Eidfest 2006
Published by Haseeb November 4th, 2006 in Dawud Wharnsby, Islam, MusicSubhanallah! Mad Props to all the organizers and sponsors of last night’s Eidfest (especially Brother Dash, Sister Islah, and everyone backstage who made the evening run so smoothly)! It was a an amazing concert! Here’s a quick review of the concert.
The evening was hosted by comedian Mohammed Amer. He was really funny, although made alot of references that only Arab people would get, lol. Hes also the latest comedian to join the cast of the Allah 
Made Me Funny tour.
Shaam performed first. Shaam is comprised of Haroon Bashir, Mahmood Norris, Yasin Alam and Imran Bashir - all young men from Birmingham, England. Mashallah they sing beautiful nasheeds in English, Urdu, and Arabic. Although I had heard of them before the concert only in passing, this was my first time listening to their complete tracks (other than snippets ive found online). A couple of tracks I liked included “Mercy Like the Rain”, & “Subhanallah”.
786, a Muslim boy band from Detroit, was next. To be honest, when i first heard of 786 years ago i was a little skeptical, as they are exactly that, a boy band. However, they can sing harmoniously, while providing beats with their voices alone - and they’re good at it too. To the pleasure of most of their (mostly female) fans, they performed their most popular hit, “Dua”, as well as “Dosti”, “Nasheed Medley” (featuring anasheed in arabic, and urdu qawalli), and closed off with the crowd favorite, “Palestine”.
Brother Dash, a young Muslim convert from Brooklyn, NY, not only played a major role in organizing the event, but was also one of the best performers of the evening. Words cannot to justice to how profound and powerful his poems are. He performed “Fitra”, “What Is This Blaze?”, “Yo Little Brother!”, “Headline Islam” [You can listen to this here], “Muslimah”, and “Boom Chicka Boom!”. Brother Dash has a website at MuslimPoet.com, where can you check out his poems and other news regarding upcoming performances, etc.
Dawud Wharnsby Ali, a 34 year old Canadian convert, has been one of the pioneers of the English Nasheed genre. In my opinion (and with no disrespect to any of the other artists), brother Dawud stole the show. Mashallah this brother, along with his amazing voice, showed so much passion while singing and really feels his music, and feeds off the beat of the (percussion) instruments as well as the clapping crowd. He performed “The Rhythm of creation” (with a brother from Shaam), “Sing, Children of the World” (along with 786 - who mashallah provided phenomenal backup vocals!), “The people of the boxes”, “Hijab”, and my favorite, a new hilarious track with the help of Shaam w/ percussion instruments, “Welcome to the I.C.E. (Immigration and Customs Enforcement)”. (Since this track isnt yet available for purchase, I have provided an exclusive (yet poor quality) recording of this song: 
)
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Native Deen, a trio of hip hop artists from Washington DC, fresh off a world tour which took them from, most recently, Jerusalem, came back to celebrate Eidfest with us back home here in the US. They performed “Deen You Know”, “Small Deeds”, and my favorite, “For the Prophets”.
Overall, mashallah, a GREAT event. Inshallah I hope Brother Dash and others behind this event will bring more events like this to our Greater New York area!
And finally, I would like ask that you all please support all of these muslim artists. (Dont ask me [or any1 else] to send you mp3s of their music!!!), click on the CD covers to purchase their respective CD’s from Nasheeds.com (they provide all these albums at great pricing, and free & fast shipping!) - Moreover music piracy is haraam!
And thank you for your support! Alot of hard work, sleep deprived nights, juggling of schedules, and patience went into putting EidFest! together. We are already talking about what the next event will be (Insha Allah
in 2-3 months) and we are also looking at doing something big in the Summer. Of course EidFest!1428 is already a lock Insha Allah 
for next year.
I can’t tell you how spiritually ‘amped’ I am from last night. Seeing the hearts of the Muslims come together for a positive event and the love for Allah
that filled the atmosphere almost brought me to tears. I thank everyone for coming out and for their support. Thanks again for the shout out on your website.
Brother Dash
http://www.muslimpoet.com
salaamalakum
this comment is unrelated to the Eidfest br haseeb but I remember you had a link for a lecture that Sheikh Hamza had done on Surah Rahman, do you think you could put it back up?
Shaam is hot! I love there Mawlid CD!
salaam,
I also really enjoyed 1st annual EidFest this past Friday. I found all performances to be good but esp Brother Dash and Dawud Wharnsby to be simply amazing. I really hope that next time eidfests are hosted on Weekends.
Br. Haseeb, do you have Br. Khalid Latif’s contact info. We are having the Eid party on tuesday and we would like to invite him to speak at our event, in shaa Allaah.
mashallah, im so impressed, keep up the great work everyone who puts this stuff together, the muslim world needs more stuff like this…
yeah, br. dawud, i def. grew up on him and mashallah you feel like his noor when your around him, he’s got this amazing vib its so neat mashallah…buy this stuff guys!!
i wish we had an eidfest…
did dawud wharnsby perform my personal fav track, ’sunshine dust?’…and shamaila i agree ~ we dont hav an eidfest either
brother Dawud got that Texan accent down pretty good. Masha’Allah
786 love them yet missed them
sighsss ;(
Asalaamu alaikum,
Jazaak Allah
Khair for posting that up. I actually found it on youtube, but its called Welcome to the INS (as it was formerly called).
I had a blast at EidFest … can’t wait for next years! Masha’Allah
all the performances were great. Meeting the artists after the show was very memorable. Alhamdullilah. I’m glad i went 
wot if u cant buy them CD’s online?