically and what I wanted to do as an artist in general. It just felt like I was in no man’s land for a bit.

“Then I started working with these guys and the creative juices started flowing again, you know. I felt inspired. I just started writing whatever I felt or whatever the track kind of made me feel.”

Abri, of course, needs little introduction. Arguably the UAE’s most accomplished male vocalist and lyricist, he has sung solo for years and with bands such as Abri & Funk Radius, with the latter releasing its first original song, Sunny Daze, just last month.

It is the first time, however, that he has collaborated with DJ and record producer Konialidis, known professionally as Adriano K, and Rischmueller, better known as Megadon Betamax, the Australian-born DJ and producer famed for his bass-heavy, boogie and disco-flavoured cuts and the label Voyeurhythm Records.

Together the three have formed Abri & The Dreamfleet, with their first album, We Fly, to be released on Konialidis’ Desmo Records in May. Co-produced by Konialidis and Rischmueller, with all lyrics written by Abri, it is a soulful and mid-tempo gem and the first full and original album from the label’s founder.